I am considering the purchase of a Garmin GPS watch, but I don't want to run the bloated Garmin Connect app on my phone. Really all I want, is the ability to pull coordinates from my watch (.gpx files) and put them on my phone or computer. Does a privacy-respecting app like this exist?

Having been on Android since day 1, I've had to pick up an iphone for work purposes recently. It's a great, high end one. The hardware is clearly fantastic.

But the software. How do people put up with this? I've been trying to get accustomed to it, but it's so clearly lackluster.

Aside from a plethora of minor issues I've been encountering, what's most unbelievable to me is how clear the lock-in is all over the place.

Things like the story about all browsers having to use the Safari view really seep out, for example I can't change the launcher/home screen to something that doesn't suck (lets me position things around and doesn't have the display density of a toddler's typewriter).

And then it was a chore to even figure out how to disable iMessage (unpopular in Europe) so I'm only sending sms via the .. sms app.

Incompatibilities all over the place. Hotspot sharing doesn't work across my 6T and iPhone, it looks like iOS hotspots are again some kind of proprietary crap. Pictures and videos being in not quite standard formats. AirPods sound quality only being decent in the Apple ecosystem as well; couldn't release an Android app to support whatever Bluetooth enhancements they're doing?

And of course, the Lightning connectors which only exist in the apple ecosystem. I agree they feel better than usb-c even, but, more of those same incompatibilities.

It almost feels like a parallel universe where everything works slightly differently, and doesn't quite have as many freedoms.

I can't deny there's some nice things in there. I actually like Safari's hold-preview for example. I also appreciate the very fine grained permission system and warnings such as "such and such app has been accessing location in the background a lot". And FaceID is really well built. But, whew, i do not know how so many people swear by it.

Some things are just different and that's okay, but some things are shockingly inferior and incompatible Just Because, and that feels super insulting 🙃

Thanks for hearing my rant.

I'm rather bored of the constant pop up ads on my current one that I paid for ads to be removed for years ago before more recently they changed to a subscription requirement for advert removal.

I'm looking for something easy to use that has no ads by default or has a one time payment to remove them. Extra features such as tags/folders would be great but not 100% required. Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

Inspired by a similar thread @kfwyre posted a while ago.

I've been given an Android phone for a work contract and I don't want to carry two devices, so I will likely migrate from my Blackberry Z10 soon. The BB10 OS (not to be confused with BBOS, which ran the Bolds, etc. of BB's heyday) was intuitive, useful, and wayyyyy better than most people who never used it would have expected, only being doomed by the app gap. I'd have considered buying another Blackberry this year if I hadn't been given this other phone. I have long been wary of Android due to both privacy concerns and UI/UX gripes. Having tooled around for a couple days already, I'm struck by how many simple things I apparently can't do out of the box, and the fact that there are so. many. ads. Even in the apps! I know I will root and de-Google the device as much as I can once I get a hang of the OS.

So, I'm mainly looking for app recommendations, but general advice is appreciated as well. My use case is very functional - email, scheduling, messaging, browsing, navigation, weather, and calls. Preference given to FOSS and/or ad-free apps, but I'll pay up if it's really worth it. So far I've uninstalled a bunch of bloatware, installed Firefox, found SwiftKey to be the only half-decent replacement for Blackberry's terrific keyboard software, and the best free no-ad weather app looks to be a Norwegian one called Yr.

Here's a list of Paid Games & Apps that I already have bought.

Utils

• Tasker
• KLWP
• Sleep as Android
• Nova Prime
• One or two Icon packs for Nova

Games

• Desert Golfing
• Death Road To Canada 2
• Meteorfall
• Mindustry
• Mini Metro
• Ordia
• Prune
• Reigns
• Reigns: Her Majesty
• RowRow
• Teslagrad
• UnCiv
• .projekt
• Sword and Sworcery

I'm looking for something worthwhile to spend it on. Is there a lesser known utility app that you use all the time? What about an indie game not getting the praise it deserves? Tell me about it!

I've been all in on Android for quite a while, but I'll be making the jump to an iPhone with the next phone I get, which will end up being soon, as my current one is having some hardware issues.

What do I need to know about crossing over?

In particular, I would like to leave my Google account behind and NOT have it logged into my new phone. I use Fastmail for my email and contacts -- will I be able to sync my contacts easily to an iOS device from it, or will I have to import them into iCloud?

I'm also open to app recommendations for basic stuff -- preferably ones that are open-source and privacy-friendly. On Android I run a lot of stuff out of F-Droid, but I know iOS is a lot more locked down, so I'm interested to know what the best options are in their store (I have no interest in jailbreaking mg device).

Also, are there any huge disadvantages I should be aware of regarding older models? The new line just came out, which means the older ones are cheaper, and I'm a casual enough phone user that I should be fine with older hardware, but I want to know if there are any big tradeoffs.

Finally, if there are any cool iOS tips or tricks I should know about, let me know!

In a pursuit of a more privacy-oriented mobile computing I've installed LineageOS ROM on my phone and decided to try living without Google Play Services, which usually provide aGPS (cell tower geopositioning), push notifications and lots of other frameworks like Google Maps that apps use as libraries.

My phone has 4 primary uses:

• Communicator - mostly Telegram, WhatsApp and Slack. Email of-course.
• Navigator - GPS and Maps are an irreplaceable tool if you're living in a modern metropolis
• Internet browser - obviously
• Music Player - music on the go

So let's see how you're supposed to tackle each of the uses, while using as much FOSS as possible.

0. System functionality - both push notifications and aGPS can be solved by microG - fake Google Play Services library. Not sure how it implements push, but aGPS is checked against Mozilla's geolocation database.
1. Communications - Telegram is available on F-Droid (OSS app store), but everything else is not. The solution here is to use Aurora (Play Store front-end to rip APKs) and install them manually. Push notifications might be broken even with microG (WhatsApp is missing notifications for me, sometimes). AOSP email is fine, K9-mail is ugly but works somewhat better.
2. Maps and navigation: OpenStreetMap is the obvious choice here and OsmAnd delivers the frontend. It has enough metadata for businesses to get you around, but compared to Google Maps it's can be sometimes lacking and/or out-of-date. Navigation itself is decent, but it's missing timetables for public transportation compared to GMaps, which can be a problem, especially if trains are cancelled or delayed. Overall it's very usable, almost feature complete, but I've found myself falling back to Google Maps in my browser when it comes to using public transport.
3. Internet browser - Firefox, with uBlock Origin installed (yes, it works on Android) it's really good.
4. Music Player - there are tons of music players available on F-Droid, you can pick whichever suits your needs. Here I actually stepped away from the FOSS and bought myself a PowerAMP license on developer's website. One of the rare moments where paid Android software is available outside of Play Store.

Now that the primary use cases are solved, let's try some other useful apps:

• E-banking? Broken without Google Play, app refuses to even start properly.
• Bike sharing? Taxi app? Public transport app? Broken without Google Maps libraries for the obvious reason. You might or might not be able to use the browser version, depending on the app.
• Reddit Relay/any app that requires the license? Okay you've ripped the APK with Aurora, but you can't buy the license to remove the ads.
• Ebook reader? Nothing good on F-Droid, have to rip something off Aurora.

Basically you have to be prepared to use your mobile browser a lot. And for some of the sites, do it in a "desktop mode" with tiny text, since the mobile version will just nag you to download the app, that might be broken.

The takeaway is simple - you give up A LOT of convenience just to cut off Google analytics (which you still might get with apps like Slack). It's certainly usable, don't get me wrong, but I still feel kind of stupid fumbling with OsmAnd when I'm out with my friends and trying to look something up. I'll probably end up going back to the stock ROM, or just installing the Google Apps. For me it was an experiment and I think I've got a general feel on how much information and use I'm actually getting out of GApps.

So Tildes, have you tried degoogling your phone? How did it go? Are you still using it?

I've been using Textra for years, but there's some new protocol whose name I don't remember that Textra isn't compatible with. This results in some messages (primarily from other LG phones to my LG phone) going only to the LG Messaging app and not Textra, which is annoying. Any recommendations?