[hn_throwaway_99]

Highlights a much better policy than Google with respect to their Pixel phones. Pixel 2 was released at the end of 2017 and stopped getting updates at the end of 2020. I was kinda pissed, as I really felt no other compelling reason to get a later model phone. I might get a Pixel 6 when it's released later this year because 5G network availability is starting to become a real thing, but at this point I feel like only 3 years of support for a flagship phone is bullshit.

[rootusrootus]

My last Android phone was a Moto X. As I recall, it got precisely one software update from the manufacturer, and within a year it was unsupported altogether. That was coincident with several notable mobile phone vulnerabilities, and not a peep from Motorola. I decided to switch to iPhone just because I didn't want to have to worry about such things any more, because I didn't want to trade out phones every two or three years (especially since Android phones absolutely tank in value), and because I don't tinker with my phone. Took some getting used to the Apple ecosystem, but I was glad to turn my phone back into an appliance.

[iSnow]

Same for Sony. Got like 2.5y support and that's it, not even regular security updates.

I am thinking about switching to iPhones. I just hope the anti-trust case forces Apple to allow other App stores or side-loading. That and the back button is what keeps me on Android, and I am sure I could accustomed to whatever gesture means "back" on iOS.

[rootusrootus]

> whatever gesture means "back" on IOS

Swipe right from the left edge of the screen.

[kemayo]

Not really! There's not an iOS equivalent to the Android "back" concept.

On Android pressing "back" will take you to the last screen you were on; importantly this might be in the same app or a different one. It'll also do things like dismiss popups and hide the keyboard, since that's also moving back to a previous state.

The back-swipe on iOS is the equivalent of the Android "up" button, in that it's specific to the current app. It's also only going to work if the current app is deliberately supporting it, of course -- they might have their own UI chrome that doesn't respond to a swipe.

The other half of the "back" button behavior on iOS is that you can swipe left/right across the bottom of the screen to cycle between apps. (Or there's a special back-button in the toolbar if you've just followed a link that took you between apps.) So it does need more intentional-knowledge about what you mean to achieve.

[rootusrootus]

Agreed, it's not a perfect analog, but for me it did work out as a roughly equivalent replacement for what I used the back button for in Android. I've also had really good luck with most apps supporting the convention.

But YMMV of course, this is going to be largely dependent on your own usage patterns, app choices, etc.

[kemayo]

Yeah, that's fair. I felt it was worth calling out that it's not a perfect 1:1 map of behavior, since the Android-back does contain multitudes and it's hard to say what a given person expects it to do in their own usage.

Honestly, having used both, I prefer the iOS separation of concerns. I've seen a lot of non-technical people get confused about what Android's "back" is going to do, so a button that'll do something different based on the context of how your reached the current screen apparently doesn't map well to many people's mental models of their phones.

[iSnow]

Personally, I love that I can open a web site in the browser from say the Reddit app and back will bring me back to the Reddit app. Guess I'll miss this behavior.

[iSnow]

Thanks!

[akmarinov]

It’s looking likely that the EU will force them to add other stores. Don’t know whether that’ll apply to the US if they do.

Also the EU isn’t in Apple’s top 3 priority markets, so we’ll see.

[iSnow]

As an EU-citizen, it's sufficient for me if the EU forces them, but I think there's also the Steam vs Apple case in the USA

[akmarinov]

Well, good news then - https://twitter.com/keleftheriou/status/1403394252457930752?...

[iSnow]

I really like Vestager, but Apple will fight this tooth and nails in court.

Sad that the article is so extremely anti-EU instead of pro-consumer.