Southern Wolf

WebOS really was so hard ahead of its time. A card based interface, gesture-based navigation, unified and always online email and account systems. There were many things WebOS did that we take for granted now, yet they did it no less than 5 years before Android or iOS. Really it was just the Palm Pre’s hardware (I had a Palm Pre Plus) that held it back. Some aspects of it were already a bit dated, even in 2010.

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It’s great seeing HeliBoard come so far, especially after it seemed like OpenBoard was potentially dead. I’m still a (firewalled on CalyxOS) GBoard user, but HeliBoard is the closest I’ve found to a viable replacement for it. I’m definitely looking forward to seeing what future developments it has in store.

Neo-Launcher is still being worked on, they are expecting to push version 1.0 later this year to GitHub, but progress has been steady from what I know. You can get the latest beta version of Neo-Launcher from their Telegram to try out. Don’t let the “beta” part turn you off, it’s basically production ready, I’ve been using it now as my launcher for well over a year, possibly even 2 at this point.

I can also confirm it doesn’t work on a de-Googled device, even with something like MicroG (though it may work on GrapheneOS’s sandbox thing).

This is absolutely true. The Fairphone kinda gets around this since its got open parts and can be user serviced for most things, but the honest question for that is how many are gonna go to that trouble, not next week when your phone is still new, but 5 years from now? The dedicated certainly will and I commend Fairphone for it, but a lot of average folks with a slower phone are gonna want to upgrade at that point.

Really, it’s gonna depend on what your top priorities are. I run a Pixel 6 Pro with CalyxOS and I love it. But for you, it depends on whether you really need top security or want to go for a more open and long term design (which may not be entirely beneficial or all that special now).

For the Pixel 8, you’re gonna get much better cameras and more of those “Pixel Features” even when running something like GOS or CalyxOS. Its really nice cause you can even use GBoard and GCam and just firewall them (or however you do the equivalent in GOS), so you get the benefits without the downsides. Though it will be more expensive too.

With Fairphone, you’re gonna get a more open design that likely will last longer. That said, it doesn’t have a top end processor in it, so you have to imagine what it’ll be like in 6-8 years trying to run Android 20. Longevity is nice, but not as helpful if it can’t keep up physically with new releases. Also, with the Pixel 8 line now set to be supported for 8 years, it kinda… Undermines the Fairphone argument somewhat, though not to a huge degree.

Personally, if it were me, I’d choose the Pixel (and also choose CalyxOS as well, but that’s more a personal choice, don’t let the Graphene folks try and sway you with a bunch of FUD. CalyxOS is just fine, but GOS is a good choice too). It will have higher quality hardware, the processor should be able to handle tougher workloads into the future, and I think you’ll quite like the experience.

But, the Fairphone isn’t a bad choice either, and its definitely supporting a better ecosystem overall. It just won’t have as good of cameras and may not run as well a few years down the road, which could be an issue for the longevity. It can also run CalyxOS as well, so you won’t be missing out on using most other normal apps.

Really, it just depends on your use case and priorities. I don’t think you can go absolutely wrong choosing either one though.

Holy crap, I didn’t know about this fork before now. I kinda thought that OpenBoard was sorta… abandoned at this point, but seeing the improvements from this fork just made me go and try it again. Normally I just use GBoard with it’s connections disabled (CalyxOS, so that is possible to do in a secure way), but trying this out now to see if I can dump Gboard entirely.

+1 for Neo Launcher!

Say what you want about Brave, but at least they are moving to their own indexing. Where as DuckDuckGo is just Bing…

Also I’d take that anti-Brave link with a grain of salt. I’ve got a hunch it’s somehow connected back to a Vivaldi dev. So I’d view it as highly untrustworthy.

Haven’t looked at a lot of Rust front-end GUI libraries recently, eh?

o7

^^^ This!

Ah, another post on a great new addition to the Fairphone lineup, another post where the top comments are complaining about because there is no headphone jack, they won’t consider it.

Y’all seriously have your priorities messed up if that’s what keeps you from supporting Fairphone. If having a device with a headphone jack is that important to you, invest in a dedicated audio player. You can get some with high quality DAC’s and more. But seriously, y’all need to cope about the Fairphone not having a single feature you want being a total deal breaker. That’s honestly petty…

I’m honestly surprised GOS hasn’t supported the FP yet. CalyxOS has for about a year or so now, and I imagine they’ll support the FP 5 too.

Lots of that going around for stuff like this.

Yeah, Nick Merrill is an awesome guy, and I really like what he’s done with CalyxOS as well. Community is great too, if you need any help, just ask and someone will definitely be able to help out.

Yeah, I chose CalyxOS over Graphene because it seems to me that CalyxOS focuses a lot more on usability (thanks to it’s MicroG support) than Graphene does. Graphene has likely improved on that front thanks to their sandboxing GSF approach, but it used to be slower to open apps and overall a bit less snappy due to the security features it enables. Plus, the team behind CalyxOS is fantastic, great guys who believe in what they are doing. Meanwhile, the leader of GrapheneOS is a bit… Psychotic, although he did recently step down after Louis Rossman called him out.

For ProtonAOSP, that’s basic just stock android. However, I’m unaware of it comes with either MicroG or Google Services installed. If it doesn’t, then you’re gonna have to figure out how to get support for apps either by flashing MicroG along with it, or be stuck with Foss app only. If it comes with Google Services, then it’s basically no different than stock Pixel Android at that point, which you might as well stick with to gain the full benefit of the Pixel device.

I love my Pixel 6 Pro! I run a De-Googled ROM (CalyxOS) on mine, but even with that, basically every Pixel feature still works as expected. Google Camera is fantastic (doubly so on CalyxOS since I can firewall it from the internet), the AI features in the photos app works exactly as expected (and firewalled too), the camera itself is fantastic as well. Beautiful screen, great speakers, absolutely wonderful and beautiful form factor for a phone.

Only real complaint is battery life isn’t the best it could be, compared to the top-tier iphones or Samsung Galaxy devices, but it’s hardly “terrible” either, as some have made it out to seem. It does seem like running a De-Googled ROM may help that some (and I’ve had fewer bug issues than it seems stock Pixel Android users have dealt with, which is weird given CalyxOS is built on AOSP).

Overall though, I love my Pixel 6 Pro and absolutely intend to stick with it well into the future, and likely consider another Pixel when the time comes.