featured [he/him]

How usable is a proot distro? I was considering using it for my tablet for some light programming

It shows for me but without animation, my server is federated w ml

In the GrapheneOS development room there’s a lot of talk about finding an OEM to get security partner status from and/or to design a grapheneos specific device. I saw they were tentatively chatting to the CEO of Mecha (currently crowdfunding for a Linux handheld called the comet) as well as another anonymous Android OEM lead. So I’d say be patient, wait and see. I’m confident the project will continue, hopefully with full support for pixels via a partnership but potentially on their own hardware.

As somebody else mentioned, using a computer and just taking calls there would work and give you solid control over microphone activation etc. If you really want the landline experience, look into adding a USB handset to that setup. It’ll just act like a mic and headphone from your computer but in the classic phone form factor

Professional audits happen for big projects, and hobbyists audit the programs they use frequently. In addition, some projects adhere to the reproducible builds guidelines, which ensures the packages you’re receiving are identical to the upstream repo. There’s more work to be done in formalizing and automating these processes but this isn’t a major issue by any means

Just make sure they know anything they put on these big tech platforms are there forever, regardless of what claims they make about “disappearing messages” etc. Do your best to guide them towards encrypted services for their own protection. As much as I hate this, iPhones are a decent recommendation in the US since almost every young person uses iMessage as the default, and that has end to end encryption available. Work to inform them on the dangers of corporate spying and profiling, as well as data leaks and security, and let them have some sovereignty over their platforms. Keeping an eye on them is good; isolating them from important modern social circles isn’t. Inform and educate first and foremost

You can use proton in an email client, but you have to install their bridge service first. This is the only way I use it personally

Vaultwarden is perfect imo

This is accurate. Additionally, the WebKit rendering engine that they have to use is open source, so not too bad imo

Random applications that use the play integrity API won’t work on any third party OSes or ROMs. For example I tried to install some Intuit app on my GOS Pixel a while back (credit karma I think?) and it didn’t work at all

Mostly LibreWolf, but I’ve been enjoying Zen Browser recently. It’s based on Firefox but with lots of cool extra functionality baked in. It is still in alpha though and I’ve experienced some bugs, including it crashing my whole system a couple of times, but it’s very promising

I’d recommend checking out Distrobox, which allows you to create containers of other Linux distros then export their applications as if they were native. Install a distrobox with one of the distros that this program works with, use the terminal to install the program within it, then if it isn’t immediately in your applications menu use the distrobox export feature to place it there.

You could also layer Nix onto your bazzite image and install it that way, but if you don’t know Nix it’ll be complicated

I’ve been into NixOS recently, not sure if I’m gonna stick with it long term but I’m trying to make it work. I love that it’s immutable while still allowing system packages, and declaratively configuring all of your common programs with home manager is super cool. Just have issues with scripts from the internet and trying to get nix-ld to cooperate

They’re agreeing with you…

On the topic of struggling to connect to self hosted services without a VPS or domain: check out mesh VPNs like ZeroTier or Tailscale. I access all my internal services over Tailscale these days and it’s super simple

By default Apple holds your iCloud encryption keys. So if you message somebody who uses iCloud without advanced data protection turned on then that encryption isn’t worth a whole lot, they can unlock it and have given up that data many times

As somebody who has used graphene for a long time, it certainly comes with sacrifices compared to stock android or iOS just by the nature of being a non-stock OS due to Google’s integrity stuff. The biggest thing I miss from my iPhone is putting my cards into my phone’s wallet and using tap to pay. Graphene can do concert tickets, boarding passes etc but not full GPay functionality. However that’s my biggest gripe. I still use iMessage for group chats that I’ve had for years where people won’t migrate; I host a BlueBubbles server at home and it forwards it all to my pixel. Never had a yubikey so I can’t speak to that issue unfortunately. I wish you the best of luck in finding workarounds or converting back, whatever is best for you. Remember that privacy is about balance; clarify your threat model and your social needs and work to find an appropriate compromise

Play integrity api is implemented by some app developers to check OS integrity. Google blocks all third party OSes from utilizing this verification method, including GrapheneOS. This isn’t new, what’s new are the apps that utilize this integrity API which is where the story comes from. Most apps still work without it. Graphene has full support for hardware anttestation and they’re pushing for this to be the norm rather than relying on Google as the gatekeeper. I use graphene every day, and while I mostly use FOSS apps from other repos, the stuff I personally use from the play store works perfectly

I was using Nix but ran into some software compatibility issues so I’m back on Arch. It’s obviously not immutable and doesn’t have generations, but using btrfs + snapper + snap-pac + grub-btrfs has given me an automated system of snapshots that let me roll back to my system state before or after each package change (As well as weekly snapshots). It has been rock solid and reliable for me. On my Debian server I just use ZFS and snapshot it weekly, which isn’t as easy to roll back but it does everything I need

I use ntfy on graphene and it works just fine. I had to fully disable battery optimizations but that was it