How difficult is it for a non techy person to change their phone's operating system from Android to one of the non Android OS options?

[admin@mastodon.ai8w.ddns.net]

@Maker_of_Things

Generally, if you're using Android, your contacts, messages, etc are all stored by Google. You can't de-Google a device without losing them.

Your best bet would be to export all your contacts to a file, save that on a different device, do the same for your messages, then find someone who's got experience flashing firmware to phones to do the de-Googlification.. then import your messages and contacts back to the device.

It's not for the faint of heart.

If you de-Google your phone, but then sign back into Google for things like play store, chrome, etc, you've essentially re-googled your phone.

[nigelharpur@musicians.today]

@Maker_of_Things
I did this a couple of years back.
Honest opinion then was that it was not an easy thing for non tech minded persons (sadly). Easier yes than it once was, but still a bit of a fingers crossed journey. I was successful and all still good. Very pleased in fact. It may be easier still now so hopefully some others will pipe up.

[joshsummer@mastodon.top]

@Maker_of_Things @Astrocat Well... Big question. You're phone will be totally ereased, so you have to save all your datas (contacts, pictures, etc) before you do anything. It's possible to save messages from Whatsapp and Signal, but it probably won't be possible with your SMS app. You don't have to save you're apps, it will be necessary to reinstall them.

[raymaccarthy@mastodon.ie]

@Maker_of_Things
You can export all your contacts as a CSV file.
You should not use RCS and opt out of it in Messages setting.
You should set Contacts to use Device and not Google Account.

Save anything that can be saved (Cloud etc) to local storage and back it up to PC.
Assume you lose everything!
If Playstore can be installed (and then you lose the value of an alternate OS as that needs the Google Framework) most banking apps won't install.
The install / flash is now simple or impossible.

[glowl@chaos.social]

@Maker_of_Things no way of doing it except exporting everything you want to keep and re importing it after switching the os installation.

because on anything newer than 10 years ago the process definitely includes wiping storage of the device.

in some way its a security feature so no one can reflash your phone and get to your data. albeit i think its overly locked down in googles favor.

[neil@mastodon.neilzone.co.uk]

@Maker_of_Things

> How difficult is it for a non techy person to change their phone's operating system from Android to one of the non Android OS options?

Bloomin' difficult.

[glowl@chaos.social]

@Maker_of_Things the installation process itself is mostly well documented nowadays, but there are some small pitfalls here and there.
take a lot of care to follow the steps for YOUR PHONE MODEL and the EXACT VERSION of the OS you want to use.

and even then there are some errors here and there. best to have someone around who has a little bit of knowledge to where to go look for additional info if things do not work or some lingo in the explanations might not mean what one things initially.

[flyingmana@phpc.social]

@Maker_of_Things even for techy people its, not trivial.
Have backups of everything, of the phone OS, but also separately of the things important.

There is some extra affort needed for some apps, mostly banking ones, as they see this device as rooted and therefore insecure.

[maker_of_things@cupoftea.social]

@admin
Ahhh, so replacing useful apps via the play store would just reGoogle the phone.
Poo!

[quixoticgeek@social.v.st]

@Maker_of_Things I've worked in tech since the last millennium. I wouldn't try it if the aim is to preserve content. I'd use a secondary device to test on. Risk of bricking is also high.

[realgene@hachyderm.io]

@Maker_of_Things
Unfortunately, those are two different problems that are often contradictory.

Installing a different OS is gated by a few factors: does the alternative OS support your phone (often not), is your phone not locked to your carrier (often is), and are you able to unlock the boot loader to allow the install (again, often not).

You then have the requirement of having another computer that can make a USB connection to the phone; installs (in my experience) cannot be performed over the air. It often requires using an application from the OS supplier, one that runs from their website, or installing the Android Debug Bridge (ADB), which is free, but is operated as a command line application. There are always instructions and tutorials on these, but I've often found it's spread across different sites.

The second part is highly dependent on whether you are trying to leave the Google environment or not.

For example, there is an app called SMS Backup & Restore, which can, as it's name implies, back up all your text messages to a file and restore them later. But that file will have to be saved somewhere (online, or on another computer), because nothing survives the installation process.

If you're staying with Google, then Gmail and Google Photos can be backed up and restored using your Gmail login. But if not, it can be problematic to move email to a different application. Photos can be transferred to a computer over USB, then copied back after the install if you don't want to use Google Photos.

Other apps again may depend on the presence of the Google Play Store on your phone, requiring a Google sign-in.
Many alternative OS's provide F-droid, an alternative app store, but many commercial apps aren't on it.

Again, all apps won't survive the install, so would need to be reinstalled, unless backed up and restored from the Googleverse.

[wir@sind.muede.monster]

@Maker_of_Things you will lose all data that you haven't backed up / that doesn't get saved remotely by the app.

The installation process itself is often only a matter of following instructions to the letter, it can be more or less confusing depending on the phone, and different guides can be better or worse. I'd say you don't need much technical understanding, but you need to be able to follow instructions to use a command line tool.

However, the options don't look great for your phone.

For not-Android, PostmarketOS is the most mature option afaik. It does not support your phone fully: https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Samsung_Galaxy_A13_(samsung-a13)

For Android-but-without-Samsung's-bullshit, Lineage, /e/ and Graphene are the big options, but those don't support your phone.
https://wiki.lineageos.org/devices/#samsung
https://doc.e.foundation/devices
https://grapheneos.org/faq#supported-devices

You might be able to dig up something unofficial by looking through here: https://xdaforums.com/tags/samsung-galaxy-a13/
But you should expect out of date and incomplete information, especially guides that assume background knowledge that they don't mention. This is the only situation where I'd seriously warn you that an incomplete guide may lead you to do a wrong thing that will break your phone.

[jernej@androiddev.social]

@Maker_of_Things basically impossible with those constraints.

[simon@gotosocial.grnwds.uk]

@Maker_of_Things It's a bit of work  - messages can be backed up using an app such as SMS Backup & Restore.
Contacts are more complicated and I recommend using an app such as Fossify Contacts, which will import your contacts from Google and allow them to be synced to a webdav service such as Nextcloud.
Apps are really just a case of remembering what you use. Many that have an online aspect will store your data anyway, and others will have backup options.
The Galaxy A13 isn't supported by LineageOS or PostmarketOS so you wouldn't be able to reinstall that phone. Actually installing the OS is varibale and you have to choose your victim carefully, but I've picked up phones from eBay for cheap that are otherwise end of life but are being kept going by Lineage or Iode or Murena or PostmarketOS.

[sarraceniawilds@sunny.garden]

@Maker_of_Things on a pixel with graphene the os switch was easy. shockingly easy. but they only do for pixels, and youd have to do all manual backups of everything.

[raymaccarthy@mastodon.ie]

@Maker_of_Things
Additionally, on Android
Gemini has be backported to older Androids.
Gemini can't be uninstalled or even disabled!
It's spyware!
A solution (for now).
You can in Settings swap back to Google Assistant instead of Gemini.
Then in Settings > Apps > Google Assistant you can stop and disable it. Because Assistant is sort of spyware.

Disable personalised Adverts in Privacy (Personal = tracking)
Disable all Sync for everything, because Google reads the stuff.
Disable Backup to Drive.

[raymaccarthy@mastodon.ie]

@Maker_of_Things
Gboard is nice & the Handwriting, but in all Google Apps check trainingg etc and disable.
Don't use Gmail or Android mail for other accounts, but install K9/Thunderbird.
Don't use Calculator or Gallery; install 3rd party as those share to Google.
Don't use Location or Find Device.
Only bother to have alt OS if you can do all banking via web and only install apps via apk without Playstore.

[seealdaeoh@cupoftea.social]

@Maker_of_Things I had a quick look and cannot find an A13 compatible build for your phone on Lineage (nearest is A21s), Jolla Sailfish, Graphene, Postmarket or e (nearest is A21s). There are other OS available that I haven't checked. Nor do I know whether you can unlock your bootloader to actually flash a new OS. Anyway, before all that I suspect that the profi's would ask 'what is your threat model and 'what are you aiming for'. Since if you want 'security' and 'banking apps' the answer that comes up a lot is Graphene which permits a 'sandboxed' google play store - but only runs on a Pixel afaik. I have converted both a Pixel (to Graphene) and a Motorola (to Lineage) both via ADB command line, It was nerve wracking but successful and I am only a trainee nerd. If you can read German check out Kuketz and his blog for de googling phones. Gd luck!