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Comment by donatj | Hacker News Reader

Anyone have any strong recommendations for apps available on F-Droid I should try?

I think I have maybe two apps installed via it currently. If something is available on the Google App Store I'm generally using that instead.

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I'm the other way arround, 2-3 things from playstore and the rest from f-droid. Here is my list:

    Acode (text editor)
    Aegist (2FA)
    AntennaPod (podcast)
    Aurora Store (playstore)
    FairEmail (E-Mail)
    Feeder (RSS reader)
    Fennec (firefox with extension support)
    KeePassDX (password manager)
    KOReader (ebook reader)
    LocalSend (send data between devices in local network)
    Mastodon mobile client
    MuPDF viewer (PDF viewer)
    Oddysey (music player)
    NewPipe (youtube frontend)
    Offi (public transport)
    OsmAnd (map)
    QR Scanner (PFA)
    Red Moon (lower screen brightness lower than minimum for reading before bed)
    ScreenStream (stream screen to website in local network)
    Stealth (reddit client)
    Termux (linux shell eviroment)
    VLC

F-Droid Basic is cool. Same thing, just without some sharing options etc., you probably don't use anyway. It was the first one to get actual background updates on modern android.

Barcode Scanner is decent, it even searches for products online, if you scan something that looks like a food label etc.

Casio G-Shock Smart Sync if you are tired of official Casio app in a casio bluetooth watch.

DuckDuckGo is there...

FadCam - if you ever need a recording without tracking attention (while phone is locked). Could get you out of some legal trouble...

Futo Keyboard is interesting project.

GadgetBridge saves some old devices. I use it for some Xiaomi eink devices that overwise require... to be connected to chinese datacenter to be discovered and sync. Which is insane, as some versions discover and can be synced on EU servers...

Grayjay for videos on many platforms.

So many HackerNews clients - I'm on Hacki currently.

Home assistant, Jellyfin, Joplin, Mullvad, Telegram, Nextcloud, Organic Maps, Osmand~, Tailscale or Yubico authenticator are all there. I like them better from f-droid.

Street Complete is an awesome way to contribute to OpenStreetMap.

Thunderbird (!) which is a fork of K9 (still active), and looks and runs great. Highly recommend.

I recently swapped from the F-Droid version of AntennaPod to the Google Play Store version so that I could use Chromecast, which they strip from their F-Droid builds because the underlying library isn't open-source and is deemed "impure" by F-Droid (it gets you a "This app has features you might not like" banner, when honestly it's a feature I specifically want).

A similar thing is true of Tempo (a Subsonic-client music player), where the F-Droid builds have Chromecast support stripped out, but the GitHub-published builds have it (so I also have to install Obtanium to get those updated).

"I want to listen to my audio on my devices in my house" is a weird thing to exclude in the name of open-source purity.

Otherwise, I love F-Droid. I just wish they had a bit more nuance to recognize that Chromecast support isn't the same as "constantly reports your location in the background to corporate servers", and so those shouldn't have the same severity of warning banners applied.

Weird, I can can stream antennapod's audio to any of my Google home devices and I assumed it'd work the same should I want to use my Chromecast.

You probably have installed it from the Google Play store rather than from F-Droid, I'd bet.

Also another odd thing to note, the droid version of antennapod has android auto support and the play version doesn't!

Great list, some of the apps I commonly use you did not mention:

  Aves Libre (Gallery)
  Breezy Weather (Weather overview)
  Fossify Calendar
  Immich (Self hosted Google Photos alternative)
  K-9 Mail (E-Mail, to be rebranded to Thunderbird Mobile at some point in the future)
  NetGuard (Firewall and logging)
  Nextcloud (Self-hosted cloud storage)
  Unexpected Keyboard (Keyboard that works nicely with Termux)

> K-9 Mail (E-Mail, to be rebranded to Thunderbird Mobile at some point in the future)

They decided not to rebrand but instead to publish two versions of the same app. See https://github.com/thunderbird/thunderbird-android for details

The Thunderbird download is: https://f-droid.org/en/packages/net.thunderbird.android/

I must've missed this somehow, thank you!

Breezy Weather: how have I missed this gem for all these years??

Thank you

From me:

    WifiAnalyse (hidden camera scanner)
    AdAway (block adds) 
    HomeAssistant (automation)
    LocalSend (easy LAN send)
    OrganicMaps (nice OSM)

Librera is an awesome ebook reader. The version on fdroid is the same as the paid app on the play store.

I hadnt checked it out in a while, but it seems to support OPDS now which is nice, I can browse my ebook library remotely now

Librera FD (F-Droid) has OPDS stripped out. https://github.com/foobnix/LibreraReader/issues/1335 But you can get the Play Store version through Obtainium. It's the PRO version (also available with Obtainium) the one with OPDS support.

Kore reader also can open OPDS collections.

*KOReader

It's super annoying though, that installing an app from F-Droid sometimes appears as installed from Play Store as well. For example, I have VLC installed from F-Droid, but it also appears in the Play Store update list and _can't_ be updated from there.

Does someone know why this is? I assume it's Google just assuming it's the only app source and not bothering to check the installation source associated with apps when pulling them into its update check list. Or is there no way on Android to check whether you're the one that installed an app?

Yes, I wish Google would fix that.

Fennec is still maintained?

Also KDE connect can be alternative to sending files if you use linux on desktop.

Yes, although there were problems arround patching the the recent vulnerable version 129.0.2, because the build script broke: https://forum.f-droid.org/t/fennec-vulnerability-recommended...

The fennec app was last updated 10 days ago, so it's now on a very recent version. (134.0.0 vs the latest 134.0.2)

I thought I'd just point out that KeePassDX can itself do 2FA (as can KeePassXC on the desktop, so you can keep your TOTP keys synced too).

OsmAnd~, the premium version of OsmAnd (OpenStreetMap map application) is available for free on F-Droid (as permitted by the source licence).

AnkiDroid (Anki - Spaced repetition app)

AntennaPod (Podcasts app)

Coffee (quicktile alowing adjusting how long will the display will stay awak)

NetGuard (VPN to control app internet access & domain based ad blocking)

Newpipe (alternative youtube & other media sites frontend)

OsmAnd (Navigation based on Open Street Map)

Sky Map (google's sky map)

Telegram FOSS (Telegram client)

VLC (media player)

WiFiAnalyzer

For games:

    Forkyz (collects crossword puzzles from different sources, like the New York Times) 
    PySolFc (mahjong, solitaire, other classic single-player games) 
    Shattered Pixel Dungeon
    Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup
    MTG Familiar (database of Magic the Gathering cards and rules)

Learning Japanese:

    AnkiDroid
    Kakugo (for kanji writing practice)

Miscellaneous:

    NewPipe (buggy every so often, but it makes YouTube bearable for me) 
    OsmAnd~ (offline map and directions app)
    SecScanQR (basic QR reader) 
    Vanilla Music
    LibreOffice Viewer
    MuPDF viewer
    KeePassDX
    Termux

In addition to all the other recommendations, Trail Sense is pretty great, and BRouter is quite useful for finding alternative routes if you use OsmAnd and cycle a lot.

I also use Etar and DAVx⁵ for calendar and contacts sync.

Rethink is useful if you don't already have another VPN setup for ad blocking etc.

I'm using:

  FreeOTP (OTP tool)
  Simple Chess Clock (once a year)
  Binary Eye (QR code scanner)
  Etar (Calendar)
  Simple Notes Pro (Very nice and simple note taking app)
  OsmAnd (Maps with great path details for hiking)

Others have mentioned many good apps, but I'll add this one:

Forkyz: Crossword puzzle app, a fork of the Shortyz app. If you like crossword puzzles, this pulls from a bunch of daily crosswords.

I regularly use the following:

Osmand and Organic maps for navigation (I like both, I just always keep two of essential apps, for redundancy)

Fennec browser

Cell and SatStat to monitor my phone connectivity

RedReader for reddit

UVC_Camera for my usb cam

FairEmail, Etar calendar, KOReader, Nextcloud, Joplin, Deck, Catima, Davx5, jtxboard, FreeOTP for productivity / life organization

Gauguin, AnutoTD, Apple flinger, 1010 klooni, SolitaireCG are my go-to games.

Aurora Store to replace Play Store completely.

I myself use the following that are on F-Droid:

- Hacki for Hacker News

- Immich

- Organic Maps

- Synchting-Fork

- VLC

- Voice Audiobook Player

Why fork of Syncthing?

The official Syncthing has been discontinued on android, I believe due to the difficulty of keeping up with the changing APIs.

Thank you.

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