I'll risk asking the first question. If it's not a good fit for the community, then at least I can serve as a negative example.

Here's the scenario. I'm going to be traveling over the next few months and expect to be in areas where I don't have a right to my digital privacy. My device might be inspected, cloned, etc without my knowledge. I might even be required to give up the passcode. I'll do my best to maintain physical control of my device at all times, but that might not always be possible. My intention is to responsibly recycle the device at the end of the summer once I return to a more secure environment. I'll try to take reasonable precautions like powering down the device completely when unattended but the potential for uncontrolled physical access has me concerned.

My thoughts are that I want something used to reduce my environmental impact but that still has up to date security patches at a reasonably low cost. I would also like it to provide an acceptable user experience. A used Pixel 4a 5G looks like a great candidate for that.

Are you using this device? Does it provide a good user experience today? I'm looking for some opinions or perhaps suggestions for a device that might meet my requirements.

I accidentally posted this to !android@lemdro.id before I noticed the sidebar said to ask buying suggestion questions here:

I'm looking to replace my failing phone. I don't need fancy hardware in terms of camera, high storage, any crazy screen technology or the like. I don't need a large sized phone, in fact I'd prefer something on the smaller side. I need it to be either bloatware/spyware-free on arrival, or easily de-bloated (permanently). I am thinking that instead of running stock Android I'd probably try either LineageOS or /e/OS anyway, so that might solve the bloatware issue.

My most important factors to consider are:

• Price
• Battery life
• Headphone jack
• De-bloated or de-bloat-able

I haven't been in the phone market for years and have not payed much attention to phone developments, so I'm kind of at a loss of where to start. What I've done so far is looked at the LineageOS supported devices, and it seems some of the lower-end Motorola phones might be the best fit for me. I looked at some of the higher-end phones that aren't the newest generation as well, but there it seems like I may run the risk of not getting (security) updates for much longer, versus buying a newer lower-end phone.

Also: can carriers force push install apps if you're running something other than stock Android? For example, if I use LineageOS can I prevent a carrier from pushing an app installation (even by SIM)?

Hi everyone, I am looking for a smartwatch that offers continuous monitoring of my heart rate and preferably other vitals (Blood oxygen, blood pressure) as well.

I have been looking at the Galaxy Watch 5 Pro, but I cannot find if it offers continuous monitoring functionality.

Can anyone give some insight, or maybe share their experience with a smartwatch that offers this functionality.

Would anyone be able to help me out? My Pixel 7 Pro broke. Unfortunately, I live in the USA and bought this on a ~~contract~~ lease for 3 years. I'm wanting something similar to it, and the used phone market has plenty of options.

Would anyone be able to compare the speeds of older phones to the G2? I know the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 is much faster and more efficient, but how comparable is the 8 Gen 1 to the G2?

If I bought an S22, would I be better off? Would it be the same performance and battery heat issues if I bought an S21?

I'm not sure how the G2 stacks up against the previous flagship Snapdragon chips, and I'm wanting to get a phone that's at least similar or better (budget permitting lol).

Any suggestions?

cross-posted for @herrvogel@lemmy.world

My grandma's Samsung J320 just bit the dust. So we need a replacement.

Her eyesight is pretty poor, so the screen doesn't need to be anything special. Her hearing is even worse, so the speaker needs to not suck.

She's a monster who treats her phones very roughly, and is prone to losing them. So the thing needs to be on the cheaper side of things so we don't feel too sad when it inevitably gets destroyed or lost.

I know about those special "old people phones" with beefed up speakers and hearing aid integrations and custom UIs and whatnots, but they're unfortunately out of the question because none of them are available where we live and import fees are brutal.

Cross-posted for @Wander@yiffit.net

Hello, I'm looking for a way in which I can cast specific media files such as images and videos to a Windows PC.

The big problem is that everything I find only mentions screen mirroring. However, due to privacy reasons I don't want to mirror my screen, instead I want to send specific videos and photos (local and maybe also external such as youtube links) to the screen.

I thought I would find a software capable of doing this but haven't been able to find anything solid. Ideally it would work with Android's native casting options, but if that's not possible then it's also okay to install a client / agent /app on the phone as long as it supports casting specific media files and not mirroring the screen.

Thank you a lot <3

What custom ROMs would you recommend?

I have a Pixel 4a 5G, which still works great but it's nearing the end of security updates. I see a lot of options on listicle articles, but I'm curious to hear from some real people

What are the best system wide adblockers in Android?

I've noticed sometimes screen fails to auto-lock after timeout has passed for various reasons (video playback, bugs, etc.).

This is a big privacy concern for me since I sometimes leave my phone on my desk assuming it will auto lock after 30 seconds.

Has anybody eslse encountered search issues and if the answer is yes how do you go about resolving it?

I installed this app and I was shocked to notice that a uninstall+reinstall didn't erase any custom data. It didn't ask me to login to my Google account or storage permission, how could it keep the app data after uninstall+reinstall?

I'm looking for a more customizable alternative to the At A Glance widget so that I can see upcoming calendar events, but toggle off the current weather display since I use a weather app besides Google Weather. I tried using Another Widget, but the calendar integration didn't work. Any ideas?

samsung tab s2 on android 10 (lineage) C: just looking for a nice launcher that doesn't feel like a poorly scaled up phone home screen

I am subscribed to !android@lemdro.id using my main lemmy.world account, but when I try to view the community I see no posts except for one (created by another lemmy.world user).

Has lemdro.id defederated from lemmy.world? I know they were hacked yesterday but if there is defederation happening there should be something posted about it.

EDIT: Ok, I figured it out. Despite having "Undetermined" set as a language, that was causing the issue. I clicked the little X next to the language menu in my profile settings to deselect all languages and now I can see everything again. I'll keep this post up in case anyone else has this issue.

I was using Infinity for Reddit (I'm sorry, I know...), and noticed the transparent Navigation Bar... Is this something that is an app-side thing or system-side thing?

So I thought it would finally be smart to find a replacement for Bromite. I picked up Mulch, and after an initial shock (I didn't think Bromite has that many enhancements for the basic things), I'm still having two main problems:

1. Using Lemmy as a pwa doesn't keep me logged in. In the normal browsing mode it works, and so it does in Bromite (incl. pwa). I can't figure out what I could change. Ideas?

2. Background video doesn't play. Or rather, it always pauses when minimising the app, and I need to resume it in the notification. Stupidly annoying. I couldn't find a solution for this, as most results lead to "Chrome will allow bg video in a beta from 5 years ago" or similar. Can't it just keep playing? I'm not talking about YouTube btw.

These were the primary things I need a Chromium-based browser for, as FF doesn't play nice with pwa nor some video sites.

(I don't feel like installing Brave or similar. I installed Chromium and I booted it after 2 minutes of seeing all the Google crap.)

Looking to download an android app. Kind of like a digital replacement for those 2023-4 planners that one sees in Target.

I tried Flexcil but their planners don't seem formatted for a smartphone screen. Any help is greatly appreciated.

Many modern phones have enough processing power to perform most of the tasks that average notebook user does.
But the ecosystem is not there yet. The "desktop mode" interfaces are very basic, there are not many applications that can also take advantage of bigger screen, and docks / lapdocks are not widely used yet.

But, is it safe to assume that this will change over time?
The "smartphone" has already eaten up so many other peripherals. Music players, cameras, etc.
I think that it would make sense to expect that laptop will be one of them in the next decade or so.

And as Android is the most widely used mobile OS, and also allows for most experimentation, it will probably be in the front of this revolution.

Which brings me to my question: What can we do to help with this? Which parts of this using-your-phone-as-a-PC ecosystem should be developed / improved first in order to get this ball rolling faster?

But the downside here is that current phones are way more locked down than current PCs. Getting root access or even installing operating systems requires some serious technical skill or is even practically impossible on some models.
So when the phones take role of the laptops, we will have even less technological freedom than we have now.
So question here is, what can be done in order to mitigate this? Develop open source versions of currently proprietary software that makes desktop modes work?

I know that it is still relatively early, but I hope that this gets revisited often in the future, and that it gets more developers and other people thinking about this.

Whenever I try to share an image to Google Chat, chat gives me a list to select the person or Space to share with. However, there's at least 10 people on here that have never been in my contacts and are not currently in my contacts anywhere. I don't know how to clear out this list and it's frustrating! Help!

I'm currently using HUR on my Joying head unit, and connecting my phone via USB. The connection seems to work randomly rather than consistently. Can anyone tell me whether there is an alternative Android Auto emulator, other than HUR?

Sharing this as I thought some of the comments are interesting

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/1930001

Other than your carrier give it for free or cheap, I don't really see the reason why should you buy new phone. I've been using Redmi Note 9 for past 3 years and recently got my had on Poco F5. I don't see the point of my 'upgrade'. I sold it and come back to my Note 9. Gaming? Most of them are p2w or microtransaction garbage or just gimped version of its PC/Console counterpart. I mean, $400 still get you PS4, TV and Switch if you don't mind buying used. At least here where I live. Storage? Dude, newer phone wont even let you have SD Card. Features? Well, all I see is newer phones take more features than it adds. Headphone jack, more ads, and repairability are to name a few. Battery? Just replace them. However, my Note 9 still get through day with one 80% charge in the dawn. Which takes 1 hour.

I am genuinely curious why newer phone always selling like hot cakes. Since there's virtually no difference between 4gb of RAM and 12gb of RAM, or 12mp camera and 100mp camera on phone.

We have several phones in our family, and all connect just fine, but not the 8T. Two of the working phones are OnePlus 6T on the same LineageOS version. Are there known problems specifically with the 8T?

The phone charges fine when connected to the car, but the car does not recognize an android auto-capable phone. With the other phones, the AA icon appears instantly on the car screen, but nothing happens with the 8T. We upgraded to the latest lineageos build and tried different cables but no change.

The car is a 2019 Peugeot 5008 II, if that matters.

Hey all! I'm finally looking at upgrading from my LG V30. I love the phone but it's really starting to show its age.

I got my V30 about a year after it came out, used, so I'm not a stranger to buying used, year old phones. Particularly, the screen, camera, and battery life. I'm the type to go all out on customization, so a new launcher, debloater, etc will be used (but I don't usually root my devices). The S22U is available for $5-600 new in some spots. Would you consider buying one at that price, or is the S23U a worthy enough upgrade to pay the extra few hundred?

When you put apps in deep sleep on a Samsung device, they're disabled unless you interact with them. This also removes them from the Play Store updates page, so they don't get updated.

Is there a way to keep installing updates for apps in deep sleep without manually going through each one?

What are the pros and cons? Will streaming and banking apps work?

I’m currently an iPhone user and want to dip my toes back into the Android world. I used to run CyanogenMod before switching to iPhone, and I would intend to run LineageOS now. I’d also by interested in trying other Android distributions such as GrapheneOS. While not strictly Android, I’d also like to have a device to experiment with Linux based systems like postmarketOS. So broad OS compatibility is my main focus.

I’m looking for a more budget device and I don’t need the latest flagship specs. I’m also happy to buy used. Any recommendations would greatly appreciated.