russian proprietary software
The "Russian" part is not the problem here
beyond
joined 5 years ago
Been a while since I used microG but I remember the Google registration specifically being opt-in. Then again, I also remember reading that /e/OS automatically enables it, so...
I do not have a high opinion of /e/OS or Murena. It is LineageOS but "degoogled" which is a meaningless buzzword considering LineageOS already does not contain Google services/apps (you have to install those yourself). Instead it's connected to its own "Murena cloud" which itself uses OpenAI for a speech to text service. But hey, it's not google so it must be okay, right...?
https://community.e.foundation/t/voice-to-text-feature-using-open-ai/70509
It might be opt in (or opt out? dunno) but this sort of thing should not be a cloud thing, it should be a local service.
It also comes with at least one proprietary app built into the OS and their app store offers proprietary apps with some sort of "tracker detection" thing. I do not trust any "app store" that purports to tell me which proprietary apps are "good."
LineageOS comes with no google apps, no cloud apps, no proprietary apps, etc. It's just a perfectly usable AOSP system. It doesn't even have an "app store" but you can install F-Droid on it. I think GrapheneOS is the same (it supports "sandboxed Google services" but it doesn't include them by default)
As far as I know the only options that exist are LineageOS, GrapheneOS, and maybe non-Android Linuxes if you're brave enough. There used to be DivestOS which although based on LineageOS brought several security, privacy, and freedom improvements, but that project has been discontinued. None of these "degoogled privacy OS" LineageOS reskins impress me.
It's a funny story but it's worth noting that copyright does not apply to typefaces in the US (although maybe it does in other jurisdictions)
Isn't this proprietary?
It does seem like a bug. I actually have a UnifiedPush distributor but have never configured Fennec to use it (I didn't even know it was an option) but now Fennec shows me this warning and there is no way to actually enable it in settings anymore.
What makes Sailfish OS unique over competitors like GrapheneOS and e/OS is that it’s not based on the Android Open Source Project, but Linux.
Not only are AOSP and its derivatives also based on Linux, they are actually free software unlike Sailfish OS which contains some amount of proprietary code (I know at least the Android compatibility layer - which I'm told isn't simply the AOSP runtime (as Waydroid uses) but some proprietary thing).
s/Linux/systemd/g
Ironically though this makes the reverse a bit more defensible (i.e. using an LLM to reverse engineer a proprietary app) because that proprietary app's source code is less likely to be among the publicly available dataset.
But I imagine the corpos aren't going to look fondly on that for obvious reasons.
I wouldn't characterize myself as "the GOS camp" (I use LineageOS) I just happen to agree with them sometimes, and this is one of those times.
I do imagine this response is to some degree influenced by their beef with /e/ (an OS I don't have a high opinion of either, but for other reasons). It just seems to me that people see "not google" and think it's a good thing, but a gatekeeper determining which OS you are allowed to use with what apps is fundamentally a bad idea even if it's not google.
It’s much more correct to say that Lineage or Graphene are Android than saying that Android is Linux.
Both of these are correct. LineageOS and GrapheneOS are AOSP; AOSP is Linux.
Linux is a kernel. Other components must be added onto Linux to create a complete Linux operating system. Adding stuff onto Linux does not subtract any Linuxness from it. Any Linux OS is "real Linux." Saying that some Linuxes are not real Linux is like saying if you add peanut butter to bread you no longer have "real bread." It is nonsense.
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They're probably asking because of GrapheneOS's newly announced partnership with Motorola, but the first such devices are shipping in 2027, so it wouldn't include this.