Why apps?

An app is a lot more responsive and not dependent on an internet connection

Also, browsers are not created equal and take up resources (just look up how much RAM is used on a desktop browser)

On a sunny day (Sat, 08 Jan 2022 14:18:24 +0100) it happened Jeroen Belleman snipped-for-privacy@nospam.please wrote in <src2v1$a58$ snipped-for-privacy@gioia.aioe.org>:

The governments want more and more control where you are, who you talk to, what you do, what you say and your opinion is. Phones and apps give it to them, for people there is no way to see what code is in those apps. crypto currencies now also in China on your phone. Access ... QR codes... Now wait till you get chipped, like your pet dog.

It is dark times and it must end Once the nukes fly and the big EMP silences all phones then freedom surfaces again If there will be anyone left to feel free is of course a valid question. But wildlife at Tjernobyl thrives.

I have my smartest phone in airplane mode... There was a lot to do about Israeli spy software used by many countries that could even start the phone's camera and watch you:

I feel better on my laptop, wrote most relevant clients email, irc, usenet, what not, and have the internet monitoring tools. And I do not want to let go of my real keyboard, those rubbing screens do not do it for me.

I do have a real gasmask for when I have to go demonstrate. :-) Seems you need a bullet proof vest and anti dog spray too these days here,

... everything censored.. I have no facebook account, do have a twitter one, no idea if it still works, never use it. Seriously think about leaving youtube, already moved to posting stuff on my own website.

No, www will not go away, wikipedia is cool, there are a zillion sites with a zillion very interesting projects.

A much bigger danger is the greens, kids grown up with Al Gore's polar bear crap now have power and shutdown nuclear - and oil based power plants, have no clue about electrickety or anything else as far as I can see and soon will force people to live in grass huts again.

So why don't 'other' linux distros run android apps?

RL

It is amusing that no one has developed a sandbox that you can interpose between any/every app and your actual resources. This would allow the user to see *which* resources are ACTUALLY being accessed as well as allowing you to "dummy up" some bogus resources to appease/confuse the app. "Yeah, my address book has just one contact in it -- and that happens to be the email address of the app's CEO! Please feel free to spam him." (of course, the next app has the email of THAT app's CEO in its place)

I.e. turn every phone into a honeypot.

But, sheeple aren't concerned with these issues. If you bring them (or "privacy", in general) to their attention, they will shrug and say "they have nothing to hide" or "no one would be interested in (pwning) me". Of course, when they get *bit*, they'll never think that it was their behavior that facilitated that!

Even without letting an app peek into your "other stuff", it already discloses enough about you as soon as you turn it on

(Yes, the visitor checking out at kiosk #23 is now identified -- from his charge card -- as John Doe. Prior to reaching the checkout, he visited the following departments, lingering at the following displays for these periods of time. We can now correlate length of time at a particular display with probability of making a purchase of those displayed items...)

(Yes, the browser with fingerprint 0xFEEDABE was seen visiting this other site just a few minutes ago. We've seen this pattern, before, so we know to serve up THIS version of the web page to better hook them into a purchase than a cold visitor)

Apps can run continuously in the background too, they don't wait for you to visit the web page.

There's a rhetorical question if ever.

Google's OS and Apple's OS probably wouldn't allow it. If more people had Linux phones it could be done, but they cost around $800 which gives an idea how much Google and Apple make from your phone.

Nah, you can get a Pinephone for $200.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

They don't have to tell you what "cookies" they are storing...

Spyware. Profiling and selling personal data. Just look at the ridiculous permissions many of them request by default.

I agree it seems to be a retrograde step to have everything as an app and it clutters up the screen to hell with random icons some of which only make sense to the dope headed Californian designer on an acid trip.

A bit like with browser cookies most people just click OK without even a second though about why a supermarket would want access to your photos, email and phone contacts list, microphone and webcam.

The odd one can be useful like an app for finding the nearest bank machine which has its compressed database and map data in the phone. (memory is cheap so some things do work better this way)

Unfortunately in the UK they are closing banks and their machines left, right and centre so you do have to update it fairly often if you want to be directed to a still working one as opposed to a blanking plate where a hole in the wall bank machine and a bank used to be!

Cash has become a lot less common thanks to Covid - everyone prefers contactless payment these days. Limit for that now raised to £100.

Yeah, and Java was envisioned (write once, run anywhere...) as an interface between every app and actual resources.

The three B's kinda ruined that.

Bugs, bloat, business. Can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em.

Bugs buried in a third-party library with no one accepting responsibility means that software and firmware can become untenable, and unfixable.

Bloat in use of oddball functions means you need versions of firmware, software, and addons to match some arbitrary list of specifications or the new (or even old) app won't run. There's no clear listing available, of course....

Business decisions (or outright collapses, or purchases/mergers) take away infrastructure, so the box can't run. Or, phone-home functions are required to un-brick the thing, and there's no one home when the checks don't arrive regularly.

All of these are "survivable" *if* you have control over the design. The ENTIRE design.

For a business, that means owning source licenses to all hardware and software.

Sadly, for a *consumer* (| user), it means the same thing! Because having all of that reside in the arms of a vendor does YOU no good if the vendor decides not to support it any longer.

Gotta wonder about these smart refrigerators, thermostats, "Alexa", etc. How much of the functionality is *in* the device and how much relies upon some other service? (when that service goes away, you've got a dumb little box that can't even be repurposed to fill its original role!)

One reason could be, sloppy programming.

Developers use old past-practices or carry-overed modules, and would rather assume they "need it" to get the product working & out the door, rather than stop, consider the user's privacy & security concerns.

my organization has a a digital lab division, working on these consumer issues. They released a "Digital Standard" document, which we are rolling out as way to evaluate connected products. WiFi routers, TVs, apps, etc.

Printers, for example, largely the situation I describe above.

cheers, RS

Wow. I only looked at the high end with switches to power off components.

But this is not realistic unless you are the galaxy emperor... We do not depend on anyone for software, so what. Cut us the silicon and we are dead.

They are all going this way as far as they can manage it of course. Design software people use (not us, we have our own) is nowadays based on yearly subscriptions, so is office etc. Exceptions/ways through it still exist I guess but for how long. The picture is turning pretty dystopian and all we can do is just live the rest of our lives the best we can, I don't think we can do much to avoid a catastrophe. Let's take it as easy as we can - while it lasts :-).

I have a Pinephone Beta and an early Pinephone tout court (not Pro). Both have the dip switches.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

On the models I was looking at, there were slide switches on the side, not DIP switches.

There is no reason at all why they would want to do that. It is an OS designed to run on phones and tablets, not computers. And in that role it is king.

Not being limited by the browser.

For example, a radio station promotes their own app to listen to that station. To make it run, you have to login, so they have you pinpointed. Once there, you can not refuse their adverts. Your privacy is lost. Of course, they also provide features to entice you and keep you in.

Even if you close the app, it can keep running in the background, and for example, tell you that your favourite program is coming now.