The whole app ecosystem however can be generated to a large extent, so missing apps should not be a barrier for free/open source mobile OSes assuming an open hardware mobile SoC.
You've tried plasma mobile? All apps are already there. What's missing are the proprietary ones like whatsapp, uber and the likes.
It's hardware support and battery life that is severely lacking.
I occasionally contribute, but nothing major. But I have a chuwi x86 tablet running debian with plasma-mobile. It's not perfect but it's quite usable I think. Now if only there would be drivers for the new style non-v4l webcams, it would be better.
Yes, I tried all open mobile OSes with PinePhone. Even apps left a lot to be desired; obviously non-open mobile SoCs are the main problem but such is the life in the ARM ecosystem where very few custom things are upstreamed.
I don't know why you're downvoted. On a really old device I had from work they pushed out an update which introduced an overlay with ads at random places on the screen.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Post_Office_scandal
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