I've been using PDAa just about as long as they have been around. I started
with Steve Job's experiment, I forget its name, and liked it. But one has
to admit it was definitely clunky. And when Apple abandoned it, I did too.
So it was on to the ubiquitous Palm Pilot. I had several, including a
Color. For reasons I don't remember except maybe to move up in the world, I
switched to Google's Nexus 2013. Believe it or not, I still have it, and it
still works. But OMG it is S L O W! I've been playing with it a little bit
lately, and I don't remember if it was always that slow, or what. In 2017 I
upgraded to an ASUS ZenPad S8. It was nice but. I really don't remember why
I upgraded to my SAMSUNG Galaxy Tab S6 Lite in 2020, but I had the money so
I went for it. It is my current tablet/PDA, and I don't have any complaints
so I'm going to stick with it for a while, probably until the next
generation of Android omes out. I bought a full-size bluetooth keyboard and
used the Tab as my quasi PC for a while. Not as useful as a full-size
laptop, but it does travel better.

So who is doing third-party Android builds these days?

MajorLanGod <lonelydad58@gmail.com> wrote:

> So who is doing third-party Android builds these days?

I did an online search on "android distro", like:

https://www.google.com/search?q=android+distro

A Wikipedia article lists several:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_custom_Android_distributions

Several hits were on LineageOS which, as I recall, might've been
discussed here already.

Another article mentiond de-Googled Android distros at:

https://itsfoss.com/android-distributions-roms/

From what I understand (never much delved into rooting my phone or
replacing the OS), you have to change the firmware code; i.e., you get
different ROM code (and to flash it means it must be EEPROM).

As the above article recommends, you should do this on a spare
(non-critical) device since you could end up bricking it.

If you go that route, you might also want to go with de-Googled apps
(obviously acquired outside their Play Store), like a replacement for
the Play Store app.

On 11 Jul 2023 17:44:25 GMT MajorLanGod wrote:
>I've been using PDAa just about as long as they have been around. I started
>with Steve Job's experiment, I forget its name, and liked it. But one has
>to admit it was definitely clunky. And when Apple abandoned it, I did too.
>So it was on to the ubiquitous Palm Pilot. I had several, including a
>Color. For reasons I don't remember except maybe to move up in the world, I
>switched to Google's Nexus 2013. Believe it or not, I still have it, and it
>still works. But OMG it is S L O W! I've been playing with it a little bit
>lately, and I don't remember if it was always that slow, or what. In 2017 I
>upgraded to an ASUS ZenPad S8. It was nice but. I really don't remember why
>I upgraded to my SAMSUNG Galaxy Tab S6 Lite in 2020, but I had the money so
>I went for it. It is my current tablet/PDA, and I don't have any complaints
>so I'm going to stick with it for a while, probably until the next
>generation of Android omes out. I bought a full-size bluetooth keyboard and
>used the Tab as my quasi PC for a while. Not as useful as a full-size
>laptop, but it does travel better.
>
>So who is doing third-party Android builds these days?

PDA: not an abbreviation you see much these days!

Do you mean the Apple Newton? That was not Steve Jobs.

I had a Zaurus SL860. It ran Linux - and (desktop) Firefox. I used it
tethered to a Nokia phone to get weather forecasts when sailing.
Unfortunately I plugged the power adapter in with the wrong polarity and
blew a fuse which I couldn't replace.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Zaurus_sl-c860.JPG

Then a Nokia 810 running Maemo, also tethered to a phone. The first device
to get mobile Firefox.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:N810-open.png
Then several Samsungs and Nexuses, most of which still work, and were
rootable. The Pixel C was the best, but it broke.

I also now use a GT S6 lite as my main device.
--
(Remove numerics from email address)

MajorLanGod <lonelydad58@gmail.com> wrote:
> So who is doing third-party Android builds these days?

I did LineageOS (formerly CyanogenMod) for a while. Unfortunately my phone
at the time (Galaxy Note 4) wasn't officially supported so I was on a build
from a community developer, which was amazing that it was possible but every
build would always have something not working. It kept the Note 4 going for
5 years after release which is a lot longer than Samsung did. I also have
an S4 which is officially supported and that's much better (and still
getting monthly builds).

Been playing with GrapheneOS lately and it looks good. A Pixel seems to be
the phone to get if you're interested in third party Android as it's the
most well-supported - others have varying levels of support for different
phones. It seems like GrapheneOS picks up new Pixel hardware very rapidly -
they had test builds available for the Pixel Tablet and Pixel Fold a few
hours/days after their release, despite never supporting tablets before.

Theo

Dave Royal<dave@dave123royal.com> wrote in
news:u8kgu4$3102m$1@dont-email.me:

>
> PDA: not an abbreviation you see much these days!
>
> Do you mean the Apple Newton? That was not Steve Jobs.
>
Yeah. I just assumed Steve sine it was Apple. The Newon was a nice box
until Apple dropped it and the rest of the industry started catching up.

It got me started on rechargeable AAs :=)