alt Hacker News> We've convinced multiple banks to permit GrapheneOS, and that's going to become MUCH easier now.
I did not know that. That is very interesting.
On that topic, an honest question: what is the killer feature of banking apps that everyone is so hot on? Are we talking like retail banking or money transmitters? I am not using any bespoke banking apps, and I don't feel like I'm missing out, but maybe I just don't know what I'm missing.
What does detract from my GrapheneOS experience is the keyboard. It's just ok. I need swipe typing though, and I haven't found anything even close to gboard glide.
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> I need swipe typing though, and I haven't found anything even close to gboard glide.
https://f-droid.org/packages/helium314.keyboard/
HeliBoard is currently asking people to volunteer swipe data so they can further improve on free and open alternative for swipe keyboard. Please consider helping out!
https://github.com/Helium314/HeliBoard/wiki/Tutorial:-How-to...
> On that topic, an honest question: what is the killer feature of banking apps that everyone is so hot on? Are we talking like retail banking or money transmitters? I am not using any bespoke banking apps, and I don't feel like I'm missing out, but maybe I just don't know what I'm missing.
For me, the killer "feature" is that I need to generate an auth code on my bank's app to be able to log in to my account and make transfers via my browser (or I can use the app directly). In other words, it's considerably more difficult to actually do (retail) banking without my bank's app.
My bank's killer feature is that they're app-first and web-first because they only have one physical branch in San Antonio. They were one of the first banks in the nation to allow you to electronically represent checks for deposit, and they did that first through their web app and then later through their mobile app.
For the keyboard I recently discovered HeliBoard. You have to add a gboard's library to enable glide typing, but so far I really like it.
We are talking about banking and pseudo-banking apps with the following typical features:
* A wallet for QR-code based payments backed by a national standard for their content and by the money in your bank account;
* A software implementation of an NFC-enabled credit or debit card, or sometimes with a magnetic strip emulation in addition to that;
* An interface to transfer money to other bank accounts in the same country or abroad, or to convert between local and foreign currency if you have a foreign currency bank account;
* A way to pay common utility bills - in some cases, by scanning the QR code on the bill;
* A way to manage banking and investment accounts - e.g., if you want an extra savings account in Japanese yen with a new debit card attached to it, tap a few times and it's there;
* A chat with bank representatives - for example, to provide supporting documents by photographing them, without ever visiting the bank;
* A second factor (as in 2FA) to approve money transfers initiated from the desktop web browser, meeting the bank standards where TOTP can't meet them (e.g., due to the legal requirement to say what transaction the code is for).
The real problem is that many banks are deprecating their browser-based interfaces and are turning app-only.