• General

  • Can the stock messaging app be made usable?

FetalNevada The stock SMS app is not an alternative. It's a joke. It doesn't even give you the option to hit "return" and enter breaks between paragraphs

The AOSP Messaging and keyboard apps are pretty basic. Fixing issues or improving them has not been a priority. The project recommends to avoid using SMS. The keyboard app will be replaced. GrapheneOS has limited drveloper resources and has to focus them carefully.

There are other keyboard apps that do have an active 'return' while using Messaging.

If Im not confused Google Messages also works across profiles. If that is the case then the cross profile issue is due to other SMS apps not supporting this functionality. Its an 'exotic' requirement.

FetalNevada It has a predictive text "feature"

That is also the keyboard not the SMS app.

If you need another SMS app to work for you, you will likely need to use it in the owner profile. If you want the isolation provided by different profiles, but still have immediate access to SMS, you could use Private Space and maybe even a work profile, rather than using secondary user profiles.

        spl4tt I haven't heard of that one, it works across profiles?

          Carlos-Anso my first thought was the keyboard but it doesn't do any of that in any other applications at all, it literally gets worse for the SMS app. Is there something I'm doing wrong? I looked all over for options and couldn't find any.

              FetalNevada Is there something I'm doing wrong?

              No there is not. Its a "feature" of the AOSP keyboard which GrapheneOS currently uses, that the return key is not shown for a "chat app". I forget exactly how it decides what it considers is a "chat app" and what is not, but it does think the Messaging app is one.

                • Zzzz

                  • Post #7
                  • Edited

                  FetalNevada the option to hit "return" and enter breaks between paragraphs.

                  While composing in the default Messaging app with the default keyboard, hit the shift key.
                  The emoji button on the bottom right will change to the return button. Then you can enter line breaks.

                      19 days later

                      Stock SMS works across profiles on my GrapheneOS Pixel8, if I understand what you mean. When I'm in Owner profile or my other two user profiles, I receive message notifications and can view new messages and send and view history of all messages. In the two user profiles, I only see the phone # and not name, assuming because I didn't bother importing my contacts into those little used profiles.

                      When I created the user profiles, I think all I did was enable "Turn om phone calls & SMS" (in Owner's Settings | System | Users | profilename )

                      what do you mean doesn't work across profiles?

                      i can see sms and reply to them from any profile owner or not.

                      myusername2025 how do i do that?

                      If you are viewing the discussion site on a desktop, there is a "Start a new discussion" button at the upper left of the front-door screen (discuss.grapheneos.org). If you are viewing on a phone, there is a button that looks like a pen checking a checkbox at the upper right of the front-door screen.