The only app I can’t live without. Except for gboard, all of my applications are Foss. There is no competition for gboard’s swipe typing, not to mention its many capabilities like as searching for gifs, stickers, being able to paste copied images, translating, and so on. I’d like to know how I can use gboard while maintaining my privacy. According to what I’ve heard, it sends all typing data to Google’s server. If you ask me, that’s a massive no-no. Do you have any suggestions?
Give OpenBoard with gesture typing a shot. No gifs and stuff, but gesture typing works together with suggestions, unlike either base OB or Floris. Someone casually mentioned it a few weeks ago and damn how much my life changed.
Life changing
I’m so thrilled right now! I’m already typing this reply on OpenBoard and I’m loving it.
Gboard was also a big hurdle to my need to degoogle my phone. But not anymore!
Thank you so much. You’ve brighten my day. I’m both happy for knowing this and for finding about it on the fediverse.
I just wanted to say how much I appreciate this whole vibe!
BTW that still uses Google’s proprietary gesture typing library internally: https://github.com/wordmage/openboard/commit/46fdf2b550035ca69299ce312fa158e7ade36967
There’s still no good FOSS alternative to Google’s library though so it is what it is.
Aha, that’s why it’s not on F-Droid. That makes sense.
Still, it doesn’t connect to the internet so unless there’s something very sneaky Google does in the background, it should be good?
Floris Board afaik has its own implementation of gesture typing, but that’s been stuck in beta without word suggestions, so it’s not really usable.
It is on F-Droid: https://f-droid.org/packages/org.dslul.openboard.inputmethod.latin/
Edit: The version on F-Droid does not have swipe.
That’s the version without gesture typing. The fork uses the same name so they can be hard to distinguish.
Doh, my edit was slower than comment federation 😀
Wow this works pretty well!
How did I not know about this?
Amazing. Thank you.
I can live with no gifs, but I can’t live without emoji support :/
It has regular emojis
Weird I’m not seeing any options for emojis anywhere on the keyboard using S23 Ultra
It’s under ‘preferences.’
Maybe you have the key disabled, look in settings under preferences. There’s a bunch of stuff you might want to tweak.
Long press the enter/return button (round, with an left point arrow). It’ll show you the emoji and clipboard buttons. 💡
Alternatively, you can turn on the dedicated emoji button on OpenBoard’s preferences.
You can also long press the comma button. There you’ll find the preferences and emoji buttons.
If you long press the comma key on the left of the spacebar, you’ll see an emoji icon on the far right.
Wow, this is an awesome keyboard! I love the pointer moving with the spacebar.
Thanks for sharing. I’ve finally replaced Gboard. Now I have to adjust to the new key sizes, but at least I know my data is private
You can resize it in settings, at least the height. I have mine set to 80%. Before OB I was using GB and I recall setting it so both looked the same.
That’s impressive thank you. Gesture typing with it now.
How do you gesture type with it? Slide doesn’t work for me and there’s no option to enable it.
You have to go to the settings and turn gestures on. Also this is not the fdroid version. This is the version from the link above.
Voilà ! My first great piece of advice found on Lemmy! So thankful for this, and for witnessing the sudden growth of a great community here on Lemmy <3
I’m glad the word is spreading, i also found out a few weeks ago through Lemmy. The only bug that drives me up the wall is when trying to delete backwards to fix a word. It eventually eats the space to the PREVIOUS word, joining them together and making an even bigger mess. It also looks like it never got an update after September :(
I guess you’re using Jerboa? Apparently that’s a bug between
WebViewWebkit and the AOSP keyboard (which OB is based on), or something… I don’t quite get what’s going on…It actually happens on any window or app I’ve used, maybe they’re all webview instances… Dunnow.
Thanks! The only thing I don’t like is that I can’t have arrow keys. It’s immediately better than SwiftKey for sure, so I’ll adjust.
You can use swiping on the space bar to move left and right at least.
AnySoftKeyboard has arrow keys and more gestures, but it’s not as refined overall imo.
Floris Board has gestures to move around IIRC, but not at the same time as gesture typing, and is lacking word suggestions.
Awesome! Using space to go left and right is good enough for me!
Thanks a ton for that. I got to really liking OpenBoard since I started using it.
I’ve been looking for something like this for so long, thank you!
What GBoard and SwiftKey can so far collect from a user is written in this PDF : https://github.com/kamilprz/android-keyboard-privacy/blob/main/report.pdf
Damn, Swiftkey sends the typed text even in Incognito mode… 😱
Where does it say that? The abstract explicitly says that neither gboard or swiftkey collect or share the input content or frequency of specific characters entered.
Does it say differently in the actual paper?
The post title contradicts the abstract. Gboard does not transmit the content “only” telemetry data.
GBoard learning algorithm has been federated since 2017 🤷♂️ edit
https://ai.googleblog.com/2017/04/federated-learning-collaborative.html
That’s actually pretty cool
It works like this: your device downloads the current model, improves it by learning from data on your phone, and then summarizes the changes as a small focused update. Only this update to the model is sent to the cloud, using encrypted communication, where it is immediately averaged with other user updates to improve the shared model. All the training data remains on your device, and no individual updates are stored in the cloud.
My main deal breaker with most open source keyboards is the usually pretty bad multi language support. I type in three languages all the time and don’t want to have to switch keyboards every time I switch the language. Currently using SwiftKey, just because it handles multi-language (fairly) well.
There is a fork of openboard with multiple language support, but it’s missing glide typing. When these two features are merged it’s the perfect keyboard. Until then the language switch icon works well enough.
As mentioned on this thread elsewhere, try the fork with glide typing enabled . it works rather well.
You mean it can auto recognize the language you’re using?
Same. Gboard is the only software keyboard capable of multi-language input that “just works”. I tried OpenBoard, AOSP, Floris, Anysoft and while they seem okay in general, none supports polyglots as well as Gboard
This is also my main deal breaker. Gboard does pretty well for me but I only type in two languages.
If you’re on calyxos, grapheneos, or lineageos you can disable network permisions for that app. If not, use netguard as a firewall and block it.
If you have Google play services the keyboard could phone home through play services. Shutting off network access isn’t 100% effective, especially for Google apps.
Obviously depending on your threat model this is fine.
If you are using Graphene, Play Services are themselves sandboxed and running as a user app with no privileges. I think they really can’t be accessed on graphene, unless specifically choosing to.
I have a limited understanding. But I believe in graphene the Google Play services are available in the user account that is running the Google Play services. So if you have a Google keyboard running as your main user and you have Google Play services running in your main user account they can talk to each other. That’s how apps like signal could use Google Play services for message detection.
But if you have a work account and a personal account and Google Play is only in the work account. The personal account cant cross talk to it.
There’s a fork of OpenBoard with swipe typing at https://github.com/erkserkserks/openboard
I’ve found this to be better than any of the alternatives.
I use the same, it’s just openboard + the propetary swipe lib
F-Droid has a lot of security issues(if you care about security), use Neo Store if you want access to F-Droid apps with a more secure app.
EDIT: Even better to use Obtainium and add the links of the APP’s own Github/GitLab repo to it.
Any chance u can explain how Neo Store is more secure?
iirc fdroid utilizes very old api which is problematic as newer api gets newer security features droidify and neostore both are more modern
Neo Store can enable automatic updates for apps downloaded from F-Droid.
And how does that make it more secure?
I don’t think it would make F-Droid itself more secure, but it’s best to get possible security updates for apps sooner with auto-updates.
I read through that article, and though I don’t have the time or knowledge to properly critique it, I found quite a lot of it unconvincing.
It’s one thing to agree there are potential issues, but the article seemed to jump a bit too easily, via rhetoric more than logic, to “therefore it’s unsuitable” and similarly to “the other ones are better”.
(Disclaimer: I only know mildly what I’m talking about!! If whoever reads this is interested, I hope you can follow the details to their source and get involved in the proper discussion for improving f-droid and/or encouraging another respiratory client.)
A tempting idea would be to compare F-Droid to the desktop Linux model where users trust their distribution maintainers out-of-the-box (this can be sane if you’re already trusting the OS anyway), but the desktop platform is intrinsically chaotic and heterogeneous for better and for worse. It really shouldn’t be compared to the Android platform in any way.
This is, quite frankly, borderline misinformation. Malicious packages in Linux distributions are unheard of. Malicious apps in the allegedly-more-secure Google Play, on the other hand, are a dime a dozen.
The downplaying of the importance of reproducible builds further diminishes my opinion of this piece.
I’m going to go ahead and continue using F-Droid, thanks.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s): https://piped.video/watch?v=IzpVI4zaso0
https://piped.video/watch?v=lAbgeJau3eE
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source, check me out at GitHub.
A tempting idea would be to compare F-Droid to the desktop Linux model where users trust their distribution maintainers out-of-the-box (this can be sane if you’re already trusting the OS anyway), but the desktop platform is intrinsically chaotic and heterogeneous for better and for worse. It really shouldn’t be compared to the Android platform in any way.
This is, quite frankly, borderline misinformation. Malicious packages in Linux distributions are unheard of. Malicious apps in the allegedly-more-secure Google Play, on the other hand, are a dime a dozen.
The downplaying of the importance of reproducible builds further diminishes my opinion of this piece.
I’m going to go ahead and continue using F-Droid, thanks.
What exactly are you trying to point out ?
From your quote: “It really shouldn’t be compared to the Android platform in any way.”
And where exactly does it downplay reproducible builds ? “reproducible builds are not as common as we would have wanted.”
“I’m going to go ahead and continue using F-Droid, thanks.” Good friend, do whatever it is you want to do.
I’m just trying to spread security awareness.
EDIT: “Saying Play Store is filled with malicious apps is beyond the point: the false sense of security is a real issue. Users should not think of the F-Droid main repository as free of malicious apps, yet unfortunately many are inclined to believe this.”
From your quote: “It really shouldn’t be compared to the Android platform in any way.”
I quoted that because it’s part of the borderline misinformation. Security is security. Malware is malware. Android isn’t magical and neither is desktop Linux. They absolutely can be meaningfully compared.
And where exactly does it downplay reproducible builds ? “reproducible builds are not as common as we would have wanted.”
Ah, you’re right. I misread that part, sorry.
I’m just trying to spread security awareness.
So am I. I’m an ornery old Linux nerd and security snob. I’d excise all proprietary software from my home and office if I could, precisely because it has such an appalling track record and the blatantly unnecessary attack surfaces of DRM and telemetry.
Can F-Droid be more secure than it is? Sure. Do the issues described in this paper mean F-Droid is so rampantly insecure that even Play is safer? Absolutely not.
By the way, I’m not sure I understand how Neo Store is supposed to be more secure, as it’s supposedly just an alternative UI for F-Droid. As for Obtainium, it’ll protect you from malfeasance or compromise on the part of the F-Droid repository, but it won’t protect you from malicious app developers, and unless I’m mistaken, the latter is a much more common threat.
“I quoted that because it’s part of the borderline misinformation. Security is security. Malware is malware. Android isn’t magical and neither is desktop Linux. They absolutely can be meaningfully compared.”
That’s why the author said it’s tempting. You cannot compare desktop Linux to Android. Android is light-years ahead in terms of security than desktop Linux will ever be.
If you install Debian on your machine then that means you trust the Debian developers. If you trust the Debian developers then that means that you trust their repositories. The same cannot be said about Android. If you, for example, install GrapheneOS you’re trusting the graphene developers for the OS and the individual developers for their individual apps you install on your phone.
On Android a compromised user doesn’t have root, on ordinary Linux desktops, a compromised non-root user with access to sudo is equal to a full root compromise. On a Linux desktop with Xorg you can easily keylog everything with one malicious app(that app automatically gets these permissions without prompting you), with modern Android that’s not even an option(you’d need to accept all of these invasive permissions yourself, unless the app has a zero day that can bypass permissions).
The list goes on and on and on. You can read more here
“Ah, you’re right. I misread that part, sorry.”
No biggie :D
“By the way, I’m not sure I understand how Neo Store is supposed to be more secure, as it’s supposedly just an alternative UI for F-Droid.”
Neo store has the highest target SDK currently so it can use security and privacy APIs that Android provides with each new version. That alone is one of the biggest reasons to use neo store over native F-Droid. It shows you the target SDK, permissions (Way more understandable than whatever F-Droid does) & trackers for the apps you want to install. So you can make a more informed decision if you want that app installed.
“As for Obtainium, it’ll protect you from malfeasance or compromise on the part of the F-Droid repository, but it won’t protect you from malicious app developers, and unless I’m mistaken, the latter is a much more common threat.”
You are adding more attack surface when using F-Droid, but when using Obtainium, you have one less attack surface. Instead of worrying about malicious F-Droid developers and malicious app developers, you only worry about the latter. Malicious app developers can still publish to F-Droid without F-Droid getting compromised.
I believe some custom ROMs use an AOSP version that is very simplified, but it’s not a 1:1 replacement. I’ll be following this to see if anybody has suggestions.
To those who have been recommending Florisboard in this thread: Thank you. I’ve longed for a good FOSS keyboard, but always found they lacked enough features that I was willing to compromise and stick with gboard. Florisboard, using the latest beta from IzzyOnDroid, absolutely hits the mark already. It’s missing a few features, like word autosuggest, but I can live without that for a while.
FOSS is not just about privacy! Freedom is that important reason you should care about. FlorisBoard is my suggestion for you.
Yesterday I installed Grapheneos so I’ve swapped to florisboard. Not bad but it’s very specific on where you swipe using gestures. I’m slowly getting used to it but gboard was a lot more forgiving.
The latest release being almost a year ago doesn’t exactly inspire confidence though.
Why is everyone obsessed with constant updates? It’s not broken, there’s nothing to fix. It’s a keyboard, I prefer it to be fast, reliable and not phone home.
I don’t need some bloated mess that will take 10 seconds to start and require a gigabyte of RAM because the devs need to push an update every week with new useless crap without testing it.
Regular updates doesn’t mean, new features all the time. It mostly means security updates, which are important.
It doesn’t have internet accesss. There isn’t much to worry about.
Ed: I understand that non-internet apps can be used for attacks as well, but maybe there just hasn’t been anything to update.
There are active forks, it might take some time until a successor is found that includes all MRs.
deleted by creator
Weren’t you the one who randomly mentioned it a few weeks ago? After which it’s been my favorite thing to recommend.
Holy crap! It’s amazing! I’m using it right now, and it’s great!
Ok I’m f-droiding right now :)
edit :just realized it’s different than the one you linked.
further edit: It’s much better than floris. Happy days, thank you for the suggestion.
If you’re on graphene OS then just uninstall GBoard and when youre installing it back uncheck the network permission checkbox. Easy as pie
No need to uninstall. Just go into Settings - Apps - Gboard - Permissions. You can deny or grant any perms (including Network) there.
If you’re on GrapheneOS, you get the option to block an app’s network access when you install it. So you can use whatever keyboard you want and it can’t call home.
Why Gboard is better at gestures? That’s because it tracks you.
Badum tssss :D
Used FlorisBoard for a good while, it’s the perfect replacement imo. I don’t remember exactly but there was a certain feature missing for me so I uninstalled it but it may have been implemented by now.
The major feature that’s missing is autocorrect, rely on it a lot
I checked every keyboard on F-Droid, Floris is the best keyboard you can find now.
Well outside of F-droid (for some reason) is OpenBoard with gesture typing
I only trust F-Droid and I don’t install any apps from outside of it!
Same and I agree, I’ll have to download it again later.
Tried it for a few minutes, it just feels off. It could just be the haptics? Idk this makes sense it just really makes me aware I’m typing on a screen
Check the settings.
Is it actually actively developed? The last version is from September of last year.
Yes, it is. But it doesn’t update fast.
Ty, yeah. I could’ve checked the repo myself 😂
I do like FlorisBoard but japanese support is lacking it seems and as a learner, it made me have to go toward Gboard. Granted I am able to put GBoard behind a firewall and cut off it’s network connectivity.
I use OpenBoard from F-Droid.
I use a fork of OpenBoard with Swipe Typing libraries added to it.
Any idea why that isn’t in F-Droid?
I’m not sure, that’s a question for the Dev.
Some of the reason may be the hastle of rebranding, having two Openboards would be confusing so the fork would need to change names and icons and such. Some of it is also be this is for personal use, and we happen to find it, so they may not be interested in the expectation of maintaining it beyond their own useage. Some of it may be this is good enough, Openboard’s release cycle is pretty slow so the fork doesn’t need to be updated and released often, so an APK on Github downloaded twice a year is good enohgh for them.
What do you mean, no competition? SwiftKey was the first to have swipe typing, and still does it best, because it learns how you swipe and adjusts itself for that.
Swype was the first to have it. It did so amazingly well and was better than SwiftKey while it was still around.
Oh shit you’re right! I forgot all about Swype. I used that too, back in the day.
I loved Swype. Nuance made it a pile of shit though. One annoying thing after they bought it was that ‘K.’ would always autocorrect to K. d. Lang. You could not tell it to stop doing that.
I use SwiftKey now. Microsoft is getting more of my data.
I never ran into that issue, but it might be because I write okay!
https://github.com/florisboard/florisboard/pull/2209
As soon as this gets merged, I’m done with Gboard I hope.
I don’t know how much of a difference it makes in terms of Gboard phoning home, but you can disable a bunch of data sharing options in the Privacy section of Gboard’s settings:
I use it without giving network permission
Network permission? How did you disable network access?
Settings -> Apps -> All Apps -> Gboard -> Permission -> Network -> Don’t allow
Network isn’t listed as a permission used or requested or denied to this app. Using Samsung S22.
And even then, that would still probably be a no-go because OP wants to use gifs
It’s a custom rom thing, when you never use stock roms you tend to forget what’s stock and what’s not.
Very annyoing that stock android doesn’t have this feature.
I use Netguard and block apps with that.
I’m using exclusively custom roms for years now.
My bad
Use Netguard
Using grapheneOS so from permissions. Not sure if possible without any fake VPN filtering app on stock
