Hey Proton how about you quit privacy-washing and actually prioritize and release feature parity products for Linux so your customers aren't being herded onto windows' data harvesting platform just so they can use your supposedly privacy forward products
I don't use proton so forgive me if this is a stupid question...
But do you need an app? Can't you just use whatever browser you want for their services?
Of course you can access everything through the web on Linux. I really like Proton's web mail interface. Unfortunately, Proton does not have a Linux analog to their windows client that provides automatic file syncing. I think that what the commenter is complaining about.
There is a dedicated Linux client for Proton VPN and in my experience it integrates quite well on Debian-based distributions.
Also, there's Thunderbird if you NEED a fat client for your email. Except Proton's strength is where the service is located and the security of access. Having a full copy locally on your system kind of defeats that.
If you have properly implemented LUKS I don't see any reason that should be a concern.
Unless you also employ very strict sandboxing, a rogue app or script could read those emails from your running system while LUKS is unlocked. There are plenty of CVEs relating to code execution; an infected JPEG, browser exploit, or any number of other things could expose your Thunderbird email database or the running memory to an attacker, particularly if you use "secure" services like Proton because you're the kind of person who would be targeted by state actors.
You need a special app that they call a "bridge" because Proton doesn't support normal IMAP and SMTP, so you have to use the bridge to be able to use normal email clients.
But they are now porting their webmail as a cross-platform desktop Electron app, after which they'll just likely discontinue the bridge "for safety". And so this issue will become moot.
I'm grateful you put "for safety" in quotes there. That's definitely bullshit talk. I'm further grateful that I just self-host my email. I can skip the bullshit of companies making random decisions that are ultimately against my wishes.
The Linux Experiment recently interviewed the CEO who answered this question.
Basically it's the same as anything else. Linux requires more effort to code for due to its variety of distributions, and has a significantly smaller userbase.
In short, don't blame Proton, blame the (lack of) users.
That's a bullshit excuse. Looks at Arch's AUR. Look at Gentoo's guru. What happens for proprietary stuff is a deb or rpm package is downloaded, extracted and files copies where they should be. That's it. And it works, because the cornerstone of the system is libc and the kernel. And these, for the overwhelming majority of applications, behave exactly the same on all distros.
I mean, can’t you just package your app in flatpack or even snap? Bam, your app works on 99% of distributions for little effort. That’s what Spotify does, and I’d argue they have even less incentive to support Linux than proton does
Sure, as long as you don't need any integration with other software, don't need arbitrary IPC, and actually keep some dependencies in line with some common denominator because there's only so much you can do with static linking (oh excuse me, distributing the shared libraries in the same package as your binaries as if it's a new thing) once it reach the "program must actually run" part.
Flatpack and every other similar solution that are described as "works everywhere" always come with a heck of limitations.
He also answered this claim, it is right for apps that aren't stuff like Proton VPN that can't work in a sandboxed environment. They are working on it iirc
Screw VPNs, give us everything else!
I don't know, I'm not a developer. Lots of companies don't make their products available on Linux, most cite similar reasoning, so it's unsurprising. But I agree it's disappointing. I really wish Linux was more user-friendly.
Spoken like someone who has never developed a app package
I think the bigger issue is the variety of distros that end up not being compatible. Even if you overall have a lot of Linux users if they, for the sake of argument, distribute evenly between all distros then it's still a lot of effort to code. The only difference is that the argument will change from "Linux has a small userbase" to "Distribution X has a small userbase".
Linux doesn't just need more users to be worthwhile to develop for, it also needs a distro agnostic solution to run software. That or significantly reducing (or streamlining) the amount of distros so the developers would have far less configurations to account for.
Flatpaks and nix packages work on pretty much every distro.
I finally said screw it and am leaving Proton for a proper paid service. I never upgraded Proton to a paid tier because it never matured enough for me to use for real. I never once migrated contacts over to it (just a couple people who understood I was testing it).
Yea, so there's a connection to my credit card. At least it's with a professional org that has proper modern mail management (something post-2000), and gives you tools to manage your email.
I really wanted Proton to work out so I could recommend it to friends and family. But it's a terrible user experience. I missed 50 emails because it keeps moving them to spam even after I set the sender as not spam. Oh, and spam management requires (according to support) logging into the web, not thru the mobile client. 🤦♂️
Can you imagine telling a customer this with a straight face and not seeing a problem with it? I'm using your app and can't manage spam?
What service are you moving to? I'm curious of other alternatives.
Here's a good starting point. All of them are hosted in Europe and enjoy strong privacy protection as an extra bonus.
That sucks! I have never experienced any of these issues
I mean, this is the mail service whose own docs candidly state that their mobile app "sometimes doesn't work". 'Nuff said.
Don't worry, they're preparing to discontinue all their desktop-native apps in favor of webmail (and webmail running in Electron).
After which I expect they'll start squeezing their paying customers, since they won't be able to leave anymore. Or sell the company, get out with "clean hands" and a wad of cash, and let someone else do the squeezing.
Hey Proton how about you quit privacy-washing and actually prioritize and release feature parity products for Linux so your customers aren't being herded onto windows' data harvesting platform just so they can use your supposedly privacy forward products
I don't use proton so forgive me if this is a stupid question...
But do you need an app? Can't you just use whatever browser you want for their services?
Of course you can access everything through the web on Linux. I really like Proton's web mail interface. Unfortunately, Proton does not have a Linux analog to their windows client that provides automatic file syncing. I think that what the commenter is complaining about.
There is a dedicated Linux client for Proton VPN and in my experience it integrates quite well on Debian-based distributions.
Also, there's Thunderbird if you NEED a fat client for your email. Except Proton's strength is where the service is located and the security of access. Having a full copy locally on your system kind of defeats that.
If you have properly implemented LUKS I don't see any reason that should be a concern.
Unless you also employ very strict sandboxing, a rogue app or script could read those emails from your running system while LUKS is unlocked. There are plenty of CVEs relating to code execution; an infected JPEG, browser exploit, or any number of other things could expose your Thunderbird email database or the running memory to an attacker, particularly if you use "secure" services like Proton because you're the kind of person who would be targeted by state actors.
You need a special app that they call a "bridge" because Proton doesn't support normal IMAP and SMTP, so you have to use the bridge to be able to use normal email clients.
But they are now porting their webmail as a cross-platform desktop Electron app, after which they'll just likely discontinue the bridge "for safety". And so this issue will become moot.
I'm grateful you put "for safety" in quotes there. That's definitely bullshit talk. I'm further grateful that I just self-host my email. I can skip the bullshit of companies making random decisions that are ultimately against my wishes.
The Linux Experiment recently interviewed the CEO who answered this question.
Basically it's the same as anything else. Linux requires more effort to code for due to its variety of distributions, and has a significantly smaller userbase.
In short, don't blame Proton, blame the (lack of) users.
That's a bullshit excuse. Looks at Arch's AUR. Look at Gentoo's guru. What happens for proprietary stuff is a deb or rpm package is downloaded, extracted and files copies where they should be. That's it. And it works, because the cornerstone of the system is libc and the kernel. And these, for the overwhelming majority of applications, behave exactly the same on all distros.
I mean, can’t you just package your app in flatpack or even snap? Bam, your app works on 99% of distributions for little effort. That’s what Spotify does, and I’d argue they have even less incentive to support Linux than proton does
Sure, as long as you don't need any integration with other software, don't need arbitrary IPC, and actually keep some dependencies in line with some common denominator because there's only so much you can do with static linking (oh excuse me, distributing the shared libraries in the same package as your binaries as if it's a new thing) once it reach the "program must actually run" part.
Flatpack and every other similar solution that are described as "works everywhere" always come with a heck of limitations.
He also answered this claim, it is right for apps that aren't stuff like Proton VPN that can't work in a sandboxed environment. They are working on it iirc
Screw VPNs, give us everything else!
I don't know, I'm not a developer. Lots of companies don't make their products available on Linux, most cite similar reasoning, so it's unsurprising. But I agree it's disappointing. I really wish Linux was more user-friendly.
Spoken like someone who has never developed a app package
I think the bigger issue is the variety of distros that end up not being compatible. Even if you overall have a lot of Linux users if they, for the sake of argument, distribute evenly between all distros then it's still a lot of effort to code. The only difference is that the argument will change from "Linux has a small userbase" to "Distribution X has a small userbase".
Linux doesn't just need more users to be worthwhile to develop for, it also needs a distro agnostic solution to run software. That or significantly reducing (or streamlining) the amount of distros so the developers would have far less configurations to account for.
Flatpaks and nix packages work on pretty much every distro.
I finally said screw it and am leaving Proton for a proper paid service. I never upgraded Proton to a paid tier because it never matured enough for me to use for real. I never once migrated contacts over to it (just a couple people who understood I was testing it).
Yea, so there's a connection to my credit card. At least it's with a professional org that has proper modern mail management (something post-2000), and gives you tools to manage your email.
I really wanted Proton to work out so I could recommend it to friends and family. But it's a terrible user experience. I missed 50 emails because it keeps moving them to spam even after I set the sender as not spam. Oh, and spam management requires (according to support) logging into the web, not thru the mobile client. 🤦♂️
Can you imagine telling a customer this with a straight face and not seeing a problem with it? I'm using your app and can't manage spam?
What service are you moving to? I'm curious of other alternatives.
Here's a good starting point. All of them are hosted in Europe and enjoy strong privacy protection as an extra bonus.
https://european-alternatives.eu/category/email-providers
That sucks! I have never experienced any of these issues
I mean, this is the mail service whose own docs candidly state that their mobile app "sometimes doesn't work". 'Nuff said.
Don't worry, they're preparing to discontinue all their desktop-native apps in favor of webmail (and webmail running in Electron).
After which I expect they'll start squeezing their paying customers, since they won't be able to leave anymore. Or sell the company, get out with "clean hands" and a wad of cash, and let someone else do the squeezing.