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  • Hacker News
  • Didn't Epic get some kind of magic injunction saying that Google had to allow open access to the entire Play Store catalogue or something?
    by kotaKat
  • They did, but you still have to sign a contract with them to get access.
    by megagpt5
  • But not for everyone for free. What it means is Epic, or anyone like Epic, will be able to write to Google, send a nominal amount of money, and get some API key and bare documentation which is only allowed to be used in Epic. It's a B2B commercial transaction under court-ordered terms, not an open API. Same as the Apple browser API. If you want, you can register a company "Kotakat App Store Inc" and get access to the same terms but you'll probably need to sue Google to make them give you access. Apple hasn't approved any browsers, either.
    by megagpt2
  • Also, EU is pushing towards more "open" app-stores through anti-trust.

    Not that it requires Google to "open up" their play-store, but that they must allow other app-stores to work on the same level. So basically allowing devs and users to move elsewhere.

    by berkes
  • Title is: Aurora Store returns a “&$Server busy, please try again later.” error
    by ChrisArchitect
  • For me anonymous use of Aurora never really worked, and with a google account it still works.
    by CodesInChaos
  • Aurora Store still works fine without the default enabled account sharing feature by creating an account for this purpose. Google hasn't blocked using Aurora Store as an alternate Play Store client. What's happening is that they're getting better at detecting and banning shared accounts. Account sharing was disallowed long before Aurora Store started using it as a way to bypass the need to make a Google account for the Play Store. Enforcement against account sharing has been increasing over time and we've been warning people they shouldn't rely on this continuing to work for years. It took longer than we thought it would to reach this point so our warnings were quite early.

    GrapheneOS supports installing the standard Play Store app as a regular sandboxed app without special access. For people using sandboxed Google Play, we recommend the sandboxed Play Store for obtaining apps only published on the Play Store. That doesn't mean we recommend obtaining apps from the Play Store as the best option. We prefer people getting developer signed builds of apps, ideally through an app store with enforcement of standards such as a minimum API level and better enforced policies against abuse than the Play Store. Accrescent is very promising. There will hopefully be more serious Play Store alternatives to replace what it used to provide prior to them phasing out developer signed builds and beginning to gate access to apps.

    On GrapheneOS, Aurora Store is mainly useful as a way to work around the Play Store having a way for developers to restrict their Play Store listing from devices not passing the Play Integrity device and strong integrity level.

    by grapheneos
  • Using lineageos on an old samsung without any google services, I guess this would impact many "degoogled" users as well
    by denzen
  • Running LOS on some kind of oneplus.

    Aurora hasn't worked right for the most part for a year due to device attestation shit.

    I'm meh on it. Not being able to install the shit from play store isn't such a bad thing. It is lame as hell that Google is doing their damndest to make apple look user friendly.

    by nosioptar
  • Please add to the title "... and all other degoogled devices", which are many orders of magnitude more than GOS: almost all Huawei devices (degoogled out of the box), custom Roms, rooted and all non-logged in. I am a non-GOS hurt victim.
    by tsoukase
  • The title is incorrect as a whole. Aurora Store wasn't blocked and GrapheneOS has no specific dependence on it for installing Play Store apps. Shared accounts are being banned and Aurora Store uses those by default but it still works. Sandboxed Play Store and Aurora Store are both still available as options for installing Play Store apps on GrapheneOS.
    by grapheneos
  • What currently works for me: settings (top right) -> accounts (icon to the right of the user name (likely "Anonymous")) -> triple dot menu (top right) -> Refresh all accounts.

    You may need to refresh a few times, or refresh again after a few updates.

    by gpvos
  • I maintain my grandmothers phone, which comes down mostly to just updating WhatsApp once in a while. Obviously she doesn't have a google account, so I've installed her AuroraStore.

    It's a shame that there is no official way to install apps on android without a google accout[1], since it's a basic functionality, just like calls or a web browser.

    [1] For obvious reasons I don't want her to download apks from the internet.

    by ssernikk
  • App verification means she can safely install apps from the Internet. The app developers can simply serve the apks from their own websites.
    by lern_too_spel
  • I am in the same boat. Keep in mind that you are trusting both google and meta. At least you can update whatsapp once every three months (for now)
    by catlikesshrimp
  • There are other Android stores. Amazon ran one for the longest time. Many brands have their own app stores as well.

    It's the app publishers defaulting to Google that's the biggest issue.

    At least WhatsApp has an official APK download, most apps don't.

    That said, Google will still let you update apps without being signed in. Hold the Play Store icon to open the quick action menu. From there you can go to "my apps" and update all of the apps on your phone, bypassing the login prompt. Not great, but a workaround that should do the trick while Aurora finds another way to hack their way into the Play Store APIs.

    by jeroenhd
  • The official download page for WhatsApp provides the apk. Other apps are problematic

    https://www.whatsapp.com/download

    by dwedge
  • I've been stuck with unupdated apps because Aurora hasn't been working for me for a while. A few of them have been nagging me to update. I have everything Google disabled or removed, and no I won't reenable any of it. Also I use anon strictly on Aurora, and no I won't login with my Google account; haven't logged in on a phone for over 8 years now and I have no intention of breaking the streak.
    by skeledrew
  • For a while as in more than a few weeks, when the current issues began?

    Have you looked for help? It sure isn't because of any Google component being disabled

    by g-b-r
  • I feel the title editorializes a bit too much. The thread only confirms the bug, not a specific cause yet. As sibling comments indicate, the effect on GrapheneOS users is undetermined.
    by kjander79
  • For me, the issue also only occurs sometimes. Usually I can download apps like normal.
    by aniviacat
  • This is standart, and happens constantly with Invidious (youtube frontend). This happened before on AuroraOSS too. They probably just flagged the accounts and no API change or A/B testing an API change.
    by titularcomment
  • This also has nothing to do with GrapheneOS except for some user overlap.
    by kevincox
  • I use Aurora on GOS. I get that they say sandboxed Play is more secure than Aurora, but I prefer it for its lack of toxicity and absence of shitty dark patterns.

    I think the increased popularity of GOS is going to draw in more users like me who picked it for reasons adjacent to Graphene's original purpose, and I hope it's not too annoying for their community.

    by troyvit
  • > I get that they say sandboxed Play is more secure than Aurora

    I don't see the word "privacy" in that sentence though.

    by einpoklum
  • > I hope it's not too annoying for their community

    There's plenty of people like that in the GOS community (the forum and the Matrix). Everyone generally understands that different people have different threat models and may want to do things that aren't the most secure. Otherwise everyone would be using GOS in airplane mode with disabled cameras and only paying for things with Monero.

    The core dev team is obviously a bit more security absolutist, but even they usually dont mind

    by flexagoon
  • I actually think there's already a lot of us in the 'community' as-is. I personally describe it as 'Valuing Privacy/Freedom over Security'. One pretty clear example of this is how they don't recommend using FireFox Mobile and F-Droid, both of which I use regardless because I'm not willing to put up with worse privacy/usability tradeoffs in the name of (imo 'hyper-')security.

    I think it's fine the mission of the project isn't directly aligned with some of us, though I can tell we often get on the core contributor's nerves lol

    by DaSHacka
  • GrapheneOS actually recommends against using Aurora and instead just using the Play Store, so this shouldn't really hurt users.

    For extra privacy, you can sign into the Play Store with a Google Account that isn't tied to anything else.

    by pyrophane
  • A Google account is a personal identifier, it is linked to your person. Therefor trying to untie it from anything else is futile.

    Google states: Using a false name or incorrect information when creating a Google account is against Google's Terms of Service.

    by slome
  • Having to have a account is absolutely a downgrade and privacy-hostile.
    by SahAssar