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Comment by drdaeman | Hacker News Reader

Google's AOSP is FOSS, Android you get on a typical phone isn't. You got bunch of proprietary binaries, kernel source code (usually, even without a toolchain to build it), and, well, that's about it.

Fuck open source, I don't give shit about Samsung/Sony/Motorola developers and how they are happy with Apache license they took AOSP under. I - the user - want free software on my phone and I mean the software that respects my freedoms. In this regard, average Android phone isn't free by any standards.

But, yeah, right, AOSP is open. Like this fact is of any use to an average tech-savvy consumer who's not skilled at reverse engineering.

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It's not open source because the average consumer wouldn't know what to do with the source code? what the hell kind of argument is that? Open source isn't about end-users, it's about developer freedom. And developers are free to use android to build things. that's what open source is.

Just because you've chosen to create your own ill-informed definition of what open means, doesn't make android any less open.

It all boils down to what you call "Android."

AOSP is open source, I've already said that. It doesn't care about my freedoms (so I don't care about its openness), but it's "open" as in OSI definition. That's true and I've never argued about that.

However, typical Android you get on smartphone (that's called "Android", too) is neither open nor free - it's usually completely proprietary bootloader, firmware and userspace, you won't have any source code for anything except for GPLed parts (i.e. Linux kernel). It just happens that those proprietary binaries were mostly built from unmodified AOSP code (but you can't really tell if code's modified or not), but this doesn't make them open.

I'm surprised no-one's mentioned Replicant, which "aims to replace all proprietary Android components with their free software counterparts"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Replicant_(operating_system)

That's mostly about binary drivers for hardware though, which remains a struggle for desktop Linux too.

So you're upset that they call it "Android" ?

You know you can change what's installed on your handset? Cyanogenmod supports a ton of phones... maybe next time you buy a handset, check they support it.

> You know you can change what's installed on your handset?

Ah, thanks for suggestions. Actually, I've had to buy a smartphone recently, and tried exactly what you suggested. Unfortunately it seems that Cyanogenmod has almost non-existent support for dual-SIM phones (at least nothing for what was available, and I was in a bit of hurry), and due to personal circumstances I needed this kind of hardware.

Then maybe it's better to discuss whether Android, as ultimately delivered to end-users, is free software.

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-software-even-more-import...

Regardless of whether most users know what to do with the source code, are they free to ask or hire a developer of their choice to study and modify it on their behalf? drdaeman's point, which seems inarguable to me, is that with most Android devices, the answer is no, because Sony/Samsung/Motorola are free to use AOSP code under the Apache license, but they don't pass that freedom on to the user.

I believe that's called "moving the goalposts". Android is free. that's what the original discussion was. No, most of the time products based on android as delivered to customers are not free software. But that doesn't mean android isn't free.

As usual, RMS had this sussed out years before everyone else realised what was going on http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/sep/19/android-fr...

Well it also implies that Android isn't popular with consumers so isn't much worth talking about, as consumers.

Relevant to this discussion is that Google's nefarious plans (more people using the internet) would have been met even with a fully free software stack. They had to expend more effort building an Apache codebase to appease their partners, who wanted to have their own (minor) proprietary forks.

This actually makes Android more attractive to Microsoft and generally increases the chance of a divergent, proprietary fork, which I believe Kindle already is.

Free software assumes that all end users might want to modify it, regardless of those users' current skill set. I may not be capable of modifying kernel source code today, but who knows what the future might bring.

Even if end users can't modify it themselves, they can hire developers to do it. This effectively creates a market for software customization/personalization, whereas closed-source software is more akin to a monopoly (whoever holds the source code, holds the monopoly to fixing bugs/adding features).

Not just that really, I think his point is more so that AOSP will not build and run for 99% of phones out there (i.e. non-Nexus phones). There's a lot of reverse engineering that goes on from people like CyanogenMod to make it work on other devices. Manufacturers release kernel source, as they must, but they rarely release other modifications they make for their own devices to even boot. There's a lot of stupidity in the Android "hacker" community (i.e. XDA) where people go around saying "X manufacturer doesn't release their sources, I'm boycotting X" when in reality, except for the Chinese OEMs they do release the source that they're required to release, it's just that 90% of the time that source is nowhere near enough to produce a build that you can run on your phone.

Open source is not for end users you are right. Fre software is, its where I as user would expect to have root by default on my own phone. Its a huge difference.

> Open source isn't about end-users, it's about developer freedom.

That is why FSF keeps criticizing "Open Source". This nonsense is awful. Software freedom is extremely important to end-users. They might like to do something as simple as protect their privacy and turn off surveillance or uninstall bloatware! If Open Source isn't about those things at all (even though they do NOT require programming skills!), then we really need to keep focusing on software freedom for real and not your insulting interpretation of "Open Source"

It's really weird that people talk about phones like general purpose computers that they should be in control of...I'm just pointing out that it has NEVER been the case. I'm not even sure what it would take to get to where it could be.

With PC's there was some FCC oversight, being a device without a transmitter meant that there wasn't a whole lot though. With cell phones they are so heavily regulated...and the carrier is such an integral part of the equation. It seems like you might get more of what you want with a wifi handset or device. The carriers have no vested interest in making a handset like you describe and their monopoly status makes market pressures almost non-existent forces for change.

Just rambling...

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