I am currently using a Pixel 4a with LineageOS and microG. When checking for app updates in Aurora Store, I can see several updates for what I believe are Google's Pixel-specific system apps, such as Android System Intelligence, Carrier Services, Connectivity Service, SIM Manager, Google Fi, etc... Checking the installed versions of these in Android settings shows their size to be only a few KB, so I'm assumig that they are just placeholders.
But my question is: Should I download these updates? Are they even compatible with microG? Is there any real world benefit in running them? (such as increased battery life, better cell service) Or would this just defeat the purpose of using an open-source implementation of Play Services in the first place?
Thank you for your help.
Related
Any way to disable "you must have Google play services to run (name of app that doesn
Title cut off, rest should say "doesn't require Google play services to run"
I only use the play store basically, and have no issues with manually enabling before checking for app updates or to download new apps (on my newer device, my older device doesn't even require them for the play store at all)
But things like ccleaner, my emoji keyboard, a few other apps I can't think, of annoyingly claim to need these services to run... While I'm actively running them and using them just fine without.
On a device without the option "disable notifications for this app"either within the app itself, or within my older 4.0.4 device that runs just fine despite it being older... How can I get rid of these annoyances?
Play services are a huge battery and ram hog which I keep disabled unless needed. So any "just install play services" comments isn't exactly what I'm looking for...
I've looked around in disable service (the app) for these apps, unable to find anything looking relevant.
Any help would be appreciated
Play Services are often used for authentication reasons. Meaning the apps look if you have a genuine version. For freemium apps they check for any in app purchases you might have done.
Other common cases are for push notifications or location services etc. These are often only minor or optional features of apps. That's why they usually work nonetheless without having Play Services active.
The only easy option is to use an alternative app store like the Amazon App Store or F-Droid. All the apps over there are pretty much guaranteed to work without Play Services.
There are also some projects out there that aim for a system without Play Services. A quick search should yield quite some results.
If you are rooted and capable of using XPosed, then there is a module in the repo somewhere that does exactly what you are looking for - hiding the pop up.
Can't remember the name right now and don't know if it is still maintained, but searching the modules should provide it to you.
However, Google Play Service shouldn't be so much of a power drainer any more. Beginning with Android 6 / M the battery optimizations are quite enormous, even though the Play Services are excluded from the system wide optimization (because they take care of these optimizations). To further improve the footprint, you could disable the location services and wireless scanning services.
Hi,
Like many people I don't trust Google.
They censor people, they remove websites from their rankings, they fire people for political beliefs, they track everybody, and of course their google play services app is capable of recording everything about you.
Is it possible to create a ROM for the OnePlus 6 that is without Google services?
How much of google can be stripped away at the ROM level?
How much of Android is necessary closed source from google?
Thanks.
frei6 said:
Hi,
Like many people I don't trust Google.
You know, they censor people, they remove websites from their rankings, and so on.
Is it possible to create a ROM for the OnePlus 6 that is without Google services?
How much of Android is closed source from google?
Thanks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think you may have chosen the wrong phone to avoid the prying eyes of google. I think that the services are directly integrated into the functions of everything in the system (with the exception of maybe play services as some phones are without play store). Certainly if i'm wrong, someone correct me. Good luck. :fingers-crossed:
thejase said:
I think you may have chosen the wrong phone to avoid the prying eyes of google. I think that the services are directly integrated into the functions of everything in the system (with the exception of maybe play services as some phones are without play store). Certainly if i'm wrong, someone correct me. Good luck. :fingers-crossed:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
But isn't there a version of Android (AOSP) that doesn't have the google spyware?
frei6 said:
Hi,
Like many people I don't trust Google.
They censor people, they remove websites from their rankings, they fire people for political beliefs, they track everybody, and of course their google play services app is capable of recording everything about you.
Is it possible to create a ROM for the OnePlus 6 that is without Google services?
How much of google can be stripped away at the ROM level?
How much of Android is necessary closed source from google?
Thanks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Although Lineage for MicroG has not been released yet, you can run HavocOS which is a Lineage based ROM that includes the "spoof patch" and flash MicroG instead of an OpenGapps package.
Please note that the micro edition of Gapps is not the same thing as MicroG. MicroG contains no Google blobs and you cannot use the Play Store or other apps that require Google Play Services. You will need to use Fdroid, YALP, etc to install and update packages.
Another alternative is to use HavocOS or any other LOS based ROM with the "pico" version of OpenGapps which contains the bare minimum required to use the Play Store. This is what I'm doing currently and it works well while reducing Googles presence on your phone. OpenGapps are based on AOSP code, so there are still binary blobs. (not really open-source as the name implies.)
Hydrogen os , exact same as oos but without Google. Have a look in roms etc
Was about to say Hydrogen Os.
I am a flashaholic. I only flash roms in my home because i have everything i need to repair in case of need.
So, flash a new rom, connect to WIFI, login to google. Surprise !!!... "Google does not recognise this device".... Same device. On the same router, connection, house.
BS "security"...
Hydrogen OS, but then you may be dealing with Chinese government spyware. Pick your poison.
I wonder if I can create two (or more) user profiles on my android device, one of which I will use only open source stuff and everything else on the other.
As far as I know, it is possible to create several user profiles in Android that are isolated from each other.
I would probably install LineageOS for this as it doesn't have google play services pre-installed on it and it seems very "clean" in terms of these things (I have never used this system).
There is something like OpenGApps that allows you to install google play services but as far as I know it requires installation from twrp. So I suspect google play services will then be installed for all user profiles on the device.
So is there any possibility to install google services for one user only?
I also know that there is such a thing as microg (and Aurora stora). When I heard that there was such a thing as "LineageOS for microG" I thought it would be a very good option (on one android profile I just wouldn't use microg). But later I also found out that it is supposedly against the google policy and that they can ban my account for it, which I would prefer to avoid.
So I wanted to ask if the only option to do this is to install LineageOS, check what applications are installed by default, install OpenGApps to it and then disable all google related applications on one of the user profiles?
Does such disabling the application also ensure that Google will not be able to "work" on my device in any way? Does OpenGApps install any system level google stuff that will run in the background anyway?
And are OpenGApps not something that I should not install when I don't want to get a google ban?
You are confusing (Open)GApps - Google themselves call them Google Mobile Services (GMS) - and Google Play Services what are two completely different things.
Google Play Services is one of the most important parts of Android. It helps connect everything together and hold it all there. The Google Play Services are the interface to the Google Mobile Services as well as to the hardware functions of the Android device. Many of your apps use Google Play Services everyday.
GMS is a bunch of apps what includes
Google Play Store,
Google Now,
Google Play Music,
Google Maps,
Google+,
Gmail,
Google Photos,
Youtube
and the Android Device Manager.
Knowing the difference it should be clear that GMS can get installed on a per-user basis whereas Google Play Services not.
jwoegerbauer said:
You are confusing (Open)GApps - Google themselves call them Google Mobile Services (GMS) - and Google Play Services what are two completely different things.
Google Play Services is one of the most important parts of Android. It helps connect everything together and hold it all there. The Google Play Services are the interface to the Google Mobile Services as well as to the hardware functions of the Android device. Many of your apps use Google Play Services everyday.
GMS is a bunch of apps what includes
Google Play Store,
Google Now,
Google Play Music,
Google Maps,
Google+,
Gmail,
Google Photos,
Youtube
and the Android Device Manager.
Knowing the difference it should be clear that GMS can get installed on a per-user basis whereas Google Play Services not.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the clarification, although I still don't really know what you meant. I thought that google play services is the name for all those components that are needed to run, for example, the google play store. If the google play store needs also other components (?), then when I wrote google play services, I meant all the components that are needed to run the play store.
In any case, I mean in practice whether I am able to install both the play store and the components needed for it only for one user in Android, but from what I understand it is not possible in your opinion.
The questions at the end of my post probably still remain the same. I can only clarify that I meant more general cases in these questions:
Does installing the play store (along with the necessary components) install any system-level Google stuff that will run in the background anyway even if I disable these apps?
And isn't installing the play store (along with the necessary components) by hand something that I shouldn't be doing when I want to avoid a Google ban?
Again:
Google Play Store simply is an ordinary user app as any other user app, too, nothing else. It itself installs , except some Android OS libraries, nothing. Only thing is it requires Google Play Services ( which are running in background ) to properly run. As already said: Google Play Services can only get installed once because it extends Android OS. And Android OS always is the same for all created users.
Don't understand what you mean with "Google ban".
Dani3I said:
I would probably install LineageOS for this as it doesn't have google play services pre-installed on it and it seems very "clean" in terms of these things (I have never used this system).
There is something like OpenGApps that allows you to install google play services but as far as I know it requires installation from twrp. So I suspect google play services will then be installed for all user profiles on the device.
So is there any possibility to install google services for one user only?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can install those apps but you have to flash it via recovery. Also, you need to do that prior to booting into the os for the first time, which I think is related to encryption.
If you already booted into your os, you need to boot into recovery and perform a factory data reset, then flash those gapps (as far as I know dirty flashing those gapps will introduce instability to those gapps. That's why you need a factory data reset).
Keep in mind that factory reseting will delete all your person data.
After you flashed it, those gapps will be available for every user
Dani3I said:
I also know that there is such a thing as microg (and Aurora stora). When I heard that there was such a thing as "LineageOS for microG" I thought it would be a very good option (on one android profile I just wouldn't use microg). But later I also found out that it is supposedly against the google policy and that they can ban my account for it, which I would prefer to avoid.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Aurora Store provides an anonymous google account. It's data isn't linked to you which means they cannot ban your account.
Dani3I said:
So I wanted to ask if the only option to do this is to install LineageOS, check what applications are installed by default, install OpenGApps to it and then disable all google related applications on one of the user profiles?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
LOS comes without any google apps preinstalled. So first flash LOS, then OpenGApps (follow their official guide. They describe it there).
And yes, after that you have to disable every google app you don't want to use for every new user profile.
Dani3I said:
Does such disabling the application also ensure that Google will not be able to "work" on my device in any way? Does OpenGApps install any system level google stuff that will run in the background anyway?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you disable it for the current user, it won't run in any way, yes.
OpenGApps itself shouldn't install anything on system level. But those apps will be installed on system level since you flash them to the system (using your recovery). However, if you disable them they won't run in the background.
Dani3I said:
And are OpenGApps not something that I should not install when I don't want to get a google ban?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't know.
jwoegerbauer said:
You are confusing (Open)GApps - Google themselves call them Google Mobile Services (GMS) - and Google Play Services what are two completely different things.
Google Play Services is one of the most important parts of Android. It helps connect everything together and hold it all there. The Google Play Services are the interface to the Google Mobile Services as well as to the hardware functions of the Android device. Many of your apps use Google Play Services everyday.
GMS is a bunch of apps what includes
Google Play Store,
Google Now,
Google Play Music,
Google Maps,
Google+,
Gmail,
Google Photos,
Youtube
and the Android Device Manager.
Knowing the difference it should be clear that GMS can get installed on a per-user basis whereas Google Play Services not.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yep that's absolutely correct
Just got the Stag Rom up and running on my Moto Stylus. Added MicroG from F-droid and all seems to work well. When I did a scan with ClassyShark, MicroG showes 4 trackers, Google AdMob, Google Analytics, Google Firebase and Mapbox ? anyone know why ? something that is needed for MicroG to work ?
Baja24 said:
Just got the Stag Rom up and running on my Moto Stylus. Added MicroG from F-droid and all seems to work well. When I did a scan with ClassyShark, MicroG showes 4 trackers, Google AdMob, Google Analytics, Google Firebase and Mapbox ? anyone know why ? something that is needed for MicroG to work ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did you consider to ask in the µG thread? I assume there're probably more knowledgable members around.
[APP] microG GmsCore - lightweight free software clone of Google Play Services
Introduction microG GmsCore is a FLOSS (Free/Libre Open Source Software) framework to allow applications designed for Google Play Services to run on systems, where Play Services is not available. If you use your phone without GAPPS this might...
forum.xda-developers.com
Personally, I'm user of µG for many years on all my devices but not an expert. I assume µG requires those libraries to make applications to run that usually require the Google Play Services but I'm convinced that they've been "disabled" in such a way that they don't deliver Google's intended results.
Thanks, kind of what I thought.
Hi there,
I have read that native Gapps core is "spying on you", so I flashed an Arrow OS without Gapps integration on my phone, and installed afterwards MicroG.
Now some apps won't work, because it can't check the license (like paid Litchi app).
Is a custom Firmware, with Gapps core integrated behaving the same as native one in the stock Firmware according "spying on you", or are they in general more safe then Stock ones?
Thanks in advance.
MicroG is a clone of Google's proprietary core libraries and applications, means it simply provides a placeholder for many APIs Google Play Services / Google Services Framework / GMS apps are relying on.
So it's not surprising that when using MicroG some GMS apps and also some 3rd-party apps won't work as expected.
Got my OnePlus 9 Pro today, before I start flashing LOS I wanted to ask a couple questions about my Google choices.
Is it possible to not have any Google apps/services on the phone but still have access to the Play Store? I've seen Aurora store mentioned a couple times, but it doesn't seem like it works that well on my current device (searching for apps that I know are there but get no results, etc.). Those apps would likely still rely on Google services and break without them, correct?
Is it possible to use Mozilla's location services instead of Google's?
If no to the above, can I use Google's location services through a proxy?
What are the differences between OpenGApps/MindTheGapps/microG? I'm considering the latter (microG) but it looks like there hasn't been much progress on it and I don't know how functional it will be.
I want as little Google on my phone as possible while still having access to GPS, apps that rely on Google having bare minimum functionality, and privacy. What is the best way to do this?
1. You have access to the web of Play Store. play.google.com