someUnexpectedSparks @someunexpectedsparks@librem.one
I'll use this to toot a bit about linux phones, primarily the Librem5 from Purism. I hope to pass on some information that I'd be interested in if I was thinking about buying one.
I am not, in any way, affiliated with Purism beyond being a customer.
If you find any of this interesting or helpful, great. If not, well most of social media is moronic anyway, what did you expect? :)
Joined Aug 2020
Well, my #librem5 #dogwood isn't back after all ☹️
It seems to have lost all interest in charging. I've gone back and forth with #purism support but no resolution yet.
The trickle charging thing I tooted about sometimes works, but it is fidgety to invoke and requires the phone to be off.
Disappointing.
OK, my #librem5 #dogwood is back.
It was either a random resolution, or a possible answer to having no indicator LED at all and a seemingly fully depleted battery is to turn off all the kill switches and follow the trickle charging procedure the troubleshooting page describes as a response to a blinking green indicator.
Chatty works for XMPP on the #librem5 #dogwood, I've seen it. Sort of.
I would call the XMPP setup … fidgety. It never quite seemed to me that the indicators of a connection and a successfully stored password fully matched reality. But I did get it to stay connected and send/receive messages for a few days.
Then one day it was gone and I couldn’t get it back.
I wanted to look at it today a bit more rigorously to figure out if the issue was me or the SW or the L5.
But…
Here’s a bit more about #syncthing
I have regular files I sync across machines, but they don't change much.
My "interesting" use case is an app I've been building for tasks and reminders. Each one is stored in an individual file that syncthing coordinates.
On my #librem5 #dogwood that has actually been working really well so far over mobile data and wi-fi. Changes have been flowing to and from the L5 without trouble and when expected.
They are tiny files. Less than ½KB each. ~32KB total.
@zwerg12 Ohhhhhh, clearly I misunderstood
I'm kind of glad I babbled a bit about why
I'll toot a bit more and you can let me know if I'm saying anything helpful
After a while on my #librem5 #dogwood experiment call, I stopped fidgeting with it and the screen timed out.
The lock screen came on behind the call screen. You could see it around the edge of the call window. I couldn’t figure out how to get to any other app from that point until I ended the call.
Annoying
Most of what I’ve seen so far is already in their bugs database https://source.puri.sm/Librem5/calls/-/issues
Purism did say this thing was pre-production, so don't take this as complaining, just noting.
In general, I don’t talk on the phone much so I won’t have much to say about that. But the other day I had a long work call that became a #librem5 #dogwood experiment.
To start, cellular was in the disconnected state I just tooted about.
I couldn’t get my bluetooth headset to play the audio.
I could switch back and forth from speaker mode to “regular” mode. There are 2 speakers, but they were about the same volume. Are they going for a respects-you-librarian speakerphone approval?
Getting back to the #librem5 #dogwood as a phone...
I’ve seen it make/receive calls. But, on at least 2 occasions, I've seen it not.
The phone status indicated it was on the cellular network. But, calls from 2 different phones didn't come through.
I tried to make a call, which it looked like it tried to do. The calls app froze and the called phones didn't ring. The red call-end button didn't do anything. I closed the app from phosh.
A recycle got things back working again.
Case in point on my mobile data needs.
On my main personal phone, my pandemically-limited past 3 months of data use (in MB): 23.92, 4.13, 11.19
On average, if it weren’t for the cable, a 300 baud modem would do me.
@zwerg12 asked about network speed, but I'm not going to answer. It’s not to be a jerk, I’m just not that interested.
I don’t stream. I prefer to own files and copy them over. Ya, its not as easy, but no ads or surveillance. Connectivity isn’t a worry. Stuff I buy doesn’t disappear when contracts change. I support artists directly.
I use the web, but phone and browser capabilities interfere in that story.
I’m in no way a network engineer, so I worry about accuracy.
This is totally awesome. Or totally silly.
The #librem5 #dogwood has a working spreadsheet app. You don’t believe me?
It is “sc” the spreadsheet calculator for unix/linux. It is a fully working spreadsheet. Well, you may want to debate “fully”. Call it spreadsheet functionality without all the cruft/fluff and unneeded features. You #terminal folks say you like that, right?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sc_(spreadsheet_calculator)
#sc
Tried a few ePub readers...
Calibre crashes on boot (Could not find the Qt platform plugin "wayland")
Okular boots, but isn’t full screen so the nav is unreachable
#foliate boots, goes full screen, and it … it … works! The catalogs work (standardebooks, feedbooks, project gutenberg). I grabbed a book and started reading. I was able to read an ePub file I had. Another ePub I had seemed to send it into infinite loops or something. So I guess I’m saying 2 out of 3 ain’t bad?
#librem5 #dogwood
When the squeekboard modifier keys appeared a week or so ago, I really wondered if I had just missed them. So I started looking for info on updates.
The info about them in the phone isn’t great. I don’t see a way to look at past updates, so I waited for another to toot.
3 screens here
1. Update Announcement
2. Package list
3. Package details (empty wherever I’ve looked)
Off-phone, I found the squeekboard change mentioned in their repo. Which made me feel better.
#librem5 #dogwood
Entering secrets in wallabag got me looking at cut/paste
Finger touch/drag to select text didn’t work in Epiphany. Gedit supports it, but it was fidgety for lines wider than the screen.
Squeekboard helps since CTRL & ALT are toggles. My go to approach became putting each secret in a file so I could CTRL-a, CTRL-c them. You know what I want? SHIFT should be a toggle too. SHIFT-navkey would be awesome!
It’s user-configurable, I may try. Having the source rocks.
#librem5 #dogwood #squeekboard
Wallabag/ReadItLater - Sort of works?
Enter your username and secrets (about 128 character's worth) and then it takes a looooong time to sync your stuff (I went to bed)
In the AM, I could navigate and read articles. It was slow. But I can tolerate it since - you know - linux phone!
The deal-breaker though, is it forgets my credentials. You have to re-enter them every launch. Bah!
There is a closed bug about access to the keyring. I may try to debug another day...
#librem5 #dogwood #wallabag
syncthing!
This makes me unreasonably happy
Installed from cli w/apt. Got 2 icons (start & web ui) in phosh, which I didn’t expect. It connected with my other machines in a few minutes. Files now syncing over both wi-fi & mobile. Smooth
This is real gnu/linux!
I’m building a home-grown, personal-cloud, screw-ball, palm-pilot replacement thing and I’d bet on syncthing as a core technology. Picture me as Hannibal Smith - I love it when a plan comes together.
OK, since I said the Librem5 was “crashy”, I feel obligated to follow that up by saying I haven’t seen a crash since I said that.
I had pretty light usage during that time - mostly charging, a couple/few hours of use per day. But still, gotta adjust my stats. They are trending in a good direction.
https://social.librem.one/@someunexpectedsparks/104781878661089200
@dos thanks for the thought
My L5 says...
```
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 44 Aug 26 23:19 /boot/dtb -> dtbs/5.7.0-1-librem5/./imx8mq-librem5-r3.dtb
```
which I think means things are "correct".
Over the past few days, it has been better.
I'll use this to toot a bit about linux phones, primarily the Librem5 from Purism. I hope to pass on some information that I'd be interested in if I was thinking about buying one.
I am not, in any way, affiliated with Purism beyond being a customer.
If you find any of this interesting or helpful, great. If not, well most of social media is moronic anyway, what did you expect? :)
Joined Aug 2020
