5 ms·

Someone should do a Linux phone that scales way back: 1. you can dial phone numbers somehow 2. you can talk on the phone 3. you can hear the person on the ot

Someone should do a Linux phone that scales way back: 1. you can dial phone numbers somehow 2. you can talk on the phone 3. you can hear the person on the other line 4. the cell reception on the phone is decent quality 5. antenna is properly placed for very good reception 6. basic SMS works, all the time 7. has been extensively tested to work with a single carrier, any other carrier is no warranty 8. boot time and shutdown time are so small that it opportunistically shuts down instead of suspend 9. bonus goal: contacts, can maybe play snake Librem 5 fails #5 and #8 (and can't really succeed at #8 unless you just drop into a command line, but then you wouldn't be able to input phone numbers). I've read some reports that #1, #2, and #3 have improved enough to be usable. On #7, they offer a bundle with a simcard for a carrier that was tested with the phone. (Doubt it was extensively tested, though.) Of the little I've read about Pinephone and Pinephone Pro, they've had problems with #3, #6, and #7, and #8. Overall, however, both appear as a smartphone complete with messaging and browsers. But Librem 5 can't do hardware acceleration for Firefox ESR (because the etnaviv driver doesn't have recent enough OpenGL features for webrender to work). Pinephone is too slow to browse. I'm not sure about Pinephone Pro (though I'd be quite surprised if it passes the Firefox webrender tests). I'd much prefer a much more basic device that gets all the basics right, and then be pleasantly surprised that I can play mp3s on it, too.

SketchySeaBeast 3y ago
Doesn't #8's opportunistic shutdown prevent it from functioning as a phone and receiving calls?
- jancsika 3y ago
  Damn, I guess I unwittingly revealed my phonecall preferences. :) Edit: Isn't there some kind of wake-on-lan on arm chips that the Baseband OS could use?
- pengaru 3y ago
  Not necessarily, if the cell modem stays powered on and can "wake" the application processor into booting when a call/sms is received.
  - jancsika 3y ago
    That's what I had in mind. (See my edit above from earlier.) Especially since both Pinephone and Librem devs are essentially dumpster diving for their hardware. Even Dell with all its resources couldn't get fast suspend on Ubuntu working (or whatever it's called). And that was just x86_64. But even I know how to power an RPI on/off! (I can even run the systemd thingy that reports startup times for various processes, which already puts us years ahead of the competition.) If we work smart I honestly believe we can have a Linux device with the feature set and battery life of my LG VX5200 by the year 2030. Edit: here's a sheet on that wonderful little indestructable device: https://www.lg.com/us/mobile-phones/pdf/VX5200_Datasheet.pdf https://www.lg.com/us/mobile-phones/pdf/VX5200_Datasheet.pdf Notice the support for "Mobile Web 2.0!" I don't believe that included SVG-- so already we're even closer to our goal!!!
- lytedev 3y ago
  Yes. Additionally, why would you want this specifically? I think OP just wants better battery life?
  - anonymouskimmer 3y ago
    If you're going as basic as OP wants you can get 10+ days on a typical phone battery regardless, just by implementing battery saver. I've done it with both smart and feature phones.
anonym29 3y ago
https://www.punkt.ch/en/products/mp02-4g-mobile-phone/ https://www.punkt.ch/en/products/mp02-4g-mobile-phone/ Not advocating for this, I do not own one, but I'm pretty sure this substantially covers all goals listed minus #8 (plus an unlisted one - Signal integration). I investigated and considered this option carefully. Ultimately ended up doing a Pixel running GrapheneOS (no microG) as a stop-gap until I buy either a Pinephone or Librem, once those are a little more usable.
- NovaDudely 3y ago
  Punkt if it had an open software stack would have a sizable market, not main stream but definitely something reasonable. Something else that platforms like that, and for everyone else, is a standardized means of communicating with banks. That way it is not up to the bank to build and maintain apps for seperate platforms. That one devices like Punkt could build alternative apps to do these kinds of functions. Great in theory, a nightmare in practice. It would open up the means of fake apps to steal details. Also as the XKCD comics said - You have 15 standards, lets make a new better one, there are now 16 standards. Side note on Punkt. They have one of the best monthly emails and I would highly recommend. Usually only a 2-3 minute read, lot of promoting their alarm clock (whatever) has a decent book recommendation and occasionally a link to a short article.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - jancsika 3y ago
    > lot of promoting their alarm clock (whatever) Maybe we should back up before smartphones. Even back up before desktops. Could 2023 be the year of the Linux alarm clock?
    - NovaDudely 3y ago
      Doesn't need linux, it is an actual physical alarm clock! https://www.punkt.ch/en/products/ac02-alarm-clock/ https://www.punkt.ch/en/products/ac02-alarm-clock/
charukiewicz 3y ago
> Librem 5 fails #5 Where's the Librem 5 antenna? Can you link to reports of reception issues stemming from this?
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
maratc 3y ago
The meaning of the word "phone" has shifted in the recent years, and your requirements are a good representation of what that word meant in circa 2007; recently however the requirements 1-8 have so little relevance that it's possible to operate a device without satisfying any of them [0]. The new meaning of the word is an expanded version of #9 whereas it's a connected gadget that runs apps from the well-stocked built-in store. Any newcomer, Linux or not, would immediately face the most obvious problem, which is a complete lack of a well-stocked store. [0] I sometimes take my smartphone abroad for a combination of offline Google Maps and WiFi hopping.
- LorenDB 3y ago
  Android devices could push something like https://gitlab.com/AuroraOSS/AuroraStore https://gitlab.com/AuroraOSS/AuroraStore or even F-Droid to get a preinstalled store that's not completely evil. For Linux devices, if you have a powerful enough phone (Pine64, can we please have a really beefy PinePhone?), you could bundle Waydroid + Aurora/F-Droid.
- AdamJacobMuller 3y ago
  Exactly true. From the original list, I really don't care at all about 1/2/3 (phone calls) and only care vaguely about SMS. My requirements are for an excellent browser and an app store with support for messaging platforms (telegram/signal/skype/slack/teams/etc) and email support, everything else is either "extra" or an outright distraction I'd probably be better off without (twitter, reddit, etc).
  - TRiG_Ireland 3y ago
    My phone exists mostly for YouTube, WhatsApp, and providing a wifi hotspot for my desktop computers. (It is irritating that much about the phone itself assumes that the mobile broadband is a fallback, and that I have a separate internet connection to give me wifi. I don't. It sometimes refuses to install updates over mobile broadband, and insists that I find a wifi connection from somewhere, by going out to a café or something.)
- moqmar 3y ago
Mochsner 3y ago
Would muditaOS qualify?
snvzz 3y ago
Genode[0] takes care of the software part. Microkernel multiserver with capabilities proper. 0. https://genodians.org/nfeske/2023-02-01-mobile-sculpt https://genodians.org/nfeske/2023-02-01-mobile-sculpt
horeszko 3y ago
I've been daily driving a PinePhone running postmarketOS + phosh for the last month and here is what I've found: 1. Yes, has a dialpad. Works as you would expect 2, 3, 4. Yes, works well on my carrier 5. The antenna is along the side of the phone I believe and the reception seems good, I haven't had issues with this 6. I would say SMS only works about 95% percent of the time. The phone does randomly disconnect from the celluar network maybe once every day or two 7. Works well on my carrier, no issues here. I have a data plan and it works fine 8. It takes maybe a minute or two to boot, but to be fair my Samsung A52 Android takes longer to boot, maybe 2 minutes 9. Yes, there is a contact app, don't know about snake :) Other: 10. The phone is slow, firefox works and all the websites I visit (including google maps, uber, etc.) render and work correctly, but slowly. I wouldn't say too slow to browse, but 100% it is slow 11. Be CAREFUL inserting the SIM card, it is extremely easy to break the SIM pins and brick the phone if the SIM card is not inserted correctly (I learnt this the hard way) 12. Surprisingly a large amount of apps available via flatpak/flathub, including both foss apps for things like email and 3rd party clients for things like spotify and whatsapp (text only, no video or audio calls). All the core linux stuff and lots of the foss apps via apk 13. However not all apps on flathub are compatible with the PinePhone since PinePhones uses aarch64 architecture, not x86_64 14. Very poor battery life out of the box, about 4 hours tops. However, after installing tlp and irqbalance (via apk) and setting auto-suspend to 1 minute, the battery life is about 8 to 12 hours of "normal" usage, so quite usuable 15. Camera is very basic
- seanp2k2 3y ago
  Pinephone Pro here, I wanted to use it as a home automation controller around the house, I think I bricked the keyboard case attachment by using the wrong charging port (why is that even a thing??) because it doesn't work, but to be fair, it never did work, and I've tried troubleshooting it for a few hours with no joy, so now I'm just kinda too frustrated with it to sink more time into it and it's sitting in a drawer. I should probably try postmarketOS on it and use it as a burner travel phone.
- xethos 3y ago
  You only mention installing, but did you have to configure tlp & irqbalance? Battery life is all that's keeping me from using my pro as a daily phone :)
narag 3y ago
1 .. 7 are must haves for me and also: · I can program the phone to block numbers and send http requests over the net. · Tethering, even if I need a USB cable for that. · I can record calls. Both sides. If I can't program it, I'd just buy a dumbphone. If I can tether, I can do without anything else, just carrying a tablet or small laptop. For me, all this is obvious, but it doesn't seem the same for others.
coldpie 3y ago
You can still buy flip phones, seems like that meets all of your requirements?
awiesenhofer 3y ago
So basically KaiOS/FirefoxOS? Seems like every Nokia/HMD feature phone should fit all your points nowadays.
BSEdlMMldESB 3y ago
0. it must be able to use the internet; with this, the rest of the software should be able to be ported/emulated somehow. number 7 points at why this won't really work. providers can just say it's a security vulnerability and shut this kind of cellphone down. 8. would be awesome, it's even a good idea for typical locked down smartphones because the battery life!
chongli 3y ago
What do #1-#8 have to do with Linux? As far as I can tell, nothing. A flip phone will cover your use case nicely. Personally, I have no interest in making phone calls. 99% of the time when my phone rings it’s a spam call. The other 1% of the time it’s one of my uncles or aunts, all of whom are in their 80’s or thereabouts. After they pass on, I will have no reason at all to make a phone call, except perhaps to book a doctor’s appointment with some doctor who hasn’t switched over to online booking.
- fooqux 3y ago
  > Personally, I have no interest in making phone calls. You say that now, but wait until you need to dial 911.
  - pwenzel 3y ago
    [flagged]
    - chongli 3y ago
      Cop showed up at my house 2 days ago at 2am. Roommate apparently sleep-dialed 911.
    - AdamJacobMuller 3y ago
      Obviously situationally dependent (where you live, why you're calling) and of course you should have the ability to defend yourself if the cops fail to preform, but all that aside, that is not a universal truth. I called my local PD # a few weeks back because someone on a scooter got hit by a car in front of my house and I called the police (local PD directly, not 911, 911 would have been slower) and they had a unit at my house in UNDER TWO MINUTES. It's literally four minutes to drive (sans lights and sirens) from the police station to my house. I know my experience is anecdotal and not universal, but neither is the "cops won't show up" one.
  - jstarfish 3y ago
    Phones really need a hardware button or key combination for this-- tap out SOS on the power button or something. It may well be the last phone call one makes in their life, but the ability to do it at all is predicated on the integrity of a piece of glass. It's insane.
slondr 3y ago
shutting down means you cannot receive phone calls. This is actually one of the major problems linux phone operating system hackers have been trying to solve — idle power consumption is really really important for a cell phone, but most hardware open enough to run custom operating systems on don’t have easy ways to suspend to a reliable low-power state.
askvictor 3y ago
#7 - so you're suggesting it only work in a single country? I think that to be practical, you're going to outsource the cellular comms to a prebuilt module that's got the carrier certification already sorted out.
harry8 3y ago
The Nokia N900 made short work of all of that on all carriers in this country a decade ago. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_N900 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_N900
__MatrixMan__ 3y ago
This is pretty close: https://www.wiphone.io/ https://www.wiphone.io/ I have one, played snake on it, liked it (hurray for real buttons). Haven't bothered set it up as my daily driver because 90% of my phone usage is Signal and so far as I know that's not yet working. If somebody has the bandwidth to hack on it in a way that will move the project forward, I'll send them mine for free. I love the idea but it's just not my kind of tinkering.
interlinked 3y ago
Just package virtualbox in a midrange android phone with an OS image that does what you want. Maybe some port forwarding to make phone calls and stuff.

SketchySeaBeast 3y ago

Doesn't #8's opportunistic shutdown prevent it from functioning as a phone and receiving calls?

jancsika 3y ago
Damn, I guess I unwittingly revealed my phonecall preferences. :) Edit: Isn't there some kind of wake-on-lan on arm chips that the Baseband OS could use?
pengaru 3y ago
Not necessarily, if the cell modem stays powered on and can "wake" the application processor into booting when a call/sms is received.
- jancsika 3y ago
  That's what I had in mind. (See my edit above from earlier.) Especially since both Pinephone and Librem devs are essentially dumpster diving for their hardware. Even Dell with all its resources couldn't get fast suspend on Ubuntu working (or whatever it's called). And that was just x86_64. But even I know how to power an RPI on/off! (I can even run the systemd thingy that reports startup times for various processes, which already puts us years ahead of the competition.) If we work smart I honestly believe we can have a Linux device with the feature set and battery life of my LG VX5200 by the year 2030. Edit: here's a sheet on that wonderful little indestructable device: https://www.lg.com/us/mobile-phones/pdf/VX5200_Datasheet.pdf https://www.lg.com/us/mobile-phones/pdf/VX5200_Datasheet.pdf Notice the support for "Mobile Web 2.0!" I don't believe that included SVG-- so already we're even closer to our goal!!!
lytedev 3y ago
Yes. Additionally, why would you want this specifically? I think OP just wants better battery life?
- anonymouskimmer 3y ago
  If you're going as basic as OP wants you can get 10+ days on a typical phone battery regardless, just by implementing battery saver. I've done it with both smart and feature phones.

anonym29 3y ago

https://www.punkt.ch/en/products/mp02-4g-mobile-phone/ https://www.punkt.ch/en/products/mp02-4g-mobile-phone/ Not advocating for this, I do not own one, but I'm pretty sure this substantially covers all goals listed minus #8 (plus an unlisted one - Signal integration). I investigated and considered this option carefully. Ultimately ended up doing a Pixel running GrapheneOS (no microG) as a stop-gap until I buy either a Pinephone or Librem, once those are a little more usable.

NovaDudely 3y ago
Punkt if it had an open software stack would have a sizable market, not main stream but definitely something reasonable. Something else that platforms like that, and for everyone else, is a standardized means of communicating with banks. That way it is not up to the bank to build and maintain apps for seperate platforms. That one devices like Punkt could build alternative apps to do these kinds of functions. Great in theory, a nightmare in practice. It would open up the means of fake apps to steal details. Also as the XKCD comics said - You have 15 standards, lets make a new better one, there are now 16 standards. Side note on Punkt. They have one of the best monthly emails and I would highly recommend. Usually only a 2-3 minute read, lot of promoting their alarm clock (whatever) has a decent book recommendation and occasionally a link to a short article.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- jancsika 3y ago
  > lot of promoting their alarm clock (whatever) Maybe we should back up before smartphones. Even back up before desktops. Could 2023 be the year of the Linux alarm clock?
  - NovaDudely 3y ago
    Doesn't need linux, it is an actual physical alarm clock! https://www.punkt.ch/en/products/ac02-alarm-clock/ https://www.punkt.ch/en/products/ac02-alarm-clock/

charukiewicz 3y ago

> Librem 5 fails #5 Where's the Librem 5 antenna? Can you link to reports of reception issues stemming from this?

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

maratc 3y ago

The meaning of the word "phone" has shifted in the recent years, and your requirements are a good representation of what that word meant in circa 2007; recently however the requirements 1-8 have so little relevance that it's possible to operate a device without satisfying any of them [0]. The new meaning of the word is an expanded version of #9 whereas it's a connected gadget that runs apps from the well-stocked built-in store. Any newcomer, Linux or not, would immediately face the most obvious problem, which is a complete lack of a well-stocked store. [0] I sometimes take my smartphone abroad for a combination of offline Google Maps and WiFi hopping.

LorenDB 3y ago
Android devices could push something like https://gitlab.com/AuroraOSS/AuroraStore https://gitlab.com/AuroraOSS/AuroraStore or even F-Droid to get a preinstalled store that's not completely evil. For Linux devices, if you have a powerful enough phone (Pine64, can we please have a really beefy PinePhone?), you could bundle Waydroid + Aurora/F-Droid.
AdamJacobMuller 3y ago
Exactly true. From the original list, I really don't care at all about 1/2/3 (phone calls) and only care vaguely about SMS. My requirements are for an excellent browser and an app store with support for messaging platforms (telegram/signal/skype/slack/teams/etc) and email support, everything else is either "extra" or an outright distraction I'd probably be better off without (twitter, reddit, etc).
- TRiG_Ireland 3y ago
  My phone exists mostly for YouTube, WhatsApp, and providing a wifi hotspot for my desktop computers. (It is irritating that much about the phone itself assumes that the mobile broadband is a fallback, and that I have a separate internet connection to give me wifi. I don't. It sometimes refuses to install updates over mobile broadband, and insists that I find a wifi connection from somewhere, by going out to a café or something.)
moqmar 3y ago

Mochsner 3y ago

Would muditaOS qualify?

snvzz 3y ago

Genode[0] takes care of the software part. Microkernel multiserver with capabilities proper. 0. https://genodians.org/nfeske/2023-02-01-mobile-sculpt https://genodians.org/nfeske/2023-02-01-mobile-sculpt

horeszko 3y ago

I've been daily driving a PinePhone running postmarketOS + phosh for the last month and here is what I've found: 1. Yes, has a dialpad. Works as you would expect 2, 3, 4. Yes, works well on my carrier 5. The antenna is along the side of the phone I believe and the reception seems good, I haven't had issues with this 6. I would say SMS only works about 95% percent of the time. The phone does randomly disconnect from the celluar network maybe once every day or two 7. Works well on my carrier, no issues here. I have a data plan and it works fine 8. It takes maybe a minute or two to boot, but to be fair my Samsung A52 Android takes longer to boot, maybe 2 minutes 9. Yes, there is a contact app, don't know about snake :) Other: 10. The phone is slow, firefox works and all the websites I visit (including google maps, uber, etc.) render and work correctly, but slowly. I wouldn't say too slow to browse, but 100% it is slow 11. Be CAREFUL inserting the SIM card, it is extremely easy to break the SIM pins and brick the phone if the SIM card is not inserted correctly (I learnt this the hard way) 12. Surprisingly a large amount of apps available via flatpak/flathub, including both foss apps for things like email and 3rd party clients for things like spotify and whatsapp (text only, no video or audio calls). All the core linux stuff and lots of the foss apps via apk 13. However not all apps on flathub are compatible with the PinePhone since PinePhones uses aarch64 architecture, not x86_64 14. Very poor battery life out of the box, about 4 hours tops. However, after installing tlp and irqbalance (via apk) and setting auto-suspend to 1 minute, the battery life is about 8 to 12 hours of "normal" usage, so quite usuable 15. Camera is very basic

seanp2k2 3y ago
Pinephone Pro here, I wanted to use it as a home automation controller around the house, I think I bricked the keyboard case attachment by using the wrong charging port (why is that even a thing??) because it doesn't work, but to be fair, it never did work, and I've tried troubleshooting it for a few hours with no joy, so now I'm just kinda too frustrated with it to sink more time into it and it's sitting in a drawer. I should probably try postmarketOS on it and use it as a burner travel phone.
xethos 3y ago
You only mention installing, but did you have to configure tlp & irqbalance? Battery life is all that's keeping me from using my pro as a daily phone :)

narag 3y ago

1 .. 7 are must haves for me and also: · I can program the phone to block numbers and send http requests over the net. · Tethering, even if I need a USB cable for that. · I can record calls. Both sides. If I can't program it, I'd just buy a dumbphone. If I can tether, I can do without anything else, just carrying a tablet or small laptop. For me, all this is obvious, but it doesn't seem the same for others.

coldpie 3y ago

You can still buy flip phones, seems like that meets all of your requirements?

awiesenhofer 3y ago

So basically KaiOS/FirefoxOS? Seems like every Nokia/HMD feature phone should fit all your points nowadays.

BSEdlMMldESB 3y ago

0. it must be able to use the internet; with this, the rest of the software should be able to be ported/emulated somehow. number 7 points at why this won't really work. providers can just say it's a security vulnerability and shut this kind of cellphone down. 8. would be awesome, it's even a good idea for typical locked down smartphones because the battery life!

chongli 3y ago

What do #1-#8 have to do with Linux? As far as I can tell, nothing. A flip phone will cover your use case nicely. Personally, I have no interest in making phone calls. 99% of the time when my phone rings it’s a spam call. The other 1% of the time it’s one of my uncles or aunts, all of whom are in their 80’s or thereabouts. After they pass on, I will have no reason at all to make a phone call, except perhaps to book a doctor’s appointment with some doctor who hasn’t switched over to online booking.

fooqux 3y ago
> Personally, I have no interest in making phone calls. You say that now, but wait until you need to dial 911.
- pwenzel 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - chongli 3y ago
    Cop showed up at my house 2 days ago at 2am. Roommate apparently sleep-dialed 911.
  - AdamJacobMuller 3y ago
    Obviously situationally dependent (where you live, why you're calling) and of course you should have the ability to defend yourself if the cops fail to preform, but all that aside, that is not a universal truth. I called my local PD # a few weeks back because someone on a scooter got hit by a car in front of my house and I called the police (local PD directly, not 911, 911 would have been slower) and they had a unit at my house in UNDER TWO MINUTES. It's literally four minutes to drive (sans lights and sirens) from the police station to my house. I know my experience is anecdotal and not universal, but neither is the "cops won't show up" one.
- jstarfish 3y ago
  Phones really need a hardware button or key combination for this-- tap out SOS on the power button or something. It may well be the last phone call one makes in their life, but the ability to do it at all is predicated on the integrity of a piece of glass. It's insane.

slondr 3y ago

shutting down means you cannot receive phone calls. This is actually one of the major problems linux phone operating system hackers have been trying to solve — idle power consumption is really really important for a cell phone, but most hardware open enough to run custom operating systems on don’t have easy ways to suspend to a reliable low-power state.

askvictor 3y ago

#7 - so you're suggesting it only work in a single country? I think that to be practical, you're going to outsource the cellular comms to a prebuilt module that's got the carrier certification already sorted out.

harry8 3y ago

The Nokia N900 made short work of all of that on all carriers in this country a decade ago. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_N900 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_N900

__MatrixMan__ 3y ago

This is pretty close: https://www.wiphone.io/ https://www.wiphone.io/ I have one, played snake on it, liked it (hurray for real buttons). Haven't bothered set it up as my daily driver because 90% of my phone usage is Signal and so far as I know that's not yet working. If somebody has the bandwidth to hack on it in a way that will move the project forward, I'll send them mine for free. I love the idea but it's just not my kind of tinkering.

interlinked 3y ago

Just package virtualbox in a midrange android phone with an OS image that does what you want. Maybe some port forwarding to make phone calls and stuff.