UPDATE:
I have installed both the music apps I described below and Retro (fork of Metro) and prefer the UI of Lotus. I am currently typing this with Summit, which feels like an Android version of mLem in terms of UI (in a good way) while being very customisable too! I have also installed a few of the other apps mentioned, like Syncthing-Fork and Offline Translator. FUTO Voice Input is useful too. Thanks everyone!
original post:
First off, I have already installed and am happy with (I don’t need any suggestions for these):
- Fennec (browser)
- Heliboard (keyboard, it’s awesome!)
- Aves (image gallery)
- AntennaPod (podcasts)
- DAVx5 + Etar (calendar)
- Fossify Calendar looks nice, but is less functional in my opinion (you can’t see the full name of events in month view!)
- Joplin (notes)
- CalcYou (calculator)
- Breezy Weather
- CoMaps
- Thunderbird (email)
- Material Files (file manager)
- Chrono (alarms, timers, etc.)
- ConnectYou (contacts)
- Fossify Messages (SMS)
- also considering Quik SMS, does it have any advantages over Fossify?
- Moshidon (Mastodon)
- RSS feed reader (Feeder + CapyReader, one of the two probably, both are great)
- Image Toolbox
- My self-hosted stuff (Nextcloud and Immich)
- KeePassDX (password manager)
- Ente Auth (2FA)
- KDE Connect
I currently need:
- music player (Metro and Vanilla Music are both unmaintained, so those are out. I’ve also found Auxio, CuteMusic, Lotus, and Phocid as options. Are there any other good ones? I want local playback, not stuff using YT Music)
- Lemmy client (Jerboa crashes when trying to log in for some reason, I’ve heard Thunder might be good?)
- are there any other apps I should look at?
Another thing, is there a guide to what all the settings in Heliboard do? It’s kind of overwhelming. One thing I have changed is the “bottom padding” to make the space bar a bit up, since I accidentally press “c” and “v” way too often when trying to hit space. Also, being able to enable the number row is pretty cool!
EDIT: I have KDE Connect as well!
Shelter is an app that allows you to isolate other apps based on work policy (made by you). Don’t trust an app? Throw it in jail. This allows a separate installation and user account for apps. You also can freeze the apps in the shelter preventing then from doin’ stuff. All with no root.
What kind of phone? If you don’t wanna be specific. I ask because Pixels can get GrapheneOS which I am obsessed with.
My phone is not a pixel (so no grapheneos). Shelter could be useful for apps like Whatsapp, right?
Yes, but if you are freezing the apps then no notifications. I personally can’t live without some google apps yet, such as food, banking and job-related apps. When using shelter you clone these apps into the work area. They then are completely separate new apps that can’t see the rest of your phone. So that’s what I use it for keeping invasive apps like Doordash (Location Whore) or Google Photos (Every Permission Known to Mankind) completely isolated from the files on my phone. I don’t know how much of that is possible for stock Android. But if you put a messaging app in there and it’s set to freeze you won’t hear responses. My understanding is it still works for stock.
Have you heard of Shizuku or Canta? These together allow you to disable some of the bloatware on stock phones.