@lemming123

Make sure to remove Play store etc first, and install the fake Gapps otherwise you have to remove and reinstall. Once installed I updated immediately from F-Droid.

https://github.com/whew-inc/FakeGApps

The XDA forum gives the Gapps you can uninstall.

You may want to use a systemless debloater with Magisk first, as you can turn modules on and off in orangefox so if you bootloop you can just enter recovery and then turn the module off and revert the change :)

Points to make a full system backup:

— before unlocking bootloader

— before making system read-write

— before deleting a system app/a group of system apps

— before moving any apps to be system apps if you don’t use the magisk systemless module [this is where I messed up big time]

I also made several backups as I was changing things, e.g. when I added my new dialler etc, I backed up the working system beforehand in case anything broke.

Feel free to ask if you have any questions!!

@lemming123@thelemmy.club

Ok cool,

I’ll get links shortly and explain in more detail, [I will also add lots of the problems would have been solved had I taken backups properly]

What I did:

Unlock bootloader, and patch/install a patched boot image and magisk
Install a custom recovery - I used orangefox, I think TWRP is also on Nothing
Make the protected file system read/write
Download a file explorer that has root access available
Go into the root filesystem, and delete all the google stuff you wish to get rid of [You will want to make sure you have a keyboard installed!!]

If you just want to get rid of google apps, you’d be able to stop here.

I did want banking apps available, and they need google services framework - you have MicroG I downloaded from the F-droid store, and then used a magisk module to make it a system app to keep everything happy there.

@lemming123@thelemmy.club

Ah I see, is bootloader unlocking etc still available? (A more techy person could still go hard on privacy implementations)

I’m using nothing myself but the op said its unavailable in their country. I also noted that now lots of ROMs come preloaded with GAPPS whereas you had to load separately in the past.

@lemming123@thelemmy.club

I managed to degoogle stock ROM, as I wanted to have the glyphs available (I feel like I’m in a minority of users that find them useful as well as just cool).

I did have the phone enter crash dump and at points had no ROM or recovery and it took a while as I was endlessly searching tools available.

I’m more than happy to share what I did?

Word of warning is you need quite a few tools, apps and packages, but they have source code available.

I’m not a mobile developer but going through the tools they are regarded well in the developer community, or scanning the code myself didn’t raise an alarms.

@lemming123@thelemmy.club

What difficulties do you encounter with the custom ROM stuff?

If you get a oneplus, they are very forgiving of things you could do to brick a phone.

A recent oneplus and installing a custom ROM (LineageOS + MicroG) would be fairly doable for a larger audience than just the “nerd” or “hacker”.

If people know what you struggle with particularly, they can help better.

To get rid of google completely, a custom ROM or other technical things are necessary, but debloating using a standard tool is a good first step and is better than what you will have from the off.

https://github.com/0x192/universal-android-debloater