Yeah I just looked now as well, there is nothing yet on google play.
From what I saw on Absinthe, it sounded like it should be on the Google Pla store.. Either way, I'm curious to try it out. It sounded like it should least be on Absinthe (maybe as an .apk you can download and sideload on you device?)
It's on 20forbeers as well, but I hate side loading anything on my phone anymore.
It's on 20forbeers as well, but I hate side loading anything on my pho anymore.
Why do you hate side loading? It's not difficult to do, and it's a way to install apps that aren't available in the Google Play store.
Why do you hate side loading? It's not difficult to do, and it's a way to
install apps that aren't available in the Google Play store.
I don't piss with my phone anymore. When I had my s2 YEARS ago, I had it rooted, custom OS installed, tweaks, etc. I just don't see the fun in it anymore. Plus when I get home, the phone gets shut off anyways. I have VOIP so no need for my cell.
Plus when I get home, the phone gets shut off anyways. I have
VOIP so no need for my cell.
Nightfox wrote to Exodus <=-
What does "piss with my phone" mean? And you don't need to root an Android phone to be able to side-load apps. I've never rooted a phone before; I've always been able to side-load Android apps with the stock phone setup. You just need to copy the APK to the phone, and you can
use a file explorer to open the .APK and it will ask you if you want to install the app.
What does "piss with my phone" mean? And you don't need to root an Android
What does "piss with my phone" mean? And you don't need to root an Android phone to be able to side-load apps. I've never rooted a phone before; I've
These days, phones aren't just phones.. I actually don't often take actual phone calls on my smartphone much anymore. And you can do VOIP on a
smartphone too. Google Voice is pretty much a VOIP app, from what I understand. Also, a lot of cell phones & carriers these days offer wifi calling, which seems to be like it's basically VOIP.
Nightfox, while I don't think they are taking away the ability to sideload, I understand that Google is trying to make it so that you "HAVE" to have you app in their store and signed a certain way. Something they are calling Developer Verification. I know that the F-Droid people are pretty freaked out about it.
What does "piss with my phone" mean? And you don't need to root an
Android
You from fucking mars?
Nightfox wrote to Exodus <=-
What does "piss with my phone" mean? And you don't need to root an
Android
You from fucking mars?
? Sorry, I've just never heard that term before. I'm not sure why the snark..
Nightfox, while I don't think they are taking away the ability to sideload, I understand that Google is trying to make it so that you "HAVE" to have you app in their store and signed a certain way.
Nightfox, while I don't think they are taking away the ability to
sideload, I understand that Google is trying to make it so that you
"HAVE" to have you app in their store and signed a certain way.
That's the same thing as taking away sideloading. What does sideloading mean to you?
If the app is in the play store and you have to deal with Google to be able to allow it on the phone at all, then that's taken sideloading away.
As a user, I don't appreciate Google telling me what I can and can't do with my general computing device, which is what I paid for.
I have VOIP so no need for my cell.
? Sorry, I've just never heard that term before. I'm not sure why the snark..What does "piss with my phone" mean? And you don't need to root an
Android
Nightfox, while I don't think they are taking away the ability toI've heard about that. But hopefully they aren't taking away the
sideload, I understand that Google is trying to make it so that you
"HAVE" to have you app in their store and signed a certain way.
Something they are calling Developer Verification. I know that the
F-Droid people are pretty freaked out about it.
ability to sideload (as you said). If they aren't, then I'd think
there wouldn't be anything to worry about.
Nightfox wrote to Exodus <=-
These days, phones aren't just phones.. I actually don't often take actual phone calls on my smartphone much anymore. And you can do VOIP
on a smartphone too. Google Voice is pretty much a VOIP app, from what
I understand. Also, a lot of cell phones & carriers these days offer
wifi calling, which seems to be like it's basically VOIP.
What does "piss with my phone" mean? And you don't need to root an
Android
To answer the question, it means, "mess around with my phone".
I don't piss with my phone anymore. When I had my s2 YEARS ago, I had it rooted, custom OS installed, tweaks, etc. I just don't see the fun in it anymore. Plus when I get home, the phone gets shut off anyways. I have VOIP so no need for my cell.
So, uhm, what's the state of linux phones these days? ... I honestly do not want to switch to another platform in the near future.
One of the reasons I prefer to use Android phones is that (as opposed to Apple), Google has been generally less restrictive on what you can do
with your device (as in allowing sideloading of apps, etc.). I hope
they don't disallow side-loading.
I'd think developers would still need to sideload their apps onto devices before they're in the Play Store in order to do testing though, so I'm
not sure how it would work if they disallow sideloading. Maybe there would be a special case for sideloading the app for developers with Android Studio or something.
One of the reasons I prefer to use Android phones is that (as opposed to Apple), Google has been generally less restrictive on what you can do with your device (as in allowing sideloading of apps, etc.). I hope they don't disallow side-loading.
I'd think developers would still need to sideload their apps onto devices before they're in the Play Store in order to do testing though, so I'm not sure how it would work if they disallow sideloading. Maybe there would be
Pretty sure I remember when their tagline (or ethos) was "Do no evil"...
Short term solution is jumping to GrapheneOS. It is an Android-based system that works without any google components whatsoever (that is not their selling point but it is a feature it has). If you need Google material you can install it inside of a sandbox.
And so that is why people replaces stock Android for something else and
then loads it up with adblockers and other cool stuff, because when you
pay for the phone you are supposed to be its master and not the other
way around.
The Wanderer wrote to nblade <=-
Re: Re: TERMinator
By: nblade to Nightfox on Sat Feb 28 2026 10:57 am
That's the same thing as taking away sideloading. What does sideloading mean to you?
If the app is in the play store and you have to deal with Google to be able to allow it on the phone at all, then that's taken sideloading
away.
As a user, I don't appreciate Google telling me what I can and can't do with my general computing device, which is what I paid for. ---
The way apple does it for developers is an app called "test flight". You share it with your QA team thru the app. The only users who can download your app have to be designated, so it's not feasible or even possible to share it out to a ton of people. At least that's how it worked more or less back before I retired(ish).
Nightfox, while I don't think they are taking away the ability to sideload, I understand that Google is trying to make it so that you "HAVE" to have you app in their store and signed a certain way. Something they are calling Developer Verification. I know that the F-Droid people are pretty freaked out about it.
https://f-droid.org/en/2026/02/24/open-letter-opposing-developer-verificat ion.h tml
esc wrote to Arelor <=-
I have a Pixel 9 Pro with GrapheneOS. It's pretty neat. I dig having "containers" (more or less) to separate work from personal. It's a
really cool implementation, and they're partnering with a new hardware vendor (which they have not announced) to build phones moving forward
in perpetuity without needing anything from Google. It's the most
privacy focused smartphone out there, I think.
The sad thing is It does matter what you pick, iPhone or Android these days. Both of them want
to lock you down and "control" what you see or hear. Not to mention both want to know what you
see or hear, so they can use or sale that data in some way. Forget 1984 where goverments are
controlling us, it is now the corporations that watch us and manipulate us.
I wonder if Intune will see a work "container" as a non-jailbroken
phone? I do like the idea of keeping work/personal data separate, and running work apps and data in a container sounds ideal.
As a user, I don't appreciate Google telling me what I can and can't do with myThen we should have youtube premium for free if they want to control
general computing device, which is what I paid for.
Arelor wrote to Exodus <=-I hate the choice between Apple and Google.
It is about Google sucking balls and their cursed OS sucking balls and using the bandwidth you pay for in order to track what you do.
Ben wrote to The Wanderer <=-
Pretty sure I remember when their tagline (or ethos) was "Do no
evil"...
The Wanderer wrote to nblade <=-
us.
I was pretty happy moving to /e/OS, and while these changes are
apparently not going to affect de-googled phones, who knows what the future holds as Google continuously works to take control of everything they can. --- SBBSecho 3.37-Linux
You know I think I looked at that a long time ago. I know I have an e.email account.
I just never bother to buy one of their preloaded phone and none of the phone I had
were on the list of phones that you could install it on.
The Wanderer wrote to nblade <=-
Unless something changes in between now and then, I'd really like my
next phone to be a fairphone, or something equivalent. I would love to stop with the annoying nearly-forced upgrade cycle. --- SBBSecho 3.37-Linux
To be honest though, I know that I'm stuck between a rock and hard place since several of the apps I use only have Google Play install option. They
To be honest though, I know that I'm stuck between a rock and hard place since several of the apps I use only have Google Play install option. They don't
make the APK available for download anywhere. I know that I been trying to look at as many Apps on F-Droid that do what I need it to do as possible.
The Wanderer wrote to nblade <=-
Does Graphene not have a play store install option? I ask honestly as I
am not familiar enough with it.
I think like the options you described, it's somehow sandboxed???, but I am not sure.
Overall, I like the idea of these Android forks that are happening. I am again. Isn't that a sad state of things?
So, uhm, what's the state of linux phones these days? ... I honestly do not want to switch to another platform in the near future.
Yes, that is pretty much the F-Droid people's POV on it. While "Side-Loading" will still be
around, if you have to register every App with Google no matter what,
then Side-loading is
nerfed and there is little point to it.
since several of the apps I use only have Google Play install option. They
It's super weird that, "intentionally installing an application on my computer"
is called "sideloading".
This may sound pedantic, but 'sideloading' originally referred to
loading the firmware of the phone via the recovery, either loading it
from SD card or transferring it over USB. Installing an APK is just installing an APK package, using the Package Installer. People just started calling that 'sideloading', incorrectly.
This may sound pedantic, but 'sideloading' originally referred to loading the firmware of the phone via the recovery, either loading it from SD card or transferring it over USB. Installing an APK is just installing an APK package, using the Package Installer. People just started calling that 'sideloading', incorrectly.
since several of the apps I use only have Google Play install option. They
Get Aurora Store from F-Droid. It downloads apps directly from Google Play without using your credentials.
But, yeah, installing an APK package should not be considered the least
bit weird, and it should be considered weird and upsetting when companies
try to control our ability to do things with our own equipment.
I didn't know that. But I think it can be useful to have a term to mean installing an APK outside of the Google Play Store (which is the official
way to get Android apps), so I think that's why people started calling it
The issue is that using a third-party app repository is not enough. Lots
of programs still use Google infrastructure unless your phone is actually
Just another bit of technicality here... Google isn't stopping people
from randomly installing APKs... It's just that in order for an APK to
Store... If that dev made another app that showed you pictures of feces and never put it in the Play Store, you could still install the APK of
the feces app because the dev is registered with Google, even though you downloaded it from some random website that distributes feces apps.
of programs still use Google infrastructure unless your phone is actually
Have you checked out the MicroG framework? For those apps that require the Google Play Services and GCM and whatnot, MicroG tricks them into thinking those things are installed. Yeah, it's not 100%, so you might run into some hiccups, but for the most part it works.
Just another bit of technicality here... Google isn't stopping people from randomly installing APKs... It's just that in order for an APK to be installed, its developer has to be registered with Google. So, say there's a dev with an app that shows you pictures of cats in the Play Store... If that dev made another app that showed you pictures of feces and never put it in the Play Store, you could still install the APK of the feces app because the dev is registered with Google, even though you downloaded it from some random website that distributes feces apps.
Adept wrote to phigan <=-
If, instead, they put a warning up that says, "this developer is not listed in the Google Play store. Do you still want to install?", I'd be fine with that.
Arelor wrote to phigan <=-
The best practical solution so far these days is running a de-googled Grapheneos and then put anything that requires Google services in an isolated sandbox with the emmasculated Google Services package they
have prepared for such purpose.
Users are too dumb to take responsibility for their actions. Manually install malware, get your phone pwned, who do you blame - your lax practices or Google?
Sure, but something else was already called 'sideloading' :). You'll see the term if you ever mess with recovery and manually update firmware files.
It's a whole couple syllables longer, but what's wrong with "manual install"? It's just differentiation about Google Play specifically, right? Because what about Aurora Store, which pulls the APK from Google Play store, just without using your personal creds to do it (instead some random anonymous creds)?
Users are too dumb to take responsibility for their actions. Manually install malware, get your phone pwned, who do you blame - your lax practices or Google?
That's all I could think of - although there's a non-zero chance you'll receive malware from the Google Play Store.
It seems sometimes various industries choose terms that don't really
make sense for one reason or another, and those terms end up sticking. One that bugs me a little is for music & movies, they use the term "digital" to mean online streaming. But the term "digital" was already
Now you've made me think of the utter (and escalating) misuse of "AI".
Most of the usage can probably make some claim, but it's _really_ not helpful when talking about different things.
Since, "video game boss logic", "LLMs", and "machine learning" (among others) get called "AI" while being concepts that share little beyond computers.
time. I think people generally know it's not true general intelligence, but I think people understand what is meant by AI in a video game when you're playing against the computer. Off the top of my head, I'm not
sure of a better term for it that would still be succinct.
Grapheneos and then put anything that requires Google services in an
isolated sandbox with the emmasculated Google Services package they have
Yeah, feces aside, that still seems pretty awful to me.
in a store that said "digital copy included", I was confused, thinking of course it does, DVD is a digital medium.. I didn't know yet it was
in a store that said "digital copy included", I was confused, thinking of
course it does, DVD is a digital medium.. I didn't know yet it was
In that sense, they mean digital vs physical.
Grapheneos and then put anything that requires Google services in an isolated sandbox with the emmasculated Google Services package they have
You're sure they don't just run MicroG?
It's a whole couple syllables longer, but what's wrong with "manual install"?
Anyone should be able to write software for any operating system and give it to whoever they want.
I 100% agree. Fuck registering anything. Anyone should be able to write software for any operating system and give it to whoever they want. Any user should be able to install any software they want made by anyone.
Nightfox wrote to phigan <=-
I agree. Sometimes it feels like companies like Apple think they know what's best for us and want to decide how we use devices we paid for
and own.
I agree. Sometimes it feels like companies like Apple think they kno what's best for us and want to decide how we use devices we paid for and own.
Hell even as a consumer, I almost can not write simple things like
scripts to automate tasks on my phone. Or hell even do things like say
To be honest, I want computers to be fun again, which is why I find myself using things like these old school BBS. And why I actually find myself wanting to buy one of those Commodore 64 Ultimates retro clones that are out.
boxoskulz wrote to nblade <=-
Have you tried Tasker?
Nightfox wrote to nblade <=-
I've been a longtime Windows user (and DOS before that), but about a
month and a half ago, I started using Linux as my primary OS. I really like Linux Mint (as it tends to just work), but I decided to switch to KUbuntu 25.10, as I think the KDE Plasma desktop looks better on my monitor (I know you can install KDE Plasma on Linux Mint, but it would
end up being and older verison, and I've heard people generally
recommend against that since the Linux Mint developers don't primarily support KDE Plasma).
I've uesd Linux for years on other systems, but since using KUbuntu on my main PC, I've started to feel some of that fun in using my PC again. For one thing, I think Linux GUI environments tend to look better than the rest (Windows, Mac, iOS, & Android) - GUI themes work a lot better in Linux GUI environments (and there are a lot more themes to choose from), and you can have a look & feel with depth in the GUI elements; on the other hand, the other major operating systems on the market have gone mostly all flat with their GUIs, which I don't find very appealing. Also, the level of customizability you get with a Linux distro and the lack of (or lower level of) things that bug you (such as update nagging, ads, etc.) are a lot less in a Linux distro. It feels like I can just do what I want more than I can with Windows.
I am glad that Linux is working out for you. I always try to recommend that people try Linux. I do however think that everyone is different and for some Linux does not work for them. My recommendation is to try all the OS you can and find one that does work for the person in question.
One things I would warn about with an ubuntu machine... when a new version comes out, you will want to upgrade to it sooner rather than later. They have (or at least did have!) a strange, not-so-debian way of messing about with apt and their software repositories that results in packages missing and/or just being skipped. If you are like me, it will turn out to be packages the system needs to boot and be functional.
With debian, if you get more than a version behind, you can always upgrade to the next version, and then the next. I have never had a problem doing so. But ubuntu will break your system if you are not careful.
It is a sad state to be sure. I was talking to a friend the other day and I was talking about how it use to be fun using a computer. Of course that was back in the 80's and early 90's. To me there was a sense of wonder
and fun to using them. Now, All I read is how everyone is trying to lock down or restrict how I use them. We have law makers trying to dicitate that the OS should know our age and report it when asked. We have Google and Apple locking down what can and can not be installed on a device.
Hell even as a consumer, I almost can not write simple things like
scripts to automate tasks on my phone. Or hell even do things like say only keep the last 500 text msgs on my device to save space like I use
to. (I recently switched phones and found that there was no longer a setting to auto delete old text message). I guess they figure you have
a ton of space on you phone why would you do that. And now couple that with AI stuff, where almost every day, I am now being told that if I
don't use AI, I'm not with it. And if I do use AI I am told, I should be using it as a "trusted companion" not a tool.
To be honest, I want computers to be fun again, which is why I find
myself using things like these old school BBS. And why I actually find myself wanting to buy one of those Commodore 64 Ultimates retro clones that are out.
I guess in the end I find it hard to swallow that something I once
loved, is now a straightjack of control and surveillance.
ads, etc.) are a lot less in a Linux distro. It feels like I can just
do what I want more than I can with Windows.
Yeah, I generally try to update a Linux distro to the next major
version fairly soon after it's released, to avoid problems. I've been
Just don't read any messages from Nick! You'll end up running arch
like me. I was a pretty big mint user, couple posts with Nick and
now I run Arch btw.
For me it's the correct distro as I'm a bit insane with wanting to
control every single tiny peice of data on my drive. I avoided it
for years and now I wish I had tried it 20 years ago.
Yeah, I generally try to update a Linux distro to the next major version fairly soon after it's released, to avoid problems. I've been running Linux Mint on a secondary PC for 10+ years and have been upgrading it that way and generally haven't had a problem. Linux Mint is based on Ubuntu, so I imagine Mint may have the same possible issues. I was originally also using Linux Mint on my main PC before I decided to switch to KUbuntu.
nblade wrote to Nightfox <=-
I guess in the end I find it hard to swallow that something I once
loved, is now a straightjack of control and surveillance.
Yeah, I generally try to update a Linux distro to the next major version
fairly soon after it's released, to avoid problems. I've been
Just don't read any messages from Nick! You'll end up running arch like me. I was a pretty big mint user, couple posts with Nick and now I run Arch btw.
Years ago I had tried Gentoo (and I recall Nick said he's used
Gentoo as well), but after a short while I didn't want to wait for it to build all the software packages from code when it installed. I think
there was a noticeable performance advantage doing that, but it was a
fairly small advtangage, and IMO not raelly worth waiting so long for packages to build.
build all the software packages from code when it installed. I think there was a noticeable performance advantage doing that, but it was a fairly small advtangage, and IMO not raelly worth waiting so long for packages to build.
HAHAHAHAHA! I'm just here to help, brother. ;)
As much as I wouldn't want to add more to your plate, you would
probably enjoy Slackware or FreeBSD, too, given your description
Glad you ended up liking it, though!
| Sysop: | altere |
|---|---|
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