FOSS launcher options?

nerdschleife@lemm.ee to Android@lemmy.ml – 48 points –

I really like the simple, stock - ish layout on my home screen, which rules out a few popular suggestions like Niagara.

  • I liked Lawnchair, but development is dead. Even the new alpha hasn't been updated in a year or more, and is missing features.

  • Neo Launcher perhaps came close to being the most ideal, but it is buggy as hell and also hasn't been updated in a year

  • Nova is what I'm using now, but I hate that it does not remember the drawer groups for each app once they're reinstalled. I work as an app tester and having to sort work apps manually every time drives me up the wall

Does anyone here have any suggestions?

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I've been using neo launcher since nova was sold. What kind of bugs have you encountered?

Every UI setup change needs a launcher restart to take effect

I think I've run into this bug a couple of times. For some reason, the grid can become unaligned and I'd have to restart the launcher from the advanced options to fix it. I wish development was faster but that's how open source goes sometimes.

I have had the chance to use it on a few different devices and ROMs. Been with it since before name change.

Performance, especially bugginess is highly variable. I don't know if it's the phone, the ROM, other apps, settings or what. Sometimes it is smooth and you forget its there. other times it is crashing every 5 mins, sometimes without being fully recoverable. Like on a certain set up my widgets would disappear when it crashed and widgets aren't in the backup so you have to redo them from scratch.

If it doesn't work on you current device just don't give up on it and whenever you get a new one give it a spin again.