After 3-4 years, I’m out. I’ve been somewhat satisfied after running /e/ on at least 4-6 different phones - but I cannot deal with the unreliable and shoddy murenacloud anymore. Don’t reply to me about rolling my own Nextcloud/whatever. While acheivable, that’s not what I was ever looking to do.
Snappymail is slower than necessary half the time, and is offline enough for me to now consider it unreliable. Today’s internal server error with murena.io, snappymail was the last straw.
Sync in general is problematic, i.e. photo/video sync hasn’t been reliable for over a year.
Murenacloud file/data sorting/viewing/organization is and has been very undercooked.
As for the phone OS side of things, it is obviously slightly better, because that is what /e/ devs seem to care about the most. And selling phones. Yet every few releases or so, there are more bugs and more ‘changes for the sake of change’ that are infuriating. I have to employ too many band-aids to get things to work the way they did previously (which was just fine) or in the way that’s best for me. And Bliss still sucks, yeah I get that it panders to all the iOS people, but really. Just blecchhhh.
One of the few saving graces of this OS is the users on the forums. They are all fine people and I will always appreciate their help over the years. I wish them all best of luck, I just ran out of patience.
There are other NextCloud providers who offer free accounts whch seem sugnificanty more stabe than murena.io.
I use free accounts at OwnDrive.com (Calendar, Tasks & Contacts sync) and thegood.cloud (Notes) as well as my paid murena.io account (now only used for file and documents sync / transfer). I recently moved all my notes from murena to thegood.cloud because of the well-documented problems with notes sync on murena: thegood.cloud has been pretty much flawless up to now.
I can relate to your points… I wish they focused more on improving current featuers than coding or implementing/forking new features. Im still statisfied as it works quite well for me but its frustrating that the mail client is laggy and Sync does not work properly. Altough not a dealbreaker for me - it can be frustrating. I still hold hope that the project progresses and I have no reason to assume otherwise as it came quite far since I joined (2021). When I subjected myself to it I knew fully well the risks of something breaking or not working and was and am still willing to take it. But still, I hope they pick up your points and focus more on it as they are important topics.
Just what is the alternative?
If google is there, and associates, or similar big tech, you are surveilled, and that means controlled, if you didn’t know.
I see nowhere else in the internet where people in the know are doing something like these guys are doing.
It must be hard work, too many obstacles to overcome. But I think it’s the only way.
I admit (even as someone who loves e/OS) that the Murena Cloud really isn’t a masterpiece and the mail connection didn’t satisfy me either.
But since I’ve been using the Proton suite (ProtonMail, ProtonCalendar, ProtonDrive, ProtonPass and ProtonVPN) on my Murena FP5, I’m quite happy again.
Although the options are limited compared to Nextcloud, the tasks that are essential for me work perfectly - including photo synchronization.
I had already parted ways with the Murena cloud some time ago and have now started a new attempt - which I canceled today because it is actually too buggy for me.
But I wouldn’t give my beloved e/OS Murena phone back - I see every day on my business Samsung Android phone what kind of impositions you get into with all that Google junk plus Samsung bloatware!
My question was very honest. As most of /e/os users, I try to pay attention to what the “privacy market” offers and I couldn’t find, until know, anything better than /e/os.
From Murena Cloud I only use Contact Sync feature, not files, notes or pictures.
I recognize that not everything is perfect in /e/os but, until now, I couldn’t find anything better and I’ve been using /e/os as my daily driver since 2020.
Daily driver here too for the last 3-4 years. Hopefully my original post didn’t come off hyperbolic. /e/ was the only thing that offered something similar to GApps, I had tried other solutions and OS’s before finding & using /e/. I think it has lots of potential, and I wished it fully lived up to what it promised. Maybe one day…maybe something else that is better funded will come around and eclipse them altogether. I think the market/demand is going to keep growing.
It is funny/sad that quite a few of us are using non-/e/ solutions and workarounds. I am planning on using a different privacy email service, another degoogled OS for the phone, and an off the shelf cloud solution I already use for large amounts of data shuffling. Is it ideal? Hell no, but honestly, it is really no worse than the compromises I’ve made with using /e/…that is, having to mitigate tracking/privacy issues as much as possible, where there’s no 100% effective way to eliminate them altogether. (At least for me)
As a FP5 + /e/os + proton user I completely agree, it is a really easy combination and has let me switch away from Apple’s ecosystem reasonably painlessly. It’s a shame to read that murena’s cloud service is a little less reliable.
Don’t have much to add but wanted to chime in on Proton. Funnely enough I use Proton as well but mostly for E-Mail that are not quite as sensitive since I rely on its better spam-filter. I think too that it can make a good replacement, although I find murena a bit more communicative (which I find good).
In the end its probably a matter of personal preference and how much value a stable experience has in your risk-reward equation. In the end, life is just balancing various interests
I hope Murena can one day be something similar to Proton. Just working without many hassles. It has such a good foundation with /e/. Lets hope, they will focus on the cloud aspects more in 2024.
I personnally think it’s easy to forget how hard it is to develop and maintain an OS for 200+ smartphones and at the same time propose an entire environment with cloud and email. And all this with only a team of about 40 ppl. Who else proposes that kind of stuff in the degoogle market?
So thank you /e/ team, I’m not done yet with you so keep up the good work
It is reasonable to expect things working. However you cannot expect the power of google and MS (paid by government=tax=people to surveil the people) and the same time for free.
E is a small group, with no money and you talk about the cloud server. Something that is really not the focus as you are already noticed. Complaining on high level in my opinion. Expect less and you will be happier.
I couldn’t agree more. I have a 20 GB paid account and so far so good. There’s been problems with file and foto sync but I also keep a local backup… because you never know.
I’ve been using /e/OS as my daily driver since 0.18 on a few different devices. Yes, there’s been tough times but the few apps I need work flawlessly. Just my two cents
But in terms of all the custom firmware packs nothing comes close to e-OS install and not worry with yes added cloud account. No other “secure” firmware has this feature out of the box.
So not complaining, yes its down sometimes but still suits my needs.
Sorry to hear, but I am very happy for several months now with e/OS on a Teracube 2e. Since the Murena mail client does not support exchange servers I use bluemail without any problems, calendar and all mail folders are reliably synchronized.
The only issue is a slightly disordered arrangement of pictures in the image gallery.
I use a private cloud with owncloud, no problems at all, synchronization works perfectly.
So keep going, maybe we should really focus on the OS, which is very reliable.
