[HN Gopher] PostmarketOS 22.06 released - now upgrades are possible
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PostmarketOS 22.06 released - now upgrades are possible
Author : kirschner
Score : 118 points
Date : 2022-06-13 11:33 UTC (11 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (postmarketos.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (postmarketos.org)
| goombacloud wrote:
| Nice to see all the different devices being worked on for (close-
| to) mainline Linux support. Some even have working mobile data,
| wifi etc.
|
| The only weird choice is not having systemd and also using musl
| due to being based on Alpine ;)
| squarefoot wrote:
| It's a good thing that they have a donation link on that page,
| however the list of supported devices still lacks recent models,
| which can be discouraging. I completely understand the effort
| required to port software, do proper tests, the time and money
| needed, plus the risks of bricking new costly devices, so I
| wonder if setting up a way for donating for a specific device or
| set of devices (no strings attached of course) could help to
| attract more interest, make users feel more involved and somehow
| also help development by telling developers where there is more
| demand.
| yrgulation wrote:
| Tangentially here is my wishlist for a phone os:
|
| - Displays text on screen
|
| - Responds to touch input for navigating a contact list and call
| functions
|
| - Initiates and terminates calls
|
| - Operates the handsfree speaker
|
| - Shows battery status
|
| - Basic text input
|
| - Provides gsm connectivity, no internet, no bluetooth
|
| - Its a dumb os doing nothing more than the above - nada, nil.
|
| I am not being sarcastic, but i would install such an "os" on
| spare smartphones in a heartbeat. It would save on battery,
| reduce waste and enhance my privacy. I am not knowledgeable on
| the topic otherwise i'd do it myself. Hopefully someone with
| experience can make it happen.
| blep_ wrote:
| It seems like the easiest way to get there is to just sell the
| smartphone and use the money to buy a (possibly used)
| dumbphone.
| robotbikes wrote:
| Just curious as to what the use cases for this are from any
| current users. Is anyone using postmarked as a daily driver
| replacement for their phone ? Do people use it as a mobile low
| power server or just a fun handheld Linux computer ?
| kop316 wrote:
| > Is anyone using postmarked as a daily driver replacement for
| their phone?
|
| Yes. I'm not sure I understand your question though. A big use
| case for PostmarketOS is software for a mobile phone, so that's
| my use case.
| npteljes wrote:
| Yes but how much do you depend on your phone? As in, what
| functions does it fill in your day-to-day life?
| kop316 wrote:
| I use it for Calls, SMS/MMS, Email, Calendar, tasks/TODOs,
| various chat applications, 2FA, password manager, and
| internet. So it fills the functions I expect in a
| smartphone.
|
| I think it has some apps for social media, but I only have
| a mastodon acccount for social media.
|
| The only thing really lacking in it is a decent maps app,
| but for the most part I get by just fine without that.
| cowtools wrote:
| I've used it for a couple months. Battery life and CPU power
| are a major hurdle, but it is promising because calling and SMS
| works just fine with the open-source modem firmware. I might
| try it again in 6 months, as I heard the next release of Phosh
| is supposed to have GPU acceleration or something and is much
| smoother.
|
| I think I will continue using AOSP on a pixel phone until
| waydroid support gets a bit better. It takes a while to start
| waydroid, and by then I'm already down like 25% battery.
|
| The "selling point" of postmarketOS is that it is based on the
| lightweight Alpine Linux, and it has a toolkit (called
| pmbootstrap) which is designed to make it easy to port it to
| stock-android phones, not just pinephone/librem5's. So whatever
| contributions you make to the OS will survive beyond this
| generation of phones. Also, other distros like Ubuntu Touch try
| to make their own weird userspace, but postmarketOS is nice
| because it behaves a lot more like the desktop linux userspace.
| Also, it's easy to run their pmbootstrap program to make your
| own image- it gives you a selection of DE's to choose from for
| example sxmo or kde mobile or phosh, and you can even set up
| FDE. What I'm getting at here is that it's a lot more
| "standard" and extensible than the other linux phone distros
| out there: they try to build on top of a minimal alpine linux
| instead of just porting a bigger distro like manjaro or
| reinventing the wheel.
|
| Hopefully we will eventually see postmarketOS ported to a more
| powerful (probably stock-android) phone that has feature-parity
| with the pinephone (see
| https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Devices#Community). I would
| definitely miss the extensibility and open-ness of the
| pinephone; ideally a company like pine64 just iterates on the
| pinephone until the hardware is usable, and the software meets
| it in the middle.
| usrn wrote:
| At long last a decent OS for Galaxy S3. I wish I had kept mine.
| It doesn't say whether it's the European or American version
| though.
| wartijn_ wrote:
| Looks like it's the international (non-US) version. From the
| wiki page[0] of the device:
|
| > So far, what works for Samsung Galaxy S III LTE (samsung-m3)
| also works for the samsung-m0 (Galaxy S III international GSM
| version without LTE, Also known as Galaxy S III 3G SHW-M440S in
| South Korea) and samsung-shv-e210s (a Korean variant). (None of
| these S III models should be confused with the North American S
| III models, which require OS builds.)
|
| [0]
| https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Samsung_Galaxy_S_III_(sam...
| yoavm wrote:
| To those who are curious - I'm working on a PostmarketOS /
| AwesomeWM based interface for e-readers, currently happily
| running it as a daily driver on my Kobo Clara HD.
| https://github.com/bjesus/air . It's very fun to have an e-ink
| device running modern Linux, and it's also very cheap :)
| captn3m0 wrote:
| KOReader has plain Linux builds, so running that ought to be a
| perfect match. I might get a Kobo to try this out, thanks!
| yoavm wrote:
| Sadly I never managed to get it running, but you're right
| that it _should_ work. I'm using Foliate for book reading and
| it works fine - not perfect but definitely good enough.
|
| https://johnfactotum.github.io/foliate/
| josteink wrote:
| Maybe I have unrealistic expectations, but I was surprised not to
| see the PinePhone Pro on the list of supported devices.
|
| Was that a mistake or does it get lumped together with the OG
| PunePhone?
| wartijn_ wrote:
| On the devices page of the wiki, the PinePhone pro is in the
| "testing" list, which has this description: "All other device
| ports, including new ones. Maintainers can create merge
| requests to move devices to community if requirements are met
| on the Device categorization page. A more detailed view with a
| full status matrix of these devices can be found on the All
| devices page"
|
| The normal PinePhone is one of the main devices, so it seems
| that that one has way better support.
|
| https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Devices
| blackbear_ wrote:
| As the sibling comment said, it's officially in testing phase.
| It already works quite well in my experience, the reason why I
| am not daily driving it yet is that it does not get calls and
| text messages while in stand-by (as of a few months ago, at
| least).
| kop316 wrote:
| This is some good background info:
| https://drewdevault.com/2022/01/18/Pine64s-weird-priorities....
|
| TL;DR: Pine64 creates the hardware, but pretty much depends on
| the community to get software support. As a result, software
| support for the Pinephone Pro is incomplete. That being said,
| PostmarketOS probably has some of the best support for the
| Pinephone Pro
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(page generated 2022-06-13 23:02 UTC)