Project Mainline delivers key OS updates through Google Play — here’s how it’s changing
I’ll never understand why typical android updates are tied to your carrier and reliant on them for distribution.
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But where’s the money in that? How does AT&T holding back a major update for months at a time help them make money? It makes me never want to buy a phone from them again more than anything.
I think the point they’re making is that updates don’t help sell more phones, and selling new phones with contracts is how they make money
Carriers likely pay google under the table to implement it that way so they can hold out updates on people and make them buy new phones. They also likely want to make sure all their crap spyware they force on your phone is working the best it can on the latest version so they can get as much of your data as well. Sometimes that might mean holding off a security patch until they themselves have wormed their way around it.
Yes this is all hypothetical, but the money there is real.
That and also pay the manufacturers under the table to not support bootloader unlocking, ensuring that the phone is ewaste after you’re done with it And forcing you to get a new one
I’m afraid this will end up the same way as Treble, and other similar efforts. On paper, this is a fantastic idea. In practice, most vendors will probably block these, or change the core distribution to the point where these are irrelevant, like Samsung or any Chinese market phones do. Not to mention that modifying anything on your device is becoming exceedingly difficult, depending on which vendor it’s from
Treble has become a requirement for Google certification, though, and it’s on almost every phone out there today. They can choose to rip Treble out of Android, but then they would never be able to get Google Play on their phones, and that’s a necessity in most countries.
Some of the Treble implementations may be buggy, but it has been a huge improvement to the custom ROM scene at the very least. Sure, hardware that integrates with a manufacturer’s ROM doesn’t work with generic software, but that’s to be expected, and it makes for a much easier jumping off point than getting all of Android and its drivers and binaries to work every time a new device comes out.
Chinese phones need to be disconnected entirely from Google for obvious reasons. However, GSIs have been found to work on some Chinese devices from brands that also target western audiences. In a sense, GSIs provide you with more freedom if you import cheap no-name Chinese devices.
Project Mainline is mostly intended for manufacturers to provide more updates, and for Google to take over the responsibility of updating stuff when manufacturers refuse to do it, like most Android critical people want Google to. Vendors have the choice between supporting it or going full Amazon/Huawei with their own cloud services and app store.
Treble is pretty good IMO, I’m using a device with LineageOS GSI, and it works pretty much perfectly. I do wish it was officially supported by LineageOS, as updating requires a PC right now, but it is pretty usable and a better alternative than using the Stock ROM.
Interesting, is there no recovery image available for your device at all? You don’t specifically need LineageOS for a working TWRP build to exist, and TWRP can flash .img files for you.
Last I checked, TWRP couldn’t flash logical partitions that make up where the GSI is patched, but it was requested, maybe something changed? Idk, the guy who created the guide on how to flash GSI on my device’s XDA forum mentioned this issue a while ago and recommended flashing through ADB.
Actually, I think the issue is that when I flashed my device, TWRP couldn’t unencrypt or something, it’s been a while and I know I should start the process from scratch
I’ve never had to flash GSI images myself, thankfully, but I do regularly use the image flashing option to reinstall Magisk after a ROM update. Those images work fine for me.
Ah, encryption and TWRP is always something. It usually works, but sometimes it doesn’t, and there’s no fix when it breaks. Broken TWRP decryption has causedme a factory reset or two but with OrangeFox the decryption stuff all seems to work flawlessly.
Since they are adding it as a part of Google Play Services and Google certifies Google Play compatible devices, hopefully this will be a requirement if they want to include Google’s playstore.
A lot of it is actually already required. I can’t find any comprehensive list, but each new release since Android 10 (when modular components / Mainline became a thing) adds new components and makes some older ones mandatory for Google Play devices.
What about lineage os?
