4 ms·

Linux on mobile is a major step back both in terms of security and usability. Modern smartphone App Sandboxes are immensely better than desktop paradigms. Sidel

Linux on mobile is a major step back both in terms of security and usability. Modern smartphone App Sandboxes are immensely better than desktop paradigms. Sideloading should be allowed, tho.

mirekrusin 3y ago
Security and usability are not the only dimensions that matter. There are people who would like to use devices they own in alternative ways ie. to develop, experiment or simply not to throw perfectly functioning, un-updatable, just few years old hardware to the trash bin. Apple doesn't want their platform to be polluted with privileged, unsigned code. They don't want next security breach news headline to include their name in it if it originated from code they haven't verified/signed/created - because they put a lot of effort into securing their platform and profit out of it. Allowing running alternative OSes would make both sides happy, no?
- zgk7iqea 3y ago
  I'm all in for allowing alternate OSes, don't get me wrong :). I'm just saying that for most people it's a bad idea, especially regarding Linux. Linux's security is abysmal because the desktop security model is fundamentally flawed. Take Flatpak for example. While it is a big step forward in terms of portability, ease of use and security, it is still allows applications to pick their permissions themselves. Even dangerous ones like X11 display server access, full file system access or camera access. However, there already is a number of secure open source alternative mobile OSes based on Android, GrapheneOS for example. Also, driver blobs for modems are often out-of-date and insecure. Making the phone drivers fully open source will probably not happen. If you know what you’re doing, installing a different OS onto can be liberating and good for the environment – most of the time the hardware is perfectly fine, just the software becomes more bloated and slower as the device ages. It’s just - in my opinion - more risky.

Linux on mobile is a major step back both in terms of security and usability. Modern smartphone App Sandboxes are immensely better than desktop paradigms. Sideloading should be allowed, tho.

mirekrusin 3y ago

Security and usability are not the only dimensions that matter. There are people who would like to use devices they own in alternative ways ie. to develop, experiment or simply not to throw perfectly functioning, un-updatable, just few years old hardware to the trash bin. Apple doesn't want their platform to be polluted with privileged, unsigned code. They don't want next security breach news headline to include their name in it if it originated from code they haven't verified/signed/created - because they put a lot of effort into securing their platform and profit out of it. Allowing running alternative OSes would make both sides happy, no?

zgk7iqea 3y ago
I'm all in for allowing alternate OSes, don't get me wrong :). I'm just saying that for most people it's a bad idea, especially regarding Linux. Linux's security is abysmal because the desktop security model is fundamentally flawed. Take Flatpak for example. While it is a big step forward in terms of portability, ease of use and security, it is still allows applications to pick their permissions themselves. Even dangerous ones like X11 display server access, full file system access or camera access. However, there already is a number of secure open source alternative mobile OSes based on Android, GrapheneOS for example. Also, driver blobs for modems are often out-of-date and insecure. Making the phone drivers fully open source will probably not happen. If you know what you’re doing, installing a different OS onto can be liberating and good for the environment – most of the time the hardware is perfectly fine, just the software becomes more bloated and slower as the device ages. It’s just - in my opinion - more risky.