Another busy fortnight for Sailfish OS. Community meetups like the one in Bremen remind us how important it is to stay connected. If you are organizing one, let us know so we can help spread the word.

Sailfish OS 5.0 rollout is now underway. Fixes and improvements continue, with bigger updates headed toward 5.1.

Catch the latest Community News
https://forum.sailfishos.org/t/sailfish-community-news-17th-april-2025-easter/22772

Happy Easter from all of us at Jolla. Enjoy the time with your friends and loved ones.

Hey #FediFriends,

Has anyone tried #SailFishOS?

Any thoughts?

Just toying with the idea of getting a mini-laptop-style phone at some point, like a Gemini.

#SailFish #Jolla
#CamelCaseForAccessibility

How does using the #Jolla #JollaC2 (@jolla) with #SailfishOS for about a week as a daily driver now (with my old #iPhone at home as a backup)?

In general, it works much better than I had hoped after my experiences with other alternative #smartphone systems and it indeed is the first (and so far only) system that indeed works quite well. Also at around 285€ (https://commerce.jolla.com/products/jolla-community-phone) it isn't too expensive, so one can simply try it out.

There are a few limitations though:

* I am really missing biometric unlocking
* There is no predictive text input, so typing could be more comfy
* The UX experience sometimes feels strange (but no no-gos for me)
* It is not a snappy and fast device
* Audio quality is so-so
* GPS really needs a GPS signal, so no WIFI-based location

What is great:

* It is a real #Linux, so it has a #terminal, #sshd, you can e.g. use the #Nix package manager etc.
* Android apps are running in a container
* You can have different users to limit data access

Unfortunately there are nearly no high-quality native apps so far and the built-in ones are very basic (e.g. email).

But: The #Android compatibility layer is very good, the system comes with #Fdroid and #AuroraStore (#Google store front-end) pre-installed, so you can easily install practically all official Android apps.

Most apps work very well, some (especially banking) apps do not though as they complain that the system is rooted, so YMMV regarding the apps you need.

In general I am really happy with this system.

And: All the de-ggoglefied Android phones like the #Volla will always still remain just that: A more limited Android. SailfishOS offers a path towards powerful native (#Qt/#QML/#Cplusplus/#Python/you name it) based apps.

I am hoping that Jolla will provide a significantly more powerful device option and that some of the problems above will be solved.

But already now, even with the limitations above, if you are somewhat technically inclined (but without the need to fiddle with a command line unlike with the open mobile Linux distributions), want to get rid of #Google or #Apple for whatever reason, want a #Linux #smartphone, support a #European company from #Finland, this phone is really usable.

I am using my @jolla #SailfishOS #Jolla #C2 phone for a few days now as my main daily driver (nearly since the day I have received it) and I need to my #iPhone only for a few things anymore (I am leaving it at home already though).

A more detailed report will come in a few days and I still might come across deal breakers, but so far: While there are a number of unexpected shortcomings, overall the experience so far was a lot better than I had expected.

This is the first #Linux based device I am testing that really seems to have the potential for a lot of people to get rid of #Google and #Apple - if they actually want.

Just got hit by some ads about the latest #Jolla C2. What are your feelings about it? https://commerce.jolla.com/products/jolla-community-phone

@pinocio
Ja. Ich verwende seit ca. 10 Jahren nichts anderes und man muss schon hin und wieder mal etwas mehr tun, aber "tägl. Baustellen" eher nicht.

Man muss halt bedenken dass Apple wahrscheinlich mehr Sekretärinnen beschäftigt als #Jolla, das Unternehmen hinter #SailfishOS, insgesamt an Mitarbeitern hat.

Umreiß' doch mal was Du so tagtäglich an Apps und Funktionen auf Deinem Smartphone nutzt. Dann kann ich versuchen potenzielle Hürden mit Sailfish OS abzuschätzen.

Er der nogen her som har erfaring med

hvilken #Linuxphone kan håndtere vores elskede

#MitID #MobilePay apps .. ?

Det er tid at gå (tilbage) til #linux på #mobil - men de to apps er ligesom #cantDoWithout ...

tak!

Time to #free the #mobilephone too.

Therefore, collecting possible alternatives here,
for me and others -

and grateful for additional pointers and experiences:

Preferably #Linux, #European

Special #denmark #Danmark twist: #MitID #MobilePay apps ..

(update: on dk mastodon, i hear #MobilePay runs on #Jolla)

#sailfish #postmarketOS #Pine #purism #librem5 #liberty #jolla #linuxmobile

https://linmob.net/categories/weekly-update/

https://social.heise.de/@ktn/113922628507531163

@linmob
@postmarketOS
@jolla #sailfish
@kim_harding

Life with Sailfish OS, day 1, hour 6-12

Installed Whisperfish manually to skip the scary-looking StoreMan thing, and managed to set it up as a secondary device. Messages got passed back and forth, so with reservations, this is possible without resorting to Android compatibility.

Drive to the village to pick up a parcel, only to realize that the SMS with the pickup code is on the Android device at home. Yep, reminder to self: SMS'es don't live on the SIM card anymore. Not in a long, long time. It was a nice sideways winter-driving weather though so didn't mind the back and forth too much - not at all actually.

Discover that the integrated Nextcloud support (which appears to do calendars and contacts just fine) doesn't include automatic uploading for photos. One can manually share photos to Nextcloud, but you need to manually type the remote folder name. Apparently automating the upload is something you can script yourself if you first install SailSync from OpenRepos. Assuming you make that leap of faith, with everything it entails. And are willing to tinker with shell scripts.

It's a rather petty issue in the big picture of things but it also happens to be one of the most important features for me, outside the absolutely critical comms + banking department.

I'm sure I'll tinker more some other day, but back on Android for now. Like I concluded in an earlier toot last week or so, I think it this could be used as a daily driver but it'd require sacrifices. Life on desktop Linux is so easy these days, I've gotten a bit lazy.
Certainly a de-googled Android would be a far, far easier thing to go with.

Life with Sailfish OS, day 1, hour 1

Having gotten my banking app to run on Sailfish by downgrading to a slightly older version, starting an experiment to use Jolla C2 as a daily driver. I've spent a few evenings tinkering with this, hunting, installing and configuring necessary apps etc. What follows is random observations from the first hour after swapping the SIM over from my real daily driver (Nokia XR20) and letting the reality sink in:

Obligatory disclaimer: this is not the intended use of the C2 phone - it's a "reference phone", aimed at developers. So we need to give the hardware a break. But, as an observation, the protective cover doesn't sit properly on the button side, making the use of the main lock/unlock button annoying. It looks and feels like an ill-fitting condom, really. I might end up ditching the cover, this is not a phone I would take to the garage anyhow.

There are zero swipe options or actions for the keyboard. In fact there are zero options for configuring the keyboard at all. What I immediately miss are two things:
- moving the cursor by swiping over space bar
- number row on the keyboard, I prefer it always there
The latter is one of those tiny details that make up ones preferences, I expect to be in the minority wrt this. The former is going to be painful.

The default search engine in the Sailfish OS native browser is Google.

Let that sink in for a moment.

This is by far the biggest WTF so far, a slap in the face, really. For a phone whose raison d'etre is to be NOT FROM GOOGLE, and advertised with a privacy edge, this is a pretty terrible blunder. The default alternative search engines are just as bad, and there's no obvious way to install or configure alternatives from the browser.

Another dive into forum.sailfishos.org reveals that once you visit a search engine (such as www.quant.com), it magically appears in the search engine preferences. Which is kinda neat, but totally undiscoverable for the new user.

Selling my #Jolla #C2 #SailfishOS #Linux #phone as it is too big for me unfortunately #PleaseBoost

https://www.kleinanzeigen.de/s-anzeige/jolla-c2-community-phone-sailfishos-/3028379041-173-3477

In case anyone doubts the credentials of the #Jolla C2 as a true Linux device (there are a few such people in the @jolla #Facebook feed ) : It's perfectly happy running the normal Linux/aarch64 binaries of @eclipseadoptium #Temurin #java #openjdk and @nodejs #NodeJS from the command line...

My #SailfishOS app #BitSailor (a native #BitWarden client) just git an update which speeds up most operations significantly if the experimental local api is enabled.

https://openrepos.net/content/rikudousennin/bitsailor