I’m an experienced technologist (a software engineer for over 30 years), I used to regularly install CyanogenMod on my phones. While I didn’t find the graphene OS installation to be particularly difficult, I did find actually using it to be too much of a challenge to live with every day. The biggest single problem I can recall is that I could not do any group SMS texts. Many searches and attempts at fixes later, I realized that it was a known bug that for reasons unknown did not seem to affect all users. There were a number of minor annoyances in addition to that bug.
That may reflect more on how Google has locked down things on the pixel phones, or other stuff they’ve done to keep things as proprietary as possible in their software and devices. I switched back because it wasn’t worth the hassle to me.
roofuskit@lemmy.world 2 days ago
I’m talking about daily use. I have a good friend, we’ve both been computer nerds since The Apple II era, we both used to put custom roms on our android phones, we’re avid self hosters, etc… He recently switched to Graphene and wants to switch back to something that’s less of a pain. His complaints are pretty much the reason I haven’t switched.
napoleonsdumbcousin@feddit.org 2 days ago
As someone who uses GrapheneOS with sandboxed GooglePlay on his only smartphone (with daily usage for years at this point): I don’t know what kind of adjustment you are referring to. I never had to adjust to anything, because I never encountered anything that GrapheneOS couldn’t do that stock Android could. Follow the installation process and after that the phone behaves like a regular phone, except you have way more options regarding security and privacy.
Is your friend trying to use GrapheneOS without any Google services maybe?
frongt@lemmy.zip 2 days ago
I had to fiddle with some stuff to get the Google location history and Android Auto working. But if you’re using it for privacy-from-Google purposes you probably don’t care about those.
napoleonsdumbcousin@feddit.org 2 days ago
Correct, I am not using GrapheneOS to then give my data to Google willingly. Kinda defeats the purpose I would say. It is the right thing that this is blocked by default and you have to actively turn it on.
Winged_Hussar@lemmy.world 2 days ago
And Tmobile / Mint Mobile regularly stop working and require reprovisioning every 36 hours.
klymilark@herbicide.fallcounty.omg.lol 2 days ago
My own personal experience over the past year with it has… Largely not lined up with that? The install process was easy, I do have gplay enabled but rarely use it, favoring fdroid, and it’s… Been fine? It’s felt mostly like stock android tbh
MyNameIsAtticus@lemmy.world 2 days ago
That’s the same thing stopping me from switching my friends from Linux. I know one of them would if I pushed.
I’ve been daily driving Linux for almost 2 years and also always have a minor issue daily. “Oh. Bluetooth module decided it just didn’t want to work. Better reload. Oh. Reloading doesn’t work? Got to restart. Oh. Now my Wi-Fi has completely crapped the bed and restarts every 5 seconds”.
Then the major issues are catastrophic, even though rare. I once had a system just start… filling up empty storage at a rate of 1 GB a second with an empty log file. I couldn’t figure out why. Ended up reinstalling everything.
I don’t mind fixing these issues. And hell, I have fun, but I’m the only computer guy in our group though so I’d be playing tech support for these people if they ever changed.
20dogs@feddit.uk 2 days ago
What distro are you using? This seems bizarre and the sort of thing you see on a less stable rolling release.
MyNameIsAtticus@lemmy.world 2 days ago
I’ve hopped around. The 3 main ones I’ve touched though are:
All of which are the Stable Versions. I believe Bazzite and CachyOS are both Rolling Releases which would explain the issues. I don’t think Ubuntu is as far as i know which makes it’s storage issue especially interesting.
I also have an issue with Debian on my media server where despite telling it everywhere possible not to go to sleep, it decides it wants to go to sleep anyways. But i don’t really consider that under these same issues because that’s a media server and i expect it to be a little more “Tinkery” than my Main use PCs.
Lyubo@lemmy.ml 1 day ago
But this is different. Linux doesn’t work well on many PCs especially laptops because the manufacturs don’t give the needed drivers and firmware. And on the top of that many programs are built with Windows and maybe macOS in mind. GrapheneOS is not entirely different operating system and is only for Pixels with Google’s own firmware and everything work the same as stock ROM.
itsworkthatwedo@sh.itjust.works 2 days ago
So you haven’t used it yourself and are shitting on an OS based on anecdotal evidence? "Stop making stupid assumptions”, I once heard someone say.
I use GrapheneOS and have helped other less tech-savvy people install and use it. You can just roll with the defaults and have a better privacy stance than the spyware Google puts out, or you can take a deep dive. It works just fine either way.
Lyubo@lemmy.ml 1 day ago
Hey, you can judge something without using it in some degree in my opinion. I’ve judged iOS and macOS because of their user experience, design and etc based on things I’ve seen and knew. But I didn’t want to spent a fortune just to express my thoughts and end up with something that I don’t like. Now that I’ve used them I hate on them even more. But in this example it seems that this person don’t have enough knowledge about this specific thing and don’t know what they’re talking about.
Lyubo@lemmy.ml 1 day ago
I didn’t test every app created but I think you don’t know what you’re talking about. To say GrapheneOS or any similar ROM is unusable for daily driver is wild. What specific usecase do he and you have to be such a deal breaking pain? You could’ve shared what was a pain at least to be helpful for someone. It’s Android with or without Google Play. If this didn’t work for you can just try something else like iodeOS. There is always an excuse.