The unsung heroes of Android: Remembering 8 legendary apps we’ve lost
https://www.androidauthority.com/legendary-android-apps-we-lost-3597775/Open linkView original on discuss.tchncs.de116
Comments72https://www.androidauthority.com/legendary-android-apps-we-lost-3597775/Open linkView original on discuss.tchncs.de
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Google killing inbox was what radicalized me to that the entire business model of big tech is bullshit
My similar turning point was when they shut down Google Reader in 2013. Never forget.
Absolutely gutted at Inbox going away. Was such a great product, and they lied about implementing its features into Gmail.
I tried using Inbox but couldn't get past the whole idea of it. I'm old school when it comes to email - just gimme everything and I'll decide if its important or not.
That said, Google's decision to kill it did open my eyes to the fuckery.
Then they killed Google Play Music a few years later. I had most of my library uploaded, but didn't delete my local copy because I'm not insane. That one radicalized me.
After google killed inbox I found out Spark Mail has that exact same feature
Huh, never used any of those, only SuperSU. Google Plus being there makes the rest of the list suspicious
Android Authority has always been Google simp along with other companies that sponsor their reviews and get them free devices, merch, trips and invitations. There's no low they won't sink to. One of their author regularly promotes Google store android merch on their social media.
Yeah, let me do it Authority
Feel free to add your own
Google chat was XMPP compatible. The shit that ensued after it's decommission still stinks to this day.
Hangouts was the death of all Google messages for me. People I knew where using it and when they killed it no one would move over to another messaging app from Google.
We're on like the third generation of Google messaging apps since the death of hangouts. Giving up on Google seems like it was the smart decision.
Google allo did die quickly but had some nice stuff, most messaging apps still don't. Like change text size, use google assistant inside the app eetc.It wasn't anything amazing but I had some fun with it
I've never heard about any of the apps in the post, but killing hangouts and podcasts still hurts.
Podcasts was good. Lightweight, cross platform and basic. YTM is a sink hole as a podcast alternative.
Apple Podcasts lives on as a far superior alternative whilst Google has left it's users in the lurch. In an alternate world, Google would still be developing Podcasts not only on mobile but also on Wear OS
Ytm still doesn't notify for new episodes. It's absurd
I didn't even try using YTM as a podcast client. Streaming music players doubling as podcast players always have a hindrance (but at Atleast Amazon Music has some ad free content from Wondery in some regions in case one is a Prime subscriber).
AntennePod is a good FOSS alternative whilst Pocketcasts is a decent cross platform one (but the latter basically is subscription based if one wants desktop and watch playback which is a downer).
I would 100% agree with you but pocketcasts recently added ads on free + has a really dated UI and antennapod is a pain if you want it to sync with other devices
Pocketcasts really is trying folks towards it's subscription driven model though I have no qualms with the UI. AntennePod relies on gPodder service to sync but that is slow and clunky sometimes.
There is Podcast Republic as well I think, which is still a one time purchase.
This is where I ended up. Republic
Reader was a site/service, but it was THE rss reader for most people. Fuck Google for killing it (and a lot of other things).
Google deprecating gmail to replace it with inbox just to depecate inbox in favor of returning gmail was so fucking stupid.
Replacements:
Titanium Backup -> SystemPanel2
MX Player -> Poweramp
Google Play Music -> YouTube Music
ES File Explorer -> FX File Explorer
Swype Keyboard -> Gboard
Google Plus -> Google One
Inbox -> Gmail
SuperSU -> Magicsk
You're welcome :3
I bought music off of google play, and I downloaded the MP3s. YouTube Music has an atrocious downloaded music section, and I don't enjoy it. I happily have returned to "finding" music and playing it in foobar2000.
FX File Explorer == > Solid Explorer
For this I'd suggest mpvKt as its a video player
Mixplorer (unless it breaks functionality without getting an update)
I replaced Play Music with ibroadcast but truthfully I could just self host a music player.
I agree with all but G+
I miss ES File Explorer to this day....
Have you tried fx
Its a shame there are no updates anymore, but it works pretty flawlessly. Especially love the sftp integration
Oh I didn't notice it was abandoned:( it was my go to for root file explorer
Yeah, there are some things I'd like added, but it works so well that I don't mind. Also theres not a really any good alternative
I still use ES File Explorer on my old phone because I'm too lazy to download anything else and I only use my old phone like once a year if even.
Legendary dumpster fire and generator of memes
Even if it was good, the fact that they wrote Google Plus and not Google+ tells me how much thought they put into this article
I was an early user of it and, unlike a lot of Google projects, there's a reason they scrapped it: it sucked.
And we're still stuck with its aftermath in that search engines require quotes rather than a + for requiring words, which they now ignore whenever the mood strikes.
Why?
Because some fuckwit at Google decided that the + was reserved for Google+ search results.
I had a lot of fun on it...
Legendar(il)y shit
ES File Explorer was very good at the beginning, but it enshittified quickly. Nowadays MaterialFiles is the best file explorer for Android, and it has more features than ES had ever. And it's open source so it can't have a similar fate. Google Play link, F-droid link
I would counter that I still feel Solid Explorer is the best, but I'm aware that's just my opinion.
Solid is for people who want what es used to be. Not sledging it, but it's unshittified ES.
Looks nice! I use the Fossify File Manager; they seem very similar.
Fossify looks similar, but it misses some crucial features I use frequently. I downloaded it now to check it, Material can do these things, while Fossify can't:
Thanks for that! I don't need those features for now, but great to know there's a solid option if I do later.
What happened to Total Commander
Total commander was never open source, even though it's freeware.
Yeah just realized. I am disappoint
Material files doesn't have anywhere near enough. ES File Explorer could open a bunch of files, a text editor, sftp, ftp, audio, image viewer, etc. ES File Explorer was intolerable on the free version, but if you paid a few quid, you got a perfect product.
Total Commander is pretty solid although unfortunately not FOSS. Even allows you to share files via WiFi etc.
MaterialFiles can connect to ftp, sftp, webdav and smb. It has a text editor. There is built in image viewer and music player in most roms nowadays, and MaterialFiles has an "open with" option where you can select what you want to do with a file.
I can't find an open with option
Tap on the triple dot next to a file, first option
The list is missing Google Now. A feature so useful Google cut it because it was reducing searches.
It wasn't an app tho
I still miss Swype.
To this day it is still better than every other keyboard I've tried at recognising traces.
Microsoft has taken Swift and run it to the ground. Then it asks how it's doing as if they've improved it. The fucking gall.
They really should've just ported the WP keyboard over to android, it's still hands down the best smartphone keyboard ever.
This list of apps is ridiculous and none of them were even noteworthy.
Titanium Backup is the exception for me. All the others... 🤷♂️🙋♂️
I enjoyed Swype before it sold out to Microsoft.
It was a really excellent keyboard.
Best keyboard I've ever used. I even used a deprecated version for a long time before it just stopped working on my phone.
RIP Swype for sure. It was so much more accurate than anything else, short of physical keyboard buttons.
Google Play music was pretty good. simple and effective. easy to use.
Google podcasts was trash
YouTube music is ... well it's just kinda bad
wait, do I have that backwards? is it Google Podcasts that was good, and Google Play music that was trash? one of them was basically impossible to use for podcasts, like if you just wanted to find what you had downloaded, that was literally not an option you had to go to the podcast and then filter by downloads
I still miss QuickPic. :-(
Inbox was fantastic. I used an older version well after the shutdown date.
titanium backup has been made obsolete by swift backup
Y'all remember bump?
Loved minuum keyboard
This list is kinda of nostalgic to me. When I was younger, I was obessed with andriod mods and rooting videos on YouTube, and I remeber all those apps getting recommened in videos!
I used none of those and have only heard of a couple, despite using Android from the beginning. Sigh.