GOS is great. Funny, I used to rom hop and distro hop a lot; but on GOS, I installed it once and so far so good (5+ months in).

Just some tips for new users: Just install it and dont be afraid to try things out (Google Store, profiles, Aurora…etc). Oh and dont make it tooooo complicate with many profiles and private space. You can test first but dont over do it if you’re not experienced.

And no, I am not a dev from GOS lol. I’m an ordinary user who wants to take control of my phone.

fuck Youtube ads.

i guess another way is to use those shitty privacy screen protectors that do not work with fingerprints at all. They can try all they want, its not gonna work.

Or grapheneos but compartmentalize sensitive data to a profile where you use no fingerprints, only pins. Duress can be entered anywhere right? So if you’re being compromised , enter the duress pin.

any ideas how to add that engine to Vanadium on GrapheneOS?

Yes it is very much doable and you can get a functional system. But there can be 2 main problems for your case:

1. you would literally install Debian and choose nothing (no DE just a bare minimum). On Arch, this is easy because it came with some packages or you can install during live to get wifi working. On Debian , last I heard you need to do some dhcp wizardry.

2. cross apps compatibility. This is very serious. Even “lightweight” DE like xfce has a lot of hidden stuff that helps to run your notifications , powers and brightness/volume. And that does not count it you want stuff from Gnome or KDE: they even have more special libraries. In your case, the worst scenario would be to have multiple libraries/configs from different DE and they try to do the same thing. This is very hard to debug and maintain.

Point 1) is not as bad, if you use an Ethernet or somehow connects to the internet. It is only for the 1st phase where you install stuff though. After that you can just use the DE’s network manager.

Point 2) should not be a problem IF you are running a window manager. The reason is that in these setups you can choose exactly what you want without messing up…On DE you can too, but you migght break things. For eg, choose dunst for notitication or xfce4-notifyd. On a mixed DE setup? Bad idea imo.

remember the good old days when firefox was the better alternative to pretty much all browsers?

anything that ties to Micro$oft is shady

is this dual boot on separate partitions? you can just nuke the windows drive right?

How long do you think it takes for those who still support him to… wake up?

This is not fucking normal.

the US or perhaps the world needs a reboot button

when is enough enough? these are not ICE, these are thugs

thanks for the detailed answer. Did you use the battery protection, i.e. charge to 80%?

"here in my garage, just bought this new Lamborghini "

yoo its only a few days after New Year wtf man.

Also this gives me 2019 vibes: January 2019 right after New Year Trump ordered missile strike that hit a top Iranian general’s vehicle.

pacman is the fastest but the syntax is weird. Has the best visual, i.e. pacman loading bar. If things go wrong like a broken dependencies it doesnt provide heloful output.

Apt is the easiest to use but its output is very congested. Remember that Linus Tech Tips linux install video? The error warnings are very squashed together making it very difficult to see.

Dnf is the sweet spot imo. As default, the speed is slow but you can tweak it on the config. Outputs are clean, and if something goes wrong like a broken dependency, dnf provides very useful info to troubleshoot.

so most apps have restricted battery with the exception being Google Play Service?

A 100% fully automated smart home is a fucking bad idea. Might as well sign your death certificates. Our family had one such system (not Alexa) and it controlled the whole thing. Yes, we should have researched better but the sellers were really convincing. Anyway there was a malfunction and it trips multiple breakers in our house. Our rhought at the time was to get the fuck out and called the electricians. Guess what? The doors refuse to open properly, so we had to climb over…

If anyone really really really wants a smart home, please only assign the system for mundane tasks like music, lightings. Dont do it for security stuff like doors, cameras.

Or just dont install one, even better.

2 months GOS user here on Pixel 9. So far so good. You do have a lot more controls over the traditional Android phones. In fact, you have too much that for average user, i think it can be a bit overwhelmed.

PROFILES

For eg, you can easily install Google apps and use them like a normal phone. Problem is on Graphene, you have many ways to set this up. You can:

a) install in your main profile and be done

b) install Gapps in main the private space within main profile

c) some crazy stuff like install Gapps in the private space of a secondary profile, which you lock using a completely different password.

I spent too much time in this loop lol. Finally i settle on: all daily apps in main profile and sensitive apps live in a separate profile (banks, important docs).

SECURITY

1. Next the security features in GOS are amazing. You can control every single permissions that an app can do. I mean every thing including the system Phone app. I can go 100% paranoid and prevent the Phone app from Phone logs, microphone and Phone. Essentially making the Phone app useless… Very very nice but you need to experiment with your apps and see which permisions you can deny and which you cant. On normal Android? You can deny some apps but the system ones, you cant.

2. I especially like the USB c feature. I leave mine on Charge only. So the port only functions to charge my phone. This cuts off every other connections: plug into PC, plug into car for Android Auto…etc. I like it that way. .

Btw, Android auto works great too if you need it. .

OS is so minimal that you will need to install essential apps on your own. For eg, i use Florisboard for keyboard, MiX for file manager.

3. I really like the screenlock options on GOS. You can set:

a) your usual password, pin, fingerprint

AND

b) a secondary pin that can be scrambled at random. So you unlock with your fingerprint then you need to enter that 2nd pin or password to enter the phone. EVERY single time. And it is scrambled too so you dont have to worry about people tracing your fingers.

AND

c) the Duress pin. This is like the nuke PIN. You set this up and hypothetically you are in a dangerous situations (thieves want you to unlock, local police abuse your phones…etc), you can enter this instead of your normal screen lock pin/password and every data is nuked. I havent tried it yet because i spent too much time set my phone rhe way I like it lol. If somebody tries it out, pls let me know.

INSTALLATIONS

Stupidly easy. On the OG Pixel, if you want to install LineageOS, you have to be very careful. Beside downloading the ROM, you need to flash a custom recovery like TWRP. Then becaude it is a Pixel, you nees to be careful which slot to flash the ROM. Flashing to the wrong one will brick the phone.

On Graphene? It is literally plug your phone in and open the browser where the install notes are. The ONLy technical thing I need to do during the process waa enable bootloader unlock. Everything else was like “GOS finishes this, GOS finishes that, can you press this button, GOS is rebooting…”. .Very very simple.

**SOME HELPFUL POINTS (i hope) **

1. dont treat this as a Degoogle phone. .You can but the strong point of GOS is security.

2. some features are not available compare to like.Samsung’s ONE UI . For eg, only allows an app to connect to 5G and not wifi.

3. dont create a super complicate setup. The backup process will a pain.

how would this afffect the forked versions like Waterfox, LibreWolf, IronFox? The AI part is a separated feature from mainline Firefox branch, so forks can choose not to include it?