Nikoyay
Android is so far removed from the mainline linux kernel that it can't be called linux in good faith anymore, it is its own thing now.
Android works with a mainline Linux kernel. This claim is completely untrue.
It can't run linux apps compiled for arm64 without emulators and translation layers, nor can linux run android apps without these.
No, Android apps are Linux apps. You're misrepresenting what Linux means. Linux doesn't mean systemd, glibc and GNOME.
That makes it a completely different operating system as far as the general user is concerned. You can argue technicalities, but it doesn't change the reality.
It's your claims which are untrue.
I was referring to projects like PostmarketOS, Mobian and Ubuntu Touch, which run a close-to-mainline linux kernel and can run native linux apps.
Android works fine with mainline Linux kernels and Android apps are Linux apps. Your claims simply aren't true. Linux does not mean what you're claiming it does.
Again arguing technicalities and deflecting blame towards stock Android and its differences with PixelOS. Yes, AOSP is barebones, because it's meant to be built upon. No phone manufacturer ships clean Android, even Google themselves add features to make it more usable.
Stock Pixel OS is nearly identical to AOSP beyond the Google app and service integration, which is largely not specific to the stock Pixel OS. GrapheneOS gets nearly all of the same features through the new major Android releases. Features in the stock Pixel OS not included in AOSP are within the scope of what we work on and we provide many.
You have such a treasure trove of open source custom ROMs (are you allergic to that phrase btw?)
It's a highly inaccurate term, which fits in with your inaccurate claims about many things.
which include all kinds of convenience features and customizations
Their changes come with substantial changes and are not what we do in GrapheneOS.
I really hope you stop being such purists and actually use these to make your OS more usable by normal people, not just paranoid security and privacy enthusiasts.
That's not what we do.
Changing system wide font and accent color via color picker are the very least you could do for customization.
These aren't feature in the stock Pixel OS and aren't relevant to the OS being usable by "normal people".
Every phone I had so far (and I tried a lot of different brands) had the option to swap the buttons, if they were not swapped to begin with. "Accessibility" features are supposed to make the phone more accessible to people, so removing, or not including an accessibility feature that people are used to, makes it LESS accessible, or did I get that wrong?
There isn't a row of huge buttons in space reserved at the bottom of the screen in the default navigation mode. The stock Pixel OS never supported swapping those. It's not something missing in GrapheneOS. Swapping them isn't an accessibility feature. The meaning of 3 button navigation mode being an accessibility feature is that some people have motor disabilities helped by it, but the overall UI is still heavily depend on all kinds of other gestures in apps.
Nikoyay Making inaccurate claims attacking GrapheneOS and spreading misinformation about it is the opposite of constructive.
Nikoyay You're requesting very niche things which would not improve anything for most people but rather would only be used by a tiny subset of people who want to tinker with the appearance of the OS. It's not about the capabilities of the OS or usability but rather a request for more room for changing things which simply aren't important. Contrary to the inaccurate way you're portraying it, GrapheneOS does a lot more than privacy and security since we fill in a lot of functionality which would otherwise be missing compared to the stock Pixel OS. It's also not only for "paranoid" people as you claim.
You're asking for things not present in either the stock Pixel OS or iOS from a project focused on improving privacy and security along with filling in missing functionality present in those that's missing in AOSP. We don't want to have all of the bloat in Samsung's fork of AOSP. The main way GrapheneOS obtains features outside of the privacy and security focus is through new major Android versions such as Android 16 QPR1 bringing UI improvements.