I spent about 1 week with Sailfish OS before realizing, again, that the Librem 5 was awesome, underappreciated, and my daily driver. So, I apologize, internet forum people. I have been daily driving it now for a little over two years with a 1 week hiatus.
The biggest reason for my switch back? AweSIM. I was so frustrated by trying and failing to use various T-Mobile providers and even a few AT&T MVNO providers to get cellular to work at my home that I blamed Purism and gave up. You know what? The cell service with Sailfish OS was not any better. So, back to the drawing board and coming back to Purism and AweSIM.
Moral of the story? I don’t know. I am fickle? I think basically, realizing that being a Linux mobile user right now is not “perfect”. One has to accept flaws, rough-edges, down-right failures. I am also cognizent that AweSIM may fail again I know I would be pretty upset about that. The reward? Freedom. I think the trade-off, for now, is worth it. (All that being said, Sailfish OS is also very cool and I do use it. I would recommend it to anyone who is interested. I also greatly miss the battery life on that device. The Librem 5’s battery is just well, not good).
Finally, I am still frustrated by the lack of software development for the Librem 5. I might have to switch again at some point if this device is not going to be supported due to money issues at Purism. I hope not. I am also frustrated by some of the business decisions at Purism. However, who else is doing this well in the Linux space and developing their own hardware. Nobody? Given the money issues, I am more than a little surprised that Purism has not simply given up like Microsoft and their Nokia devices, etc. Or, a closer example would be Canonical and Ubuntu Touch.
Keep in mind software development for the L5 doesn’t depend on Purism only. It’s a question of “Debianesque” package developers everywhere adapting their existing applications, or creating new ones, to work in the emerging Linux mobile devices (L5, Pinephone, future handsets).
By the way, may I ask how you obtained a Sailfish license in North America? Are Jolla finally making it available to users in this market now?
Agreed on the Debian part. Flathub also works, to a point. My frustration is not with packages though. Why are we still on Phosh from, I believe, last September, for example? Why is Gnome-Calls so far behind what is on Flathub? I understand there is a “road to Crimson” but I do not believe Purism is “currently” working on Crimson, unless you know something I do not.
Getting a Sailfish license was easy: I ordered the license from their website. I am in the United States so they must be.
A Purism dev said they first want to release a new device before they start to develop software further. Seems like they want to invest money to get new cash for software development. That’s why I wait maybe 1 or 2 month after next device is released.
Guido is still actively working on mobile Linux, though those developments haven’t been added to the Byzantium repository. Since the sources are available, one could manually update the packages, though it is not a convenient option.
Guido has a few options to sponsor his work if you’re interested, though it might not directly help the Librem 5, but the general mobile Linux ecosystem. https://honk.sigxcpu.org/piki/donations/
He is also no employee of Purism and still not the only one outside of this company who’s coding. Guido does a good job, but it also does not help as long as we stick on Byzantium. He managed to combine Mobian with some packages from Byzantium to make his phone working well, if I got him correctly. But that’s no solution for an average user. We don’t just want to have Phosh updated, we also want our phone runs as stable as possible.
In my experience Mobian is close enough (almost indistinguishable for most things) to a more up to date PureOS that I’m not too worried about the software longevity of the L5.
Great, now we can forever point to you as an example to those who are considering giving up. “You think you’re giving up now, but you’ll anyway come back soon, just like @flanders51 did. Let’s see if you can last more than a week without your L5!”
Hi. Yes. I am that person. I deserve whatever derision that comes with. I recall someone insinuated I was an idiot before. Not sure I agree, but I certainly deserve some finger-pointing.
My best experience on the PinePhone, a stopgap while waiting for the L5, was with Mobian. All other things being equal, if Mobian provided Pipewire and solid hands-off Bluetooth, I’d switch in a heartbeat. But to be fair, the minute Purism caught up I would switch back (I really appreciate Purism’s hard work and emphasis on privacy).
