[Fred Zyphal]

I have him on Skype and touched base with him earlier this week. He replied, just he built a new house for the past years and moved there earlier this year. Seems he's quite busy, though he confirmed he still has his webOS stuff around somewhere.

Cool, good to hear he's doing well. He came through for us when we needed him, several of us still have a working Pre 3 in our pockets because of Sumi batteries ... just tell him thanks.

[Fred Zyphal]

Maybe there's a usable and open mobile OS out there. Maybe that could one day be LuneOS and there's always Lineage or similar as a fall back.

Surprisingly, there's no PinePhone specific image for Lineage, so I tried to build it myself based on a Youtube video I found. It kind of sort of works, but apparently there's no bootloader, so you have to launch it through a terminal window on your computer, which is kind of useless. In the mean time I've become a fan of Ubuntu Touch, and there's an Anbox spin called Waybox that's specific to Ubuntu Touch if I need to run any Android apps, it seems to work. The main guy behind the PinePhone also likes it, and he runs a thread on the PinePhone forum with tips and tricks for Ubuntu Touch almost daily, he even came up with a way to do OTA updates so we don't have to download the latest image and re-flash all the time. Ubuntu Touch is still in active development by a very good team of people, just not Canonical people. I'm not ready to switch my cell phone service to it yet, because the Pre 3 is still working great, but I'm becoming comfortable enough with this combination to have confidence in it as a replacement when the time comes.

[Mutoidi]

I have him on Skype and touched base with him earlier this week. He replied, just he built a new house for the past years and moved there earlier this year. Seems he's quite busy, though he confirmed he still has his webOS stuff around somewhere.

Thanks Herrie, that explains a lot regarding Sumi's delays etc.
Please do me a big favour when you are next in touch with him anyway, and say that Robin in Melbourne (me!) is HANGING OUT for the final return of his repaired EVT 'Go'!
He 'should' still have my address & $'s I sent him for postage etc.

[Fred Zyphal]

I've been playing with the PinePhone using my cheap backup SIM card from Consumer Cellular, it works ok but their service sucks. So I decided it was time to find out if I would be able to use it with my Verizon account, and as expected when I went to my "My Verizon" page, selected "bring your own device", and checked my PinePhone IMEI number, I found that it's not supported. So off to the next step, call Verizon and request an exception, my form is in process, and it actually sounds like it's going to happen since I've been a customer for decades, they simply have to allow my IMEI number on their network.

However, while talking to the Verizon customer support guy, I learned that they plan to support 3G until Dec. 31, 2022, so my beloved Pre 3 still has quite a bit of life left, as long my last Sumi battery holds out. In the mean time, just last week, Pine released the PinePhone Pro to developers. It's better, stronger, faster, and costs twice as much but I don't care, I'm getting one as soon as I can, they say they've worked most of the original kinks out. I filled out an application and tried to make my case, but I'm not really a developer and I probably won't get one until they're released to the general public.

So that's where it stands, my Pre 3 will be with me until I've had a PinePhone Pro in my hands long enough to get comfortable with it, or until the end of 2022, or until Sumi's battery dies, which ever comes first.

[codepoet80]

Pine released the PinePhone Pro to developers. It's better, stronger, faster, and costs twice as much but I don't care, I'm getting one as soon as I can, they say they've worked most of the original kinks out.

Thanks for this update, its very useful! TMobile moved their 3G shut down to July (maybe it'll move again!) and they're planning to keep 2G up until next December, so I have at least 7 months left with my Veer -- maybe a year, if its still usable on 2G only.

Meanwhile, I'm also trying a Linux mobile OS. I bought a Sony Xperia XA2 and plan to install Sailfish OS and give that a try. Its not free, but it looks pretty well polished, and has a commercial dev team supporting it specifically for that (and a few other) handset. You're not supposed to be able to get the OS in the US, but I'm sure a VPN will work-around that.

[Herrie]

Thanks for this update, its very useful! TMobile moved their 3G shut down to July (maybe it'll move again!) and they're planning to keep 2G up until next December, so I have at least 7 months left with my Veer -- maybe a year, if its still usable on 2G only.

Meanwhile, I'm also trying a Linux mobile OS. I bought a Sony Xperia XA2 and plan to install Sailfish OS and give that a try. Its not free, but it looks pretty well polished, and has a commercial dev team supporting it specifically for that (and a few other) handset. You're not supposed to be able to get the OS in the US, but I'm sure a VPN will work-around that.

If you need help, I'm in EU, helped Alan Morford out before.

The Sony device could fairly easy run LuneOS. We haven't played with Sony devices, but when SFOS runs, getting LuneOS to run using Halium should be straight forward really.

Pinephone Pro looks like a great more modern option vs regular Pinephone which really had 2013 era specs. If the uptake for the Pro in terms of dev is just as good as the regular Pinephone there will be plenty of options in terms of OS.

Sent from my Titan using Tapatalk

[codepoet80]

If you need help, I'm in EU, helped Alan Morford out before.

Thank you. I didn't even need a VPN, I just had to pick a European country from a list at checkout, then use PayPal.

The Sony device could fairly easy run LuneOS

I bet it could! The SFOS image is quite nice, a few brief observations:

• Basic phone functions all "just work" - phone calls, a very compliant and compatible web browser, camera, even MMS worked with a little futzing around with APN settings. I paid for the "enterprise" version so Exchange email worked with both my home and work accounts -- although it choked on a contact with a birthday and I had to recreate my address book, delete the account from the phone and retry.
• The first party App Store is... well, let's just say we have better App Store solutions on webOS (between Preware and the Museum). But the paid version of SFOS includes a Dalvik runtime and runs third party Android Appstore, so most of my needs are met that way.
• I'm encouraged by how hard it was to get the GPS warmed up and finding a fix -- makes my experiments on webOS look rather sophisticated! I did eventually get some Android navigation apps going, so that'll be useful in a pinch.
• Entertainment-wise, obviously there are some good Android games. The common non-Google Podcasting apps are in the alternative Android App Store and work great, as long as you keep the Android network stack warm. Google apps won't work, so that rules out YouTube, but the website works great with the built-in browser. Netflix, Hulu, etc... refuse to run for lack of Google DRM, so streaming TV isn't going to happen.

In short, with a little tinkering -- and hopefully continued maturity of the platform, SFOS could be a realistic replacement for webOS. I don't love the UI or their unusual gestures -- especially compared to my Veer. And speaking of which, even the non-ultra Xperia is larger than I'd like. Apparently there is a "compact" version that is unofficially workable on Sailfish (but lacks the paid features, so probably not worth it.)

I wonder if it might be possible to arrive at some mash-up of Sailfish OS and the LuneOS. On the devices they support, hardware functionality is near 100% (GPS sluggishness notwithstanding). Adopting their underlying bits, and including the much nicer LuneOS UI plus Enyo kit might combine to make a platform that could be really great for devs and users alike...

[cheque_some]

Thanks for this update, its very useful! TMobile moved their 3G shut down to July (maybe it'll move again!) and they're planning to keep 2G up until next December, so I have at least 7 months left with my Veer -- maybe a year, if its still usable on 2G only.

Got the following long-dreaded text from T-mobile yesterday:

T-Mobile: As a valued customer, we are providing you formal notice
that T-Mobile is retiring the 3G network on July 1, 2022. You'll need
to upgrade or replace your phone before 7-1-22 to continue service,
including the ability to make 911 calls depending on your location
t-mo.co/3GtTVVw

Good to hear that the 2G shutdown is a little bit farther off, I can still manage on EDGE, assuming there's still some left.

[Fred Zyphal]

So that's where it stands, my Pre 3 will be with me until I've had a PinePhone Pro in my hands long enough to get comfortable with it, or until the end of 2022, or until Sumi's battery dies, which ever comes first.

They finally released the Pro to "Enthusiasts", mine is on the way. I've been using the original with my cheap backup SIM from Consumer Cellular, and it's getting better and better. They seem to be shipping the Pro with Manajro Linux and the Plasma UI, so I decided to focus on that for awhile instead of Ubuntu Touch. One noteworthy comment is that the cellular service just always works, where it's been a little sketchy under Ubuntu. Other things like GPS are the exact opposite though. I'm anxious to get the Pro in my hands and see how it works, it could be awhile though ... in the mean time the Pre 3 keeps chugging along, I still expect Verizon to support it through the end of 2022.

[Herrie]

We have LuneOS images for the Pro too, so you can have a familiar OS too

Sent from my Titan pocket using Tapatalk

[Fred Zyphal]

We have LuneOS images for the Pro too, so you can have a familiar OS too

I tried LuneOS on the regular PinePhone and it worked really well, there were just a few things missing that made it less than optimal. Now I can't wait to try it again once my Pro gets here.

[Herrie]

You can create issues or request here so we can (try to) address them: https://github.com/webOS-ports/luneos-testing/issues

Sent from my Titan pocket using Tapatalk

[Grabber5.0]

Been keeping an eye on this with my Pre3 today. As of now, there has been no change. It's possible that it just disappears overnight, but I expect over the coming weeks that the signal will shrink as they get towers reconfigured.

-- Sent from my Palm Pre3 using Forums

[Fred Zyphal]

Well, alas, my last Sumi battery died ... but then I remembered that I bought one of those extra thick extra high power Mugen batteries a while back. It requires the special back cover that makes the Pre 3 look pregnant, but what the hell, at least I'm still use'n it, and after playing with the PinePhone for a while, even a pregnant Pre 3 seems small ... lol

[mazzinia]

Well, at least you're not dead in the water. I'm still unable to catch sumi (his battery here failed too lately) , and hanging with claws at the original battery that strangely by staying unused for some years, sort of recovered a bit ... enough to be relied onto

[cheque_some]

I got a nastygram via SMS from T-mobile the other day:

T-Mobile: IMMEDIATE ACTION REQUIRED: You have device(s) associated with lines XXXX that will experience SERVICE IMPACTS when the T-mobile 3G network retires on 7/1/22. Impacted devices MUST BE REPLACED BEFORE 7/1/22. t-mo.co/5Gfree

I'm hoping it will fall back to 2G, but I guess we'll see. Anyone else thinking about their next step? I really didn't think it would be the hardware that finally made this thing unusable, figured it would be the software. But I guess the community has had an easier time patching the software than the hardware.

[mazzinia]

It's similar to what I received , i think, here in Italy by a different provider quite a bit of months ago by now. The phone is working without an issue on 2G; in your case the main question is if T-Mobile has 2G active ( since in some places also 2G was being retired, i think ? ).
Otherwise is going to be fine, without losses of quality in the calls..