alt Hacker NewsI personally tend to own two Phones. One all-day carry GrapheneOS device (Pixel 8) and an older WiFi and at home only iPhone for all payment and ensurance stuff.
This is inconvenient in some ways, but at least it is sort of privacy as good as it gets while still being able to run official apps when I need them at home.
To de-google the phone, I use F-Droid as primary App store, Aurora as fallback for non-f-droid Apps and as a last resort Obtainium to install Apps that are not in these stores.
The only google App I really "need" (kind of) is the Camera App, which is sandboxed via GrapheneOS Storage Spaces and without Network permission (why would a camera need internet?).
To backup my phone, I use the integrated GrapheneOS Solution (seedvault!?) for storage and apps, immich for Photos and MyPhoneExplorer for Contacts.
Sometimes it is a bit hard to find good apps for specific purposes, so for everyone interested, here is a list of Apps that I personally use or have used.
Newpipe - Youtube Client
Audiobookshelf - Audiobooks
Voice (PaulWoitaschek) - Local Audiobook Player
Substreamer - Music
DSub - Music (alternative)
VLC - Video-Player
Organic Maps - Google Maps alternative (not as good)
PDF Doc Scanner - Open Source Document Scanner
Wireguard - VPN
Immich - Photo Backup / Viewer
LocalSend - File Transfer
K9 Mail / FairMail - Email Client
KOReader - Ebooks
Binary Eye - QRCodes and Barcodes
Pure Todo - Self hosted PWA PHP Todo List
Signal - Messenger
Open Camera - Open Source Camera AppReplies
I like Organic Maps because it isn't full of the social things. Every time I open Google Maps it shows that card at the bottom with "what's popular in your area", full of pictures of people's breakfasts and other nonsense. Organic Maps is free of this noise.
Also, the desktop client on Linux is quite useful.
Alternatives for Windows etc. are Cruiser Maps, a Java application (and also available as an Android app).
Due to [0] and [1] I'm using the new fork "CoMaps" now, feature comparison: https://www.comaps.app/support/how-do-the-features-differ-fr...
It's pretty excellent! The improved integration with OpenStreetMaps to provide edits/additions is great. I made my first contribution to OSM via CoMaps.
Thanks for this, it's so helpful for people trying out a new platform.
I'd love to have something like this for Linux desktops as well. Maybe a website that has app-lists, where people can then potentially add info about their use cases and reasoning for their choices. Could be a great subreddit!
I tried Omarchy specifically because installed an opionated selection of apps to covered most bases, and it got me started in Arch fairly quickly. I've now completely swapped out all the components so I no longer use Omarchy at all, but it was a great way to get back into desktop Linux after being away for 20 years.
What would sandboxing an app like Google Maps look like? There are definitely situations where a sub-par map app would be detrimental. Obviously it's going to send data to Google, but do I have to sign into an account or will it have some other way of identifying my phone if I used a one-off account just for it?
I like your recommendations mostly, just wanted to point out that Organic Maps has had a falling out with the Open Source community that built it, so I wouldn't use that anymore. The community fork is called 'CoMaps' now.
Grayjay is another good YouTube (and other streaming platform) client made by the company that owns Immich
Voice audiobook player is so nice and simple, a pleasure to use
Some other FOSS apps I use daily:
Aegis - 2FA (https://github.com/beemdevelopment/Aegis)
Breezy Weather - A very good looking weather app (https://github.com/breezy-weather/breezy-weather)
OnlyOffice Documents - MS Office suite replacement (https://github.com/ONLYOFFICE/documents-app-android)
Fossify Calendar (https://github.com/FossifyOrg/Calendar)
Fossify Messages (https://github.com/FossifyOrg/Messages)
Aves - Local gallery with great organization (https://github.com/deckerst/aves)
Termux - Terminal emulator (https://github.com/termux/termux-app/)
Unexpected Keyboard - A unique keyboard that pairs nicely with Termux (https://github.com/Julow/Unexpected-Keyboard)
WG Tunnel - WireGuard client (https://github.com/wgtunnel/wgtunnel)
These are all easily installed through Obtainium: https://obtainium.imranr.dev/