Ahh, so the only thing saving us from a corporate dominated future is laws…
Well I’m an American, I’m sure if they wanted, they could always make a EU version and US version. I’m a bit worried for the future.
Edit: Spelling
Android is open source, and there are many forks of it already. If they were to try this, those of us who care would just run a fork of Android.
Burning a new ROM is just as hard fora regular user as jailbreaking an iPhone, so practically it doesn’t make a difference if android is open-source or not.
Also, even though core android is OSS, what you and i run on our phones heavily depends on the play framework which is Google proprietary. Amazon has tried and failed to fork android before with its fire devices and that hasn’t worked.
Yup! Sideloading is legally required to be available by the EU Digital Markets Act by March 2024. Both Apple and Android must comply!
Does apple comply? Just asking as I do not have an iphone and was under the impression its not possible.
side loading has always been available on apple Iphones, it’s just been locked exclusively down to their developer program for debugging and testing purposes and said installed apps are only valid for a limited amount of time. I expect it will use the same framework that the dev program uses, just not as restricted. That being said i can forsee them region locking it.
Nope, Android itself is not restrictive, it’s the extra add-ons by vendors that cause restrictions.
This is it.
I switched to Pixel phones ordered from Google. I can replace the software with whatever and not worry about breaking an eFuse warranty.
If they are going to restrict sideloading, they’ll probably restrict bootloader unlocking too. In the future, just make sure you research the bootloader unlockablility before buying a phone, because the next pixel might be locked.
Actually you may not be too far off. Noticed recently that users don’t have access to their Android>OBB or Data folders anymore through the normal files app. I know there is a workaround but I haven’t been able to get it to work. This may not affect downloading/installing apk’s from other sources, but if you have to manually install the OBB/Data you cannot do that.
Um I still can. You use a file explorer app (I use an app called ZArchiver) and find the directory, tap on it and there is a pop up telling you to grant it permission, then you will need to locate it using a android system file explorer, and once you find it, you can grant permission to access the directory to the app. I know its hard to describe using words, but I can record my screen and show it to you.
Edit: In android 13 the data and obb diectory aren’t actually restricted to third party file explorers, only the sub-directories, like the files used by an app (those directories starting with “com.”) are resteicted and you need to manually grant permission using the method I said. I can access data and obb just fine using ZArchiver.
It is weird, I have a Redmi Note 9s and my phone comes with both a xiaomi files app and a google files app. I can’t see the data or obb folders with the xiaomi one but I can read and modify them with the google app one.
So I assume this limitation is only for third party apps?
Android 12 MIUI 14, got the update a week ago, but it has been like that since Android 11 if I’m not mistaken.
Solid Explorer has restored access to Android>obb and data folders since an update some time back fyi.
I used to root my Android phones. Then I stopped because all banking apps were disallowing launch if your phone was detected as having root.
yeah i wish there was a reliable way to fix this, last time i checked there werent any. also those apps didnt even show up in play store (ex.: revolut)
You can just hide root from those apps. I have everything working, even Google Pay.
Back when I looked into this, which was more than half a decade ago, it was a nightmare to figure out what worked and what didn’t. The XDA community is also hard to distangle.
Maybe it’s changed since then but I didn’t have the time to look into what worked and what didn’t.
People complain about this as if it’s some sort of massive roadblock that nobody’s solved yet.
Magisk Hide handles this and has been around for years. Venture around on the relevant XDA forum and SEARCH
If you’re talking about things like Google deprecating the two apps, then yes such things will continue. Google is slowly starting to sink (for whatever reason), and they are trying their hand at YouTube advertisements and Android.
But the source of Android is FOSS, and whilst Google does make up majority of the development efforts, if they were to close-source everything they would be causing massive ripples through the tech industry. I’m sure Samsung is going to try their (admittedly, very expensive) hand in court too if Google takes such a lick. So will Huawei and Xiaomi in the Chinese courts. Not to mention that Google benefits from the patches provided to Android from the FOSS community.
I don’t think it’s going to happen soon, if it does.
