Free and Open Source Software

21650 readers

42 users here now

If it's free and open source and it's also software, it can be discussed here. Subcommunity of Technology.

This community's icon was made by Aaron Schneider, under the CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0 license.

founded 3 years ago

MODERATORS

Gaywallet@beehaw.org

alyaza@beehaw.org

Is there a list of apps that microG gives users access to? (feddit.nl)

submitted 1 day ago by fort_burp@feddit.nl to c/foss@beehaw.org

6 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I have been thinking of getting away from the Google ecosystem (while still staying on Adroid) and microg has come onto my radar. I understand that it's a service that tricks other apps into thinking Google Play Services is installed on the phone, thus allowing the app to work on a phone that does not have Play Services.

How do I find out which apps these are, exactly?

From what I have read, not all apps from the Play Store require Play Services, and exactly none of the apps from F-Droid require Play Services... is that correct?

The goal of this question is to figure out if I need LineageOS with microG or just LineageOS. I have moved off Google services already but still use some mainstream apps like WhatsApp, Snapchat, and TikTok.

TIA

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] glitching@lemmy.ml 1 points 11 hours ago* (last edited 11 hours ago) (1 children)

it implements a subset of play store features, notably a client for GCM/FCM so push notifications work. you can see which ones are subscribed in microG settings.

no idea how the three apps you mentioned work with that stack. maybe it's time to look for alternatives, not just for this stack's sake.

[–] fort_burp@feddit.nl 1 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

a subset of play store features, notably a client for GCM/FCM so push notifications work

So are push notifications then reliant on Google? Wondering not just for de-Googleings sake but for privacy too.

[–] glitching@lemmy.ml 3 points 6 hours ago* (last edited 6 hours ago) (1 children)

yeah of course. if you go the non-microG lineageOS way, every app has to implement its own checking for messages, that's a significant drain on battery. there are non-google push alternatives, like UnifiedPush, but the app has to be written to specifically support it - element x, conversations and clones, Molly (Signal fork), KDE Plasma, etc. have it. but if you want an app from the play store, they predominantly can't handle push on their own, you hafta open them manually and check for e.g. messages.

also, the notifications you receive via FCM aren't readable by google, it's just a signal for your app to wake up, then the app's handler goes to its server, fetches the message and then locally forms and displays the notification.

[–] fort_burp@feddit.nl 1 points 3 hours ago

Ok, thanks for explaining it.