Chromium… I’m so getting downvoted with this one.

Anyways,

I have an old Android 6 phone that is still not completely unusable and my older family members want to use it as a backup phone (in fact, they already do). They can’t live without Facebook (obviously) so I installed Firefox on it and made a PWA for Facebook. It works surprisingly well but Firefox itself is quite sluggish and slow to open on that piece of hardware. So I’m thinking of installng a Chromium browser on it, as well as on my other old devices to make them run a bit better and just out of my extremely unhealthy curiosity.

But the problem is they all do not support modern arm64 apps that most Android phones use nowadays. Instead they need this other type called armeabi-v7a. There were Chromium based browsers that had a v7a version (Bromite for example) but they all suspiciously died at the same time more than a year ago. Does Chromium really not support the old architecture (or whatever it is) anymore or I’m just not searching well enough?

P. S. Advices to buy a newer device will not be accepted and will be treated with appropriate level of hostility.

  • 𝒍𝒆𝒎𝒂𝒏𝒏@lemmy.dbzer0.com
    6·
    4 months ago

    Chromium… I’m so getting downvoted with this one.

    Why? Anyone is free to use whatever browser floats their boat 🤷‍♂️

    Firefox itself is quite sluggish and slow to open on that piece of hardware

    Do you get the same issues on an older version of Firefox for that device? If yes, proceed with caution - your device’s internal EMMC might be nearing EOL considering how old Android 6 is

    But the problem is they all do not support modern arm64 apps that most Android phones use nowadays. Instead they need this other type called armeabi-v7a

    They probably just stopped building for Android 6 devices. The SDK and various third party libraries continue to add new features all the time, and unlike Firefox, the majority of devs do not have the time or resources to manually code-in the missing bits to retain compatibility with old versions of Android. As a side effect, these custom implementations may have bugs or issues that go unnoticed due to the shrinking install base.

    One of the more noticeable bits that changed is the Share API, which is why Firefox’s one looks so different vs every other app. There are other things like enhanced battery optimization and the storage API, which have changed a lot since Android 6.

    IMO your best option is an older version of FF, or install Lineage (etc) on that device and use another browser

    Edit: change “age of device” to “shrinking install base”

    • GolfNovemberUniform@lemmy.mlOP
      2·
      4 months ago

      The people that are using the phone click malicious links almost every day. Old versions are out of question because of security.

      I don’t think the phone has eMMC health issues. It’s just too slow for modern browsers.

      and use another browser

      What can you recommend? WebView browsers will have security patches from 2016 on that device.

  • aluminium@lemmy.world
    5·
    4 months ago

    Last time I checked ARM v7 is not the issue, there are still up to date builds available from Chrome itsself or Brave, rather Android 6 is. Google seems to have a cycle where roughly every fall they drop another Android version.

    Right now the minium requirement is Anroid 8 and if the cycle continues it will loose support in a few months and Android 9 will be the new minimum requirement.

    However I also have a a few Android 6 or 7 devices and usually firefox runs fine on them if they at least have two proper large CPU cores. But using two year old Chromium based browsers, I never ran into any sites that wouldn’t work correctly.

  • Orfeluh@lemmy.world
    2·
    4 months ago

    https://github.com/Alex313031/Thorium-Android There is this browser it supports arm32, I don’t see support for armeabi v7a, I don’t know will it work, not really familiar with tech side of that

    https://www.viayoo.com/en/ This is browser for older devices, very lightweight, even managed to install older version on Android 2.3.4

    https://f-droid.org/packages/org.mozilla.fennec_fdroid/ And this is Firefox fork, maybe it will run more smoothly than Firefox

      • thehellrocc@beehaw.orgEnglish
        1·
        4 months ago

        The Cromite GitHub page also says it supports arm32-v7a right at the beginning (for some reason later in the README it lists the platforms again without it, someone probably forgot to change it), I believe it’s the file in the releases called arm_ChromePublic.apk (not arm64), so try that

        (Note: it does say it’s Android 7 or higher though, so it still might not work unless you try some custom ROMs)

      • foremanguy@lemmy.ml
        1·
        4 months ago

        I agree for Cromite, but maybe you should double check Mulch? On fdroid it is said only armeabi-v7a…

        EDIT : As seen on another comment maybe try to install Lineage, what’s the phone reference?

  • a Kendrick fan@lemmy.ml
    21·
    4 months ago

    Downvoted bcos Op bi+ched about downvoting in the beginning of text, that’s bad behaviour, do better

    Although, the Chromium project just like Android are free, they’re stained by being majorly developed by google and are the major source of spying and tracking today

  • infeeeee@lemm.ee
    21·
    4 months ago

    FFUpdater supports Android 5+: https://f-droid.org/packages/de.marmaro.krt.ffupdater/ You can install a lot of browsers from there, maybe one of them supports this phone: https://github.com/Tobi823/ffupdater

    Also check slimsocial, it’s a facebook client, supports Android 4.4+ and it lists arm7 support: https://f-droid.org/hu/packages/it.rignanese.leo.slimfacebook/

    And new Chinese phones (Redmi, HMD, etc) are really cheap, they are good as a backup smartphone. I know it sounds terrible, but you can’t really do anything with planned obsolescence. Our time is short on this planet, waiting for websites on old hardware simply doesn’t worth it, you should spend this time on more important things.