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Comment by jacquesm | Hacker News Reader

It's not side loading. It is just installing and running. I swear all this 'for your benefit' crap is going to relegate all of our computing hardware to the status of dumb terminal before long.

Note how the term 'side loading' is already weighted against you doing it, it is supposed to make you feel you're doing something that is borderline illegal even if it is still possible and that you are bypassing safeguards that would stop you from doing this stupid thing if you only took the proper route.

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Kind of like "jailbreaking" as a term. It makes it seem like you're a criminal escaping from confinement enforced by good and decent society.

Yes, good one that is another one.

Agreed. I refuse to use the terms "rooting" and "jailbreaking" in professional environments, I always use terms like "admin access to the mobile device".

Because that's what it is, despite the extremely successful campaign to paint people who want admin access on their mobile computers to be painted in the same light as pirates.

To jailbreak you need to be imprisoned. Since your only crime was buying an iPhone it presents apple as the tyrant. I think the term fits

It’s called that because you used to download the apks on a separate computer and then load them onto the phone, it has nothing to do with sounding illegal

You could always download apks directly from your phone...

That's how I've always done it. Why would anyone do it any other way? Genuine question.

Some devices don't have browsers, some are locked-down and only support one app store, or sideloading via adb, sometimes the UX is better (SideQuest for the Meta Quest).

The large majority of Android devices have a browser by default.

I did not check but I think that the term may be older than Android, iirc on Symbian phones installing custom Java applets required a computer to place the package on the phone.

Back in the day it wasn’t the norm though. We plugged our phones into our computers to manage media, jailbreak them, install apps downloaded from forums, etc.

Hell, people used to use iTunes to manage the apps on their iPhone and organize their Home Screen.

No, you could always install APK's manually, and there were early package managers, you didn't need a computer at all or to jailbreak an android.

Then with the windows mobile world, you could install manually, or use activesync which really sucked. Same with Palm. I don't recall Blackberry.

> No, you could always install APK's manually, and there were early package managers

In fact on the iPhone Cydia existed before the app store ever did. Apple had decided that web apps were the way to go.

No, that's not necessary. You can download them straight to your phone. The 'side' is clearly in reference to the fact that you bypass the app store.

Yes, you can download APKs but I don’t remember that being common in the early days of Android.

This was before it had a download manager or file manager and using your computer to manage your phone was the norm.

The term predates Android anyways, goes back to the 90s I think.

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