Alerts on de-googled devices considerations

[paulfertser]

Hello,

Certain part of android userbase is not able to use google push notifications for different reasons (not knowing much about the field I'm listing just the most obvious ones):

1. Some run plain AOSP-based builds (e.g. LineageOS; GrapheneOS without sandboxed google services, many others) without GApps;
2. Some run Waydroid on weak hardware such as PinePhone.
3. Some might have a spare cheap smartphone from China (with android fork from the vendor) which redirects everything google-related via some shady unreliable proxies making google push notifications not a viable option.

I can imagine the following ideas to help those users:

1. Allow generating an alert (with sound) from within the application itself; even if it's delayed by 10 seconds it's still better than no alert at all;
2. Consider integrating an independent push notfication mechanism such as https://unifiedpush.org/ . You can self-host the ntfy server for the purpose.

Thank you for the attention and detailed answers, it's always a pleasure to read (other than the security-through-obscurity ones ;) ).

[eladnava]

Hi @paulfertser,
Thanks for creating this issue.

In Israel, the percentage of non-GMS Android devices is less than 1%. Therefore, while it would be nice to support these users, it would require extensive implementation work, and therefore it may not be worth the effort-to-reward ratio.

I'll keep this in mind for future releases, though.

[bahtioraliev]

Hi,
I would like to join as +1 for the following request.
Although de-googled users considered as a minority in the android field, it would be very respectful to support those users.