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I will ask this question again: why not use android instead, since android is open source? Building another mobile OS from scratch seems ill advised, or what am
by jokoon 5y ago
I will ask this question again: why not use android instead, since android is open source? Building another mobile OS from scratch seems ill advised, or what am I missing?
If android is open source, it's not google-dependent. I think there's something that I don't understand, but I bet that the core of android can still be used by any phone manufacturer, so I don't really see why pinephone is making their own OS.
Does that mean that android, despite being open source, is hardly usable/customizable by developers, or too complex/bloated?
- jt_thurs_82 5y agoThere's a couple of big reasons, as I see it: - licensing: some people, myself included, think a FOSS/Libre license such as LGPL/GPL3 is better for people and society. Android is mostly apache, which means it's not resistant at all to a company "stealing" it without giving back to the community. - dependency on google: like it or not, key components of android are completely maintained by google. That means that the future of an open platform is at the whims of one organization. Sure, you could fork, but android is a massive project and a small team could hardly keep up. - "the core of android can still be used by any phone manufacturer": android, and the related IPs, is pretty firmly in the control of the US government. A lot of funding for non-android mobile OSes comes from other governments interested in a platform and support that is unencumbered from five eyes states My personal opinion? Having more platforms is good, as are more compatibility layers. Android is more than just an OS or a platform, it's a set of ABIs for running apps that's used by over a billion people.