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I've been running Lineage OS without any Google Play Services and it's been pretty rough. A lot of apps from various APK mirrors just straight up don't work, ev

I've been running Lineage OS without any Google Play Services and it's been pretty rough. A lot of apps from various APK mirrors just straight up don't work, even when they seem like they shouldn't be affected at alll. F-Droid has been a great source for apps, especially when I'm seeking a particular need without a specific app in mind. Most recently that's been wanting a file browser and a PDF reader. The open-source focus is a nice bonus, but more importantly I consider its stability to be the best of all Play Store alternatives I've tried.

nimbius 5y ago
agreed. most people dont know, but you can install Signal as an APK from their website (although they throw in a healthy dose of fear mongering with it.)
fabianhjr 5y ago
> A lot of apps from various APK mirrors just straight up don't work > without any Google Play Services Have you tried microG? I have been intending to get into calyxOS since it has microG as default for compatibility.
- cheald 5y ago
  CalyxOS with MicroG is great - it all basically works, except for NFC payments and most Chromecasting. But MicroG does still provide some exposure to the Google ecosystem, so if your goal is to wholly sever then it won't be what people want. For people like me who just want a "best effort" reduction in tracking and telemetry, it's been great.
  - nosedief 5y ago
    neither of the two are great. MicroG stands in conflict with Android's security model by spoofing Google app signatures and being a deeply privileged app compromising the whole system's security. CalyX has is constantly harassing and bullying other privacy-focused projects, causing incredible harm to the privacy and security community. It also has been missing updates for 4 months recently, making it a terrible choice for anyone.
    - dmw_ng 5y ago
      > deeply privileged app compromising the whole system's security doesn't this also describe Google Play Services?
    - toastal 5y ago
      > Wait, on their FAQ page I see that they don't want to include the patch for security reasons. Is this ROM unsafe? > No. LineageOS' developers decided not to include this patch for various reasons. The signature spoofing could be an unsafe feature only if the user blindly gives any permission to any app, as this permission can't be obtained automatically by the apps. Moreover, to further strengthen the security of our ROM, we modified the signature spoofing permission so that only system privileged apps can obtain it, and no security threat is posed to our users. LineageOS for microG FAQs (https://lineage.microg.org/ https://lineage.microg.org/)
      - h4waii 5y ago
        This should be a show-stopper for anyone considering microg. https://github.com/microg/GmsCore/issues/1567 https://github.com/microg/GmsCore/issues/1567 Security is an afterthought for most Android distributions and most software built around them. I went from years of self building AOSP and LineageOS, and after a long hard look at why I was doing it, I stopped and installed GrapheneOS. While it's an extremely opinionated project and borderline hostile, I trust the developers to do things correctly and will continue to use and recommend for security-conscious individuals.
        toastal 5y ago
        I wish Pixel devices were easy to acquire in my country or I would have considered this. I was actually looking at it yesterday for my girlfriend's new phone.
    - kornhole 5y ago
      Check out GrapheneOS.org. You can optionally install a sandboxed Google Play services. I want CalyxOS to survive, but they are falling behind security updates.
  - loufe 5y ago
    I'm on it as well. A trick I found for getting around casting devices not showing up, at least in the cast of spotify casting devices a couple weeks back for me, was to install the app ControlDLNA from f-droid. Opened it once on the network and magically the casting options appeared and worked perfectly.
VZXvZXVBZ 5y ago
as another poster mentioned, microg is the way to go on lineage. add in the aurora play store client (package available in fdroid), and you're able to install/run the majority of apps found on the play store the biggest issue with this setup is that you need to manually install a location provider (like mozilla location service) for microg from f-droid, and importantly, adjust app permissions to allow the location provider to always run in the background. if you don't have the location provider installed and allowed to run in the background, a lot of apps like lyft, lime, uber, gig, etc will misbehave
ntnsndr 5y ago
Librera PRO is a great PDF (and eBook) reader on FDroid. And bonus: the version on FDroid is the paid version on Play (last time I checked).
PausGreat 5y ago
You might want to try Graphene OS. It supports running Google Play services in a sandbox.

nimbius 5y ago

agreed. most people dont know, but you can install Signal as an APK from their website (although they throw in a healthy dose of fear mongering with it.)

fabianhjr 5y ago

> A lot of apps from various APK mirrors just straight up don't work > without any Google Play Services Have you tried microG? I have been intending to get into calyxOS since it has microG as default for compatibility.

cheald 5y ago
CalyxOS with MicroG is great - it all basically works, except for NFC payments and most Chromecasting. But MicroG does still provide some exposure to the Google ecosystem, so if your goal is to wholly sever then it won't be what people want. For people like me who just want a "best effort" reduction in tracking and telemetry, it's been great.
- nosedief 5y ago
  neither of the two are great. MicroG stands in conflict with Android's security model by spoofing Google app signatures and being a deeply privileged app compromising the whole system's security. CalyX has is constantly harassing and bullying other privacy-focused projects, causing incredible harm to the privacy and security community. It also has been missing updates for 4 months recently, making it a terrible choice for anyone.
  - dmw_ng 5y ago
    > deeply privileged app compromising the whole system's security doesn't this also describe Google Play Services?
  - toastal 5y ago
    > Wait, on their FAQ page I see that they don't want to include the patch for security reasons. Is this ROM unsafe? > No. LineageOS' developers decided not to include this patch for various reasons. The signature spoofing could be an unsafe feature only if the user blindly gives any permission to any app, as this permission can't be obtained automatically by the apps. Moreover, to further strengthen the security of our ROM, we modified the signature spoofing permission so that only system privileged apps can obtain it, and no security threat is posed to our users. LineageOS for microG FAQs (https://lineage.microg.org/ https://lineage.microg.org/)
    - h4waii 5y ago
      This should be a show-stopper for anyone considering microg. https://github.com/microg/GmsCore/issues/1567 https://github.com/microg/GmsCore/issues/1567 Security is an afterthought for most Android distributions and most software built around them. I went from years of self building AOSP and LineageOS, and after a long hard look at why I was doing it, I stopped and installed GrapheneOS. While it's an extremely opinionated project and borderline hostile, I trust the developers to do things correctly and will continue to use and recommend for security-conscious individuals.
      - toastal 5y ago
        I wish Pixel devices were easy to acquire in my country or I would have considered this. I was actually looking at it yesterday for my girlfriend's new phone.
  - kornhole 5y ago
    Check out GrapheneOS.org. You can optionally install a sandboxed Google Play services. I want CalyxOS to survive, but they are falling behind security updates.
- loufe 5y ago
  I'm on it as well. A trick I found for getting around casting devices not showing up, at least in the cast of spotify casting devices a couple weeks back for me, was to install the app ControlDLNA from f-droid. Opened it once on the network and magically the casting options appeared and worked perfectly.

VZXvZXVBZ 5y ago

as another poster mentioned, microg is the way to go on lineage. add in the aurora play store client (package available in fdroid), and you're able to install/run the majority of apps found on the play store the biggest issue with this setup is that you need to manually install a location provider (like mozilla location service) for microg from f-droid, and importantly, adjust app permissions to allow the location provider to always run in the background. if you don't have the location provider installed and allowed to run in the background, a lot of apps like lyft, lime, uber, gig, etc will misbehave

ntnsndr 5y ago

Librera PRO is a great PDF (and eBook) reader on FDroid. And bonus: the version on FDroid is the paid version on Play (last time I checked).

PausGreat 5y ago

You might want to try Graphene OS. It supports running Google Play services in a sandbox.