Google has confirmed it isn't discontinuing AOSP, but it's making a change that makes it harder for devs to build Android for Pixel phones.

TL;DR

  • Google has made it harder to build custom Android ROMs for Pixel phones by omitting their device trees and driver binaries from the latest AOSP release.

  • The company says this is because it’s shifting its AOSP reference target from Pixel hardware to a virtual device called “Cuttlefish” to be more neutral.

  • While Google insists AOSP isn’t going away, developers must now reverse-engineer changes, making the process for supporting Pixel devices more difficult.

  • nintendiator@feddit.cl
    English
    227·
    2 days ago

    or a brand whose phones support their requirements other than google.

    Wasn’t Graphene’s “selling point” for long being that nothing but Pixels can match their reqs? I don’t see why any current band would want to make it easier for them, and I also don’t see new brand significantly entering the market.

    Graphene boiled themselves in their own frogpan.

    • passepartout@feddit.orgEnglish
      28·
      2 days ago

      This is not a selling point but rather a unfortunate but comprehensible circumstance. Nexus and later Pixel phones have not been anything more than reference hardware without significant sales until the Pixel 6. Google has been a software company that has greatly benefited by android being an “open” platform you could contribute to and use their services on.

      The App / Cloud ecosystem has gained a lot of competitors, so Google is doing their best to reverse this course of action by pulling more and more functionality out of AOSP into Play services and now into Cuttlefish. We can only wait and see how other phone manufacturers react to this.

    • Noxy@pawb.socialEnglish
      7·
      1 day ago

      Nah, you have it backwards. GrapheneOS didn’t choose Pixels for any reason other than they’re the only acceptably secure devices out there. I can’t imagine they want this to be the case.