Deemo

Few problems:

1. Safteynet (play integrity) and root detection

There are magisk tweaks to help combat this but its a annoying game of cat and mouse. Some apps like chase have particularly annoying root detection to deal with. Also regaring safteynet once google fully enforces hardware attestation passing safteynet with tweaks will be borderline impossible (most tweaks try to spoof older phones that don't support safteynet hardware attestation).

2. Widevine

Many streaming services (Netflix, Hulu, Disney, etc) will downgrade your video quality to 480p-540p due to L3 from unlocking the bootloader (a step thats usually required before you can root).

3. Physical security (potential risk)

Unlocking the bootloader is the first step to allowing for rooting and custom roms. One pro/con is when you unlock the bootloader you are partially at risk to a evil maid attack (some one with physical acess to your phone can compromise it). While difficult to do automatically (and probably very very rare) some one could hypothetically place a malicious bootloader that could steel data. The risk of this is mostly low but does exist.

Best reason would be if you were a reddit sync user in the past Lemmy sync would feel familiar.

It analogous to Apollo users feeling voyager similar (to an extent).

Not to sound like a downer but I kinda gave up on custom roms. Few problems:

1. Play integrity/Safteynet. On roms like lineage os its a nightmare to maintain this, in the past you could use spoof custom props, but maintainer dropped support for the module. Also using safteynet bypasses typically requires magisk which trips root detection on apps like chase banking (making a annoying cat mouse game). The only work around I found so far is using custom roms with saftey net bypass built in like Pixel experience and Evolution X but those have problems (explained bellow).

2. Random reformat requirements (specifically Evolution X). Every 3 months a clean reinstall is required because of changes in underlying os (like ERofs). Sure tools like Migrate and SwiftBackup can help simplify but resetting things is a pain. Its worse if you use android wear device (like galaxy watch) since every reset means a manditory reset of the watch aswell. This also kinda leaves you in a place where if you need to reset and say your close to the next major android release is it worth resetting or waiting for the next version of android to drop since ANOTHER reset may be needed.

3. Toxicty in XDA/telegram. Idk if its just me but sometimes on telegram people just feel angrier?

Example conversation (good and bad interaction). Background context I was using evolution x and maitainer stepped down. I was considering switching to pixel experience but wanted to ask about evo x maintiner leaving since was wondering if it was due to a technical issue and if said technical issue might impact pixel experience.

Question with good interaction:

Follow up hostile reaction from a different user (I didn't add any new context/messages from first message):

I will admit I may have gone slightly off topic and may have been a bit premtive in asking the question (since a new maintainer picked up the torch within 2-3 hrs), but in the past with pixel experience when the maintainer quit no new maintainers came for 3-5 months (and safteynet broke during that duration).

Sorry if this post kinda sounds grumbly. I want to like custom roms. I'm still using the Feb version of Evo X since its feature set is arguably better than oneplus oxygen os but it kinda becomes a trade off do you want more features and more maintences or accept limited number of new featuers (for only 2-3 years) but with less overall maintence.

The problem comes down to education institutions. I remember when we got Chromebooks in my highschool (8 years ago) admins forgot to turn of developer mode and half the school unenrolled the Chromebook managing to bypass all restrictions. This went on for half a year until one day our school needed to run a state exam (more for measure of schools performance not as a college entrance exam or anything).

The computerized testing program required deploying a specific chrome app accessible when chrome book is logged out (can't just download from chrome web store). When they tried to push the client since half of Chromebooks were unenrolled it failed. This required the school it to recall pretty much all chrome books to manually re enroll all of them and disable developer mode (prevents unenrolling and prevents sideloading Linux).

Problem is if older Chromebooks are used for Linux in an educational environment there would be nothing stopping a student from whipping up a bootable USB and dumping another distro (bypassing restrictions). I'm also not sure if there is a enrollment mode equivalent Linux (there may be but not sure).

At least that's my two cents (not a school it admin just a memory from the past 😉).