Complete beginner questions

Carrousel7956

You will see a lot of posts about problems on the forum, but in reality very few users have problems. There are ~ 400k users so in reality there are very few forum threads with people posting questions. You don't see daily posts of people saying their phone is working, it just works. This project is way more polished than any linux distro with premier app support because of Android. If GOS was the stock OS on regular phones, people wouldn't notice a difference(excluding the default apps, those are not great UI-wise, but can be easily changed).

At the end of the day, it depends on what you prioritize. Do you prioritize freedom(from the open source) and privacy, or do you prioritize maximum ecosystem integration and your decisions being made for you. In the UK, Apple was pressured to put a backdoor into iCloud and they ended up removing e2ee from iCloud. Something like that would never happen with GOS.

I used iOS, I was all in on iCloud with Advanced-data-protection. Apple is a good setup, but honestly the biggest improvement was the OS is smoother and there are such a good open source app development community.

1nix

Carrousel7956 thanks you so much, decided that i will get the pixel 10 pro 512 or 1tb, using a physical sim so no esim problems, thanks

xxx

Johnnyloans The pixel 10s have a different GPU manufacturer which has driver issues.

This is still a thing? Planning to get a 10a cheap.

Johnnyloans The pixel 9s have issues with the esim breaking

Seems to be some devices only.

Johnnyloans

xxx

The 10a is like a pixel 9 with hardware. No PowerVR GPU, the mainline 10s have that.

xxx This is still a thing?

Yes.

Johnnyloans No chance of this change fixing https://github.com/GrapheneOS/os-issue-tracker/issues/6631 right?

Grapheneos response:
That's unrelated and will hopefully be fixed by Android 17 due to another major GPU driver update.

Source: https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/35816-grapheneos-version-2026052400-released/13

xxx

Johnnyloans The 10a is like a pixel 9 with hardware.

Sorry I was confused :-)
P10 without a has GPU-Problems. 10a not because it has the P9 chip but maybe esim hiccups? Oh my.

Johnnyloans

Maybe Google fixed the issue after seeing how some of the 9s went.

Hopefully you live in an area where Google honors their 1 year warranty should anything go wrong. Usually the esim issue arrives long before then.

1nix

Carrousel7956 thanks rlly, have a nice day, thanks again

1nix

Carrousel7956 Thanks, don’t have any AirTags so not losing out on that one, just want some location sharing with my family, everyone in this community is so helpful, like literally i can’t express my gratitude enough

xxx

1nix using a physical sim so

For 'most' users including me e-sims work. I have the P6 & P9.

Bomnam

Carrousel7956 Once you try GBoard there's no going back

Do not use GBoard. It is incredibly highly integrated into the Google stack and is entirely capable of recording everything you type and sending it off even when internet is denied for the app through inter-app communications. I've been on the FUTO Keyboard for awhile now and it's definitely the best keyboard to use with GrapheneOS. Very similar to GBoard in many ways and has many modern features that make it super usable. It even has swipe typing for those who use that as of the most recent update.

In general, some of the better alternatives for system apps is the Fossify suite of apps. Their gallery app especially has been great for me as I just disabled the GOS default one and have the Fossify one set as my default. It actually has a decent and competent photo editor which you can not take for granted with many open source gallery apps.
KashCal is a really good calendar app I've been trialing for the past bit and I've really enjoyed it. It even syncs with iCloud calendars if you have any. You can add Google calendars via WebDav and any other calendars via ICS. I really recommend it.
My top pick for weather is BreezyWeather, it looks nice, performs well, has support for a ton of different sources (avoid AccuWeather, they're the devil!) Its just overall a super polished app and has worked great for me for some years now.

I can provide more specific recommendations for apps or alternatives to the ones I've mentioned if desired.

Definitely dont use GBoard though. You're trusting every message, password, and keystroke you ever type to Google.

Carrousel7956

Bomnam I don't have any closed source apps with internet access, so I'm not trusting anything. I also monitor connections with Rethink DNS and there are 0 google connections on my phone. This means that there is no telemetry going back to google. Iirc some people on here said that Gboard respects their privacy settings.

Once an alternative keyboard is as good as Gboard I'll definitely try to switch, I prefer open source apps and I only have 8 closed source apps on my phone (none have network).

Just because something is closed source doesn't mean it can't be private.

1nix

Bomnam thank you so much for software recommendation

Carrousel7956

Bomnam Alright I'm switching to FUTO Keyboard, just tested and the swipe typing is even better than GBoard.

Johnnyloans

Carrousel7956 This means that there is no telemetry going back to google.

Any app could be programmed to contact an ip address instead of a domain name.

Carrousel7956

Johnnyloans Could it deceptively show a different domain associated, though? Every connection I see has a domain associated.

I doubt they do this and none of the apps except molly use a private DNS thingy where it only shows 9.9.9.9

Johnnyloans

Carrousel7956 Could it deceptively show a different domain associated, though? Every connection I see has a domain associated.

Rethink DNS tells your phone the ip address for a domain name.

A connection between 2 devices works like this:

I go to my router's admin webpage

I type 10.1.1.1 into the browser
Browser goes to 10.1.1.1

Or I can use DNS to not memorize/type the ip

I type router.local into the browser
My phone goes to the DNS server asking for the ip address of router.local. It logs this query.
My phone gets back 10.1.1.1
My browser goes to 10.1.1.1

As you can see, in the first example, my phone never contacts rethinkdns or any DNS. No log entry.

1 small caveat that doesn't change this fact:
Many router's will have the phone contact the manufacturer's website to get the logo or something, not sure why. So, you might see a DNS query for that but you won't see your 10.1.1.1 connection in the logs.

1nix

Carrousel7956 didn’t expect the ending of this to be useful, thanks

bqyoung

Carrousel7956 Another benefit of FUTO Keyboard is that it includes FUTO Voice Input, very nice speech-to-text. I installed FVI separately for use with Heliboard, and I find it to be very accurate.

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