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Luca Weiss

The Software Longevity Team at Fairphone (which I'm part of 😀) is excited to announce that today, following the Fairphone 5 launch, we are also releasing the source code for its Android 13 operating system.

You can find instructions for browsing, viewing and downloading the source code on code.fairphone.com. The source tree contains all Android and Linux kernel sources that we can publish, excluding some proprietary components.

For more details see: forum.fairphone.com/t/fairphon

code.fairphone.comOpen Source at Fairphone — FAIRPHONE open source documentation

@z3ntu I hope that this phone will be available unlocked without having to sign up with Google and ask Google for their permissions! 🙏

@whynothugo already the case, check out Murena

@mart_e
I didn't fully research but Murena seems also incorporates their own cloud stuff and it's not vanilla AOSP. Why would I move away from a company to another?

I know not all companies are the same for respect of privacy but essentially what I want is vanilla Android with no bloat. Murena doesn't seem to provide that if I understand correctly. Which means I pay for stuff I don't want.
@whynothugo

@aiono I dn't use it so can't really answer for sure but Murena replaces Google stuff by their own.
As explained by @z3ntu users have expectations of what they are able to use.
fosstodon.org/@z3ntu/111006582

Many apps rely on Google services and will just not work if you don't have a compatibility layer. Murena offers one.
If you want to go fully 0% Google services, you need to get your hands dirty and accept a lot of broken apps.

@mart_e @z3ntu

I like the part of Murena where it provides compatibility layer.

However, it also comes with cloud solution + account stuff (don't know if I need one) which I don't want. I manage my own cloud instance.

I just want a solution that is as plain as AOSP gets + open source Google services alternative (maybe microG works good enough?). Murena does more than what I want which means I pay for what I don't want.

@aiono @mart_e So I guess for you lineage.microg.org/ would fit best? When (hopefully not an 'If') Fairphone 5 gets full LineageOS support, then it should also automatically get these microG builds I believe.

lineage.microg.orgLineageOS for microG

@z3ntu @mart_e

If I use Lineage OS then I lose "5 year software support" Fairphone offers that I paid.

I want to do the "right thing" ethically and have a de-googled experience. But I am not rich either. I don't mind paying more if it takes more money to produce device ethically, but I mind paying more for stuff I can't/don't want to use.

For me it seems best to buy refurbished Pixel 5 from Murena or buy 2nd hand device and install /e/OS. By buying 2nd hand I don't harm environment as well.

@aiono @mart_e Yeah sure I understand that. But unfortunately it's a lot of work to maintain software and we can't make everyone happy :/

@z3ntu @mart_e

Don't get me wrong please I may sounded a bit aggressive. I really like what you are doing so please keep doing it! I think your place in phone market is very important and unique.

I understand people like me are much less than people who just want a phone that is working so it probably makes sense for Fairphone to focus on them.

@aiono nobody is offering that because no for-profit company would sell a phone that is not working out of the box.
Selling a phone with an alternative ROM is already a very niche market.

The smartphone ecosystem is a shitty duopole I am afraid.

@mart_e I understand why Google Service replacement must be there, but why not having cloud is "not working"?

@aiono you mean a replacement of Google Service that is not a cloud? You still need some minimum level of servers to have messaging apps running and stuff.
If a company (like Murena) is sane enough to provide an alternative, I guess they try to monetize it by selling more services. Which I can't blame them for.

I am afraid for your kind of requirements, flashing an alternative ROM is always going to be the way to go (and I hope it will change one day, don't get me wrong)

@aiono @mart_e @whynothugo last time I ran /e/ it just had davx5 and some other foss tools integrated, which was trivial to just point at my nextcloud instance in stead of the default murena thing. This was a while ago, do it's possible some things there have changed.

@mvgorcum @aiono @mart_e I looked at it a year or the ago and the general experience wasn’t good. It felt like they wanted to doGoogle as just be the new Google themselves. It’s been a while though, so an FP5 from them might be a good opportunity to try it out again.

@whynothugo If you want to unlock you will need to go through the (Google) setup wizard once, but then you can unlock the bootloader and install whatever you want on the phone!

@z3ntu Oh, so same story as the FP4; I need to sign up with the Google and ask them for permissions to install something on phone.

Same as all the other OEMs shipping Google-locked phones.

I wish Fairphone would either stop pretending to be different, or actually stop shipping this user-hostile crap.

@whynothugo As @mart_e wrote, you can also buy the phone preinstalled with /e/OS from Murena where you never have to touch this Google code if you wish.

But GMS is just something expected by at least 99% of users so it's practically impossible to ship an Android phone without it. Huawei tried and invested many many millions if not billions into building an alternative ecosystem and get apps on board and I think they have even been half successful with that.

@z3ntu
Congrats on the release of fairphone 5 and great job with that iot soc.
Quick question: Does fairphone still use the public android verified boot test key as their oem keys like in fairphone 4, etc or has that been fixed? Because if it hasn't been fixed the avb is still broken and useless as a security feature and that really needs to be fixed.

@DenJohn Fairphone 5 has - to my knowledge - a properly working AVB setup without test keys :)

@z3ntu
I really think buying this device but only problem I have is I want de-googled vanilla Android that is also supported. It looks like both directly buying FP and Murena doesn't offer that.

@aiono I'm hoping there will be LineageOS and some other ROMs like CalyxOS and iode available soon. Depending what your definition of "vanilla Android" is.

@z3ntu They will be available but then they are not supported by the company. So then I pay for "5 years of software support" and basically can't use it if I want a de-googled experience.

Basically I am looking for something like Android One experience we had before.

@z3ntu im loving my fp3+ but im tempted to get fp5 and put lineageos on it :D

@z3ntu How big is the diff between your downstream code and Linux kernel /aosp upstream code?

@taketwo The code is based on Qualcomm's CodeLinaro code (formerly CAF), so from that there's some diff to AOSP but not exactly sure how much exactly Qualcomm adds on top of AOSP. On top of this CodeLinaro there's not a lot added for the device.

And the same story for the kernel, but at least there compared to Linux upstream there's quite a significant diff, mostly coming from Qualcomm's additions.

@z3ntu make the Fairphone warerproof IP68, and it would be my toy....

@z3ntu@fosstodon.org You people are awesome! I'm very excited to be receiving a Fairphone 5 hopefully soonish 🙌