According to this article the support of security protocols for smartphones with Android 7.1.1 or older wouldn’t be supported anymore which would make the Android support 4.1 and 4.4 useless. This would be the time to wether adapt the kernel to a newer version that would allow a higher Android Version. Or Android support wiuld just get useless…
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Updating the kernel is almost entirely up to the original device vendor. There’s very little SailfishOS developers can do.
As vendors usually don’t care about these things, well, yeah.
Anyway, in this case the problem is that of the OS certificate store. There are ways to add certs to that store, so I don’t see the situation as so bleak.
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Isn’t there Android 8 support with SFOS on up to date devices?
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8.1 to be precise . AlienDalvik is made by a swizz company, not by Jolla, but I forgot the name. I am sure they keep up with following devices.
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@apozaf
https://web.archive.org/web/20131113193859/http://www.myriadgroup.com/Myriad/Device-Manufacturers/Android-solutions/~/media/D42B513FB5114FF2B4CA13A2D8CE313E.ashx
Couldn’t find anything on their current site - https://connect.myriadgroup.com/
You almost had me worried there. The original Aliendalvik runtimes are essentially unusable anyway, so no big change there. There is already Jolla’s own solution for Android 8.1 compatibility, which works quite well for newer phones, and there is always the native browser that is progressing quite well.
(And if i didn’t misunderstand the article, even Firefox for Android might not be affected)
Certificates is perhaps one of the few things Jolla could update in Aliendalvik, but by now, does it really matter?
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@Firefox84 :
Please update your topic’s title.
Don’t get me wrong but this is clickbait. Even the preview of the link (which you could have summarized for all non-german speakers , btw.) clearly mentions certificates (and lacking updates for these) as the reason, not the Android version
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@rozgwi i believe you are much more in the matter then me, as quite active as you are in this forum and all your expertise. Correct me if i am wrong, but does it make a difference if the supported Android version is not able to browse websites anymore or wouldn’t be supported at all anymore. Aren’t apps often using webtechnologies, so this would mean many of those apps would not work anymore. So more reasons for an update of the Xperia X kernel and with it the Android runtime. Sony offers an up to date kernel for Xperia X, so it would just be up to @Jolla and the community to bring this kernel to our beloved Xperia Xs. Otherwise we can soon, just keep it in our drawer. Sorry, i posted this in my lunch break, and as i am german speaker, i just read this article and wanted to share it 
I’m sorry , my intention is not to boast with my technical knowledge. Basically I can also only give an educated guess on this.
No, I meant that you’re speculating. With a clickbaity title.
You’re not familiar with the technical background, that’s all right. But the posts you got in response explain about the certificates. So that’s why I think you should update the topic.
On the matter of Baseport 8 (new Android layer used for newer Xperia devices) on Xperia X: Jolla clearly stated that they won’t do it and why. Somewhere there’s even a FAQ entry.
Hope dies last though , so I’m crossing fingers for some enthusiastic porter to find a fix for the issues blocking the necessary hardware adaptation. But that’s a different story…
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To be a bit more helpful:
Most apps will stop supporting the outdated Android version of 4.4. e.g. Firefox for Android - which to my knowledge provides it’s own certificate bundle - has dropped support a few months ago. So, yes, sooner than the certificates become invalid we probably run out of apps to use for browsing any website
Addition :
If updating the native browser comes along well, as it seems to be the case in the last SFOS releases, this problem might become less urgent in the future
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original article is speculating on android smartphones arent getting any software updates at all. it have very little or no impact to sfos.
installing letsencrypt root certificate is one or two commands action for existing sfos users. It can be easily packed to rpm to be preinstalled with sailfish software update or manually.
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Also it is about websites. The Sailfish Browser engine was updated lately and version 60 should come next so even older SFOS devices will have the possibility to access those sites.
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So apparently letsencrypt wants to use a workaround which will work until 2024 
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Want to say, I have an up to date SFOS running on a Sony Xperia 10 and cannot access some webpages and get error messages, that say that the browser is too old.
I wonder why it isn’t possible to port some up to date Firefox or ungoogled Chromium browser to SFOS and run it under SFOS without Alien Dalvik!!!
Ahem. You’re somewhat late to the party. There’s tons of questions on the old TJC (and also some topics here, I think) dealing exactly about the what and why of this issue. Actually the situation has improved a lot, so let’s be fair.
Plus the ‘outdated browser’ issue and 'too old certificates on Android ’ are different cups of tea
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