Technology
A nice place to discuss rumors, happenings, innovations, and challenges in the technology sphere. We also welcome discussions on the intersections of technology and society. If it’s technological news or discussion of technology, it probably belongs here.
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I am a gadget fanatic, but I also love to maintain privacy. One problem I always see mentioned is wallet garden on iOS. I put some of my experience into the ring here. I use GrapheneOS as my daily drive for most things. This starts with no google services and ends with profiles where I can separate people and groups and install multiple of the same apps.. like signal etc.
For lots of my work, I use a samsung fold 4. It replaced my laptop, and it's convenient. With adg (remove many Samsung apps and the Facebook and microsoft bloatware) and block internet access to most apps via rethinkdns and decloudus, you get a pretty convenient yet private device. I monitor what goes in and out and block all i don't need.
My family is all into apple so I also have an iPhone (not an excuse haha, I also love some of the wallet gardened things. Like apple music, imessage (for very few people) and I love the focus setup. I know you can do a lot manually on android to get it similar, but focus modes are a killer. I also never found as great looking and working mastodon apps (and yes, I use tusky, fedilab, and a few others on android. I still prefer what ios (some paid, some free have to offer, mammoth comes to mind on the free end). To make things more private, I use adguard pro in combination with decloudus and block apple our of the device. Still get push, and all works when you add a very few domains listing on the decloudus whitelist page.
So I use 3 options (GrapheneOS what is surly the best when it comes to privacy) but also wouldn't want to miss ios or a fold.
iOS is great and if it works for you and you are happy with it, perhaps even have a mac then you can make it a great, private and secure device. Use lockdown mode is also a great way I didn't see on android yet.
I noticed that with all my friends and family, once they get into the ecosystem, they can't get out.
Apple has a lot of proprietary systems that forces users to get into the ecosystem. That ecosystem is expensive to maintain. And say you wanna switch back to android. Then you're met with the sunk cost fallacy. What are you going to with all the hardware and services you bought that is now useless outside of the ecosystem?
I do not understand your frustration. Like how can google unify iMessage with RCS if Apple refuses to do so. I mean why would Apple even bother and lose one of its pro.
For FaceID there's face Unlock but it's not faceid. Fingerprint is the rule and I'm fine with that one. I'm not sure about the home screen UX but I use smart launcher 6 and it does a good job of providing a neat sorted apps catehpry list for me. As for battery life. The new snapdragon 8 gen 2 provides beastly battery life compared to previous generations which were a regression.
About extended software support. I agree google is a bit behind samsung. But, 5 years os support is not bad. You have samsung, some oneplus smartphones and than google.
In the end if none of that matters, you do you. You do not need justification to use or the other. Just read some reviews and make your decision.
There's literally one reason I stick with android, you can just put files on it and use them, I know iOS has improved greatly here, now you can actually have some approximation of file system access, but I really don't want to use a janky app like iTunes (at least on windows it's kind of broken still) to get anything on and off the phone outside of iCloud. I end up using my phone more like a pocket linux computer enough of the time that I just can't jive with such a locked down device.
I really like the hardware, and iOS is a very cohesive and easy to use experience it just doesn't fill my use cases for a phone. I'm not the kind of person who just uses something, I always want to crack it open and tinker with it, I think my record for not modifying a car after purchase is 2 weeks (only because I wanted to make sure it wasn't a lemon). Android just fits my ethos better.
I mean, getting files off of iphones is certainly a hurdle but I can't say I do it often. I back up my photos and videos, so I don't know what else I'd use on my phone in the way of files.
I've been really tempted to make my next phone an iPhone just because of the software support. There are rumors the next iphone will have USB-C as well.
It's not just a rumor, as the EU made made it law, so Apple wouldn't be able to sell them there otherwise.
Woke up and chose violence today huh? ;)
Having used both, I’d say stick with Android if you prefer tinkering, hop to iOS if you just want to pick up your device and do stuff.
Neither platform has any real privacy unless you do a de-googled Android (and that should be a third category IMO). Apple claims privacy but is at least moving toward a place where that isn’t really true. Privacy is a moot point when it comes to smartphones I guess.
To answer your question: don’t move to iOS if it doesn’t support a feature/function that is non negotiable for you. The stuff that works on iOS works well, and the stuff that doesn’t just basically doesn’t exist for the most part. iOS really only puts stuff into production that it thinks are near enough perfected already and everything else isn’t released outside beta programs.
Be sure if another apps or features are as important for you as those you said Face ID, iMessage, home screen UX, battery life. For example, not being able to run syncthing on IOS is a dealbreaker for me. Another app is minimalism launcher, etc...
not being able to run synching
Do you mean syncthing? I'm just asking for clarification, because that's an important piece of software for me.
I used custom roms for years on Android and in 2020 decided to give iOS a go. I bought a used iPhone 7 to just dabble for a bit and have stayed with it ever since. I have no more desire to constantly modify the system as it just works. I miss a few things that were great on Android, such as NewPipe (Ad-free YouTube app), being able to open any file easily and emulating GameBoy games on the go. I also miss the way the photo gallery on Android worked, as iOS forces you to have every single photo (screenshots, downloads, etc.) in your library and you can't file it away. I hope that the coming laws (in the EU and US ) will force Apple to allow other app stores which might fix these shortcomings with third-party apps.