LineageOS
The Android group’s largest aftermarket distribution, LineageOS, is now up and working with Android 11. The brand new launch known as “LineageOS 18.1,” and builds for over 60 smartphones are hitting official servers for manufacturers like OnePlus, Google, Xiaomi, Sony, Motorola, LG, and even some previous Samsung units.
New Lineage OS 18.1 accommodates, in fact, all of the Android 11 features from the Android Open Supply Challenge (AOSP), like a brand new notification panel with a persistent media participant, floating “bubble” notifications, one-time permissions, new emojis, a brand new autofill system for the keyboard, and extra. All of the Lineage apps now assist darkish mode, and a fork of the FOSS “Etar” calendar app replaces what Lineage calls the “stagnant and largely unmaintained” AOSP calendar. The FOSS app SeedVault has been included as a built-in backup answer, and Lineage’s display recorder and music apps have been revamped.
Google releases the Android supply code as “AOSP,” however Google’s repo is an enormous pile of code that is not device-ready. LineageOS takes AOSP code and whips it into shippable form, patching up any lacking parts with its personal code and including a few of its personal apps rather than Google’s proprietary apps (although you’ll be able to flash Google’s apps on high of Lineage, too) and baking a number of customization and mod-friendly options into the OS. Every thing Lineage does is free and open supply.
Most significantly, Lineage has a military of volunteer system maintainers who port builds of Lineage to every particular system, merging in {hardware} assist and debugging compatibility issues in order that particular person mannequin house owners can truly use the OS. This yr, the entire course of took seven months. (And to any for-profit system producers on the market that have been simply crushed to the replace punch by a workforce of volunteers with solely public-level entry to the supply code, disgrace on you!)
Lineage’s largest barrier to adoption (and a cause you won’t be capable of set up it in your system) is the business’s affinity for locked-down bootloaders. Many telephone producers and carriers don’t need their prospects to have the ability to management the system they personal, so that they lock the bootloader, which blocks the set up of aftermarket OSes, root entry, full NAND flash picture backups, and the flexibility to resurrect the telephone in restoration mode if one thing goes unsuitable throughout an replace. If you may get a tool with an unlocked bootloader (both formally or by way of a safety exploit) and official LineageOS assist, you will be set for years, although. As we speak, 6- to 7-year-old units just like the OnePlus One and Samsung Galaxy S4 are being up to date to Android 11.
If you wish to attempt Lineage, the release blog post accommodates hyperlinks to device-specific directions for each supported system. The challenge can be, as all the time, placing out the decision for extra system maintainers, documentation writers, and translators.
