C’mon, man. I’ve already given you clues for that.
I totally understand that the Librem 5 is not, at this stage, to the point where you would like it to be.
Probably you would like contacts-from-SIM to happen automatically or without much effort on your part. Yes, the Librem 5 is still at the stage where some things are not as easy as someone might like.
That’s because the world has moved on in 23 years to newer, better technology.
It’s a bit like complaining that a new startup bank simply doesn’t deal with personal cheques. Sure, I get it, maybe cheques are important to your individual workflow but …
Yep, 100%, I understand that that is what that functionality was designed to do.
These days … people use a range of alternative technologies.
Some people use a central server
Some people synch via a central server
Some people would just synch the new phone from the old phone (e.g. when you get a new iPhone all the crap i.e. not just contacts just magically transfers wirelessly from the old phone to the new phone)
And finally a bit more low tech … some people will export all their contacts from the old phone to a file, move that file from the old phone to the new phone, and import from that file on the new phone 1
And for all the convenience of moving contacts via SIM … some people who have a Librem 5 may have procured a new SIM for the new phone (leaving the old SIM in their existing phone until they personally reach “daily driver”), in which case the SIM can’t be used for contacts on the new phone anyway.
1 This is what I did and, coming from iPhone, it was more hassle than is ideal but that is not entirely Purism’s fault. Do you think Apple makes it easy to migrate off iPhone?
I’d just point out that if you think transferring those contacts will be painful, it will be even more painful if they’re lost due to not being backed up. Please back them up, you’ll likely be able to restore them to the L5 from said backup but even if you can’t, please back them up before something happens to them.
For my part - with each incremental improvement, my usage of my L5 increases. The biggest blocking factor for full adoption as a daily driver is, frankly, the ability for an OTP/MFA app to scan QR codes. The battery life has improved to be tolerable. Call quality is great. The camera is tolerable but not something I need it to be great at. Email client could be better. I use PGP and Geary is not PGP friendly. And Evolution, even with mobile enforcement turned on, is just fugly.
Getting closer. Future, à mon avis, is getting brighter.
I’d just point out that if you think transferring those contacts will be painful, it will be even more painful if they’re lost due to not being backed up. Please back them up, you’ll likely be able to restore them to the L5 from said backup but even if you can’t, please back them up before something happens to them.
Especially true since the Librem5 eats SIM cards. Back those up ASAP!
I’ve been using the Librem 5 as my daily driver for over a month now. I put up with a lot. My wife however does not. She asks me before going out with her 60% 3 year old phone if I have a working phone.
Me, with my device plugged in for the past few hours, say “yes” even though it realistically will only last 5 hours with normal usage, much less that what she can get with her phone with what’s remaining.
She orders a Lyft for a ride to her event, and suggests we walk back. We finish the event, and guess who doesn’t want to walk back, pay for a ride, or wait around for technical difficulties. I open the Epiphany Web App, and guess what’s logged me out even though I set it to remember web data storage. I look up and see an empty cab go by that honestly would be faster to chase after and hail than wait for the web app to load the various pages needed to login.
This “phone” still does not perform at par with a 4G flip phone, so I can’t even recommend it to the growing movement of normal people who want to disconnect, but still be reachable via mobile flip phone. It is definitely a small mobile Linux touch screen device. It is definitely not a smartphone in a way that meets expectations even with the workarounds and trade-offs, despite all the hard work the team has and continues to put into it.
Is your System up to date? If i use it for 3 to 5 hours with a mixed Screentime, WLAN, Mobil and GPS on. It End up at 50% Charge later and that is enough to Suspend it for the next 12 Hours of Sleeping and re arrive in my Office. So i think you have not used it for some days and charge it enough? The charging however is long like 3 to 5 hours for a near at full battery. But i have some times i do not use a o this phone during working. Just for a Call. And with mixed Screentime i think about watching 10 Minutes Movie, hear a 1 hour podcast check emails and browse mastodon for 30 minutes.
This works fine here. If you have a Prepaied Card, did you activate some Mobil Data Flat?
GPS Works fine here after tow or three days outsid walking. Gnome Maps working fine. But i wait for an offline solution without transfering so much mobil data.
I did not Check the Camera not sure if i have the Beta-Version or not. QR and Barcodes working fine with Decoder. I do not want a Mobil for Pictures.
Yes that Storage thing is not working good, however if you set up ssh and run scp its fine. Right now i just use Data by Email, Messanger, or a USB-Stick with USB-C Adapter. However i have a USB-Keyboard, Network and can Copy files from the Bash, by do a SCP to my Server or Host Computer from the Librem 5, works on every Linux computer like a charm and so the Phone do.
Yes but if some young folks would not like to understand language or math, or Code i have no mercy with them. But every Human deserve a phone or an Application with do not slate them because of Information and Complexity. So i stand here to chance that with hardware. There was this news about 650.000 Attributes collected about folks using usual OS, Apps and Webpages…
…so that not a fair fight. And this Linux Phones are the only one, where you can have a Chance to change that in Future.
I have Tesco mobile and I’m in UK. Sorry I don’t know what HKS is. I do not have any VPNs installed.
No. Never.
I take the micro-sd card out and stick it into my pc.
You do realize that this is catch-22. Verizon will not white-list L5 until enough people buy the device but people are not going to buy the device because it doesn’t work on one of the largest phone networks in USA. Purism CEO should get into contact with someone at Verizon and ask them if them can approve the device.
The difference here is that Normal computer has a keyboard and mouse with big screen. That makes the typing experience lot faster and easier. Typing on a piece of glass that is 6" is a bad experience.
Pretty much this. There is only so much even the Linux people will put up with. I’m not sure how to explain this but I don’t want my phone to be a project. However it is important that L5 succeeds and becomes 3rd option. Buying generic Android phones and reverse engineering them is counter productive.
I wouldn’t bother with Epiphany. Install Firefox and call it a day. But expect scaling problems when you go into its settings page.
Economics. It won’t happen on its own without adoption and funding. If you want something more mature, there’s the option of waiting for time to pass or getting the word out there so others can try it out who are willing to tolerate some quirks.
Purism devs have been directing most of their attention toward software development on the Librem 5 lately. Some fixes came out relatively recently that may address some of your concerns.
Oh sorry: hardware killswitch
Yeah, sounds like something to bring up to support@puri.sm.
That would drive me mad. I understand that you don’t want to touch the terminal if at all possible; have you checked out apps/services like Syncthing or Nextcloud? If there is not a native arm64 Linux app for something, you may want to test-drive a web app and see how it performs.
I understand the circular dependency here. My personal experience with major telecom companies would suggest that Purism doesn’t drive enough sales to warrant their attention, but maybe. I suspect that Purism leadership has looked into this and that it would be done already if it were a simple affair.
The device supports a variety of input methods that can ease this burden.
I agree. Future looks dim.
You made 6 common points.
You got 6 excuses.
Sounds like you got the same model I have. BUT…
It is said the the 5 is “a work in progress”. Now, knowing that, I don’t expect it to do much of anything. I read the ads, but have, since purchase, lowered my expectations 75% and now, due to health issues, I had to buy a digital phone I can rely on.
Meanwhile, I look forward to L5 working better one day, but do try the huge amount of help I received to get it readable and online. Learning new OS commands was not in the ads.
They’ve made it this far. Let’s hope they can augment the ‘team’ with more techs who can help move this along before people opt to use Google implants instead of desktops and digital phones.
~f
With ssh, you can also log in to the L5 over WiFi via the Terminal on your computer, to run commands on a larger screen. (With your computer’s larger, physical keyboard.)
