No offense but it shows you haven't actually used one. By default any notifications on the phone are locked down. I can see I got a text message but I can't see the info. If I look at the phone it shows who the text is from and the contents of the text (or whatever notification we're talking about). If I swipe up I can use the phone. This experience is so far above and beyond anything google has offered to date I don't even know where to begin.
Google is so far behind on faceID it's laughable. And this is coming from someone who switched from an iPhone 6 to a Pixel and stuck with google all the way until the Pixel 4. Sorry - the hardware is getting worse, not better. And the spying/data collection has become too much. When you've got a CIO that says he'd let any house guest know he's got devices recording them and would suggest anyone that has google devices in their house do the same - you lost me.
> This experience is so far above and beyond anything google has offered to date I don't even know where to begin.
I know about notifications being hidden when locked and expanded/shown only when you unlock. On Android, you can hide notification details from certain apps and show the details for others. For some apps I am okay to not worry about seeing the details of the notifications without unlocking the device. I don't unlock my phone to only see notifications, I have disabled most of the notifications and I unlock to do something actively. So more often than not, I want to get there without an extra step. So having an option there is the right thing. Pixel phone also gave an option do either - go to home screen or just show notifications.
> Google is so far behind on faceID it's laughable
I actually hate FaceID and like fingerprint unlock better so I don't really care about that. But by so far behind, you mean not caring if the eyes are open, sure they are far behind.
> the hardware is getting worse, not better
I didn't use P1 or P2 and jumped on P3 from 6P, I like it and didn't feel the hardware got worse. P4 battery life is bad (to say the least) but P4XL doesn't seem to have those issues.
You brought up other issues with Android/Pixel but conveniently forgot to respond how iOS is crippling options itself. Don't even want to start with all browsers being wrappers of Safari.
>I actually hate FaceID and like fingerprint unlock better so I don't really care about that. But by so far behind, you mean not caring if the eyes are open, sure they are far behind.
I guess it doesn't really matter if you prefer touch unlock, it's gone from the Pixel 4 with no signs of ever coming back. But with a really, REALLY bad implementation. Oh, someone can murder me and unlock my $1,000+ phone? Solid decision by that product manager...
>You brought up other issues with Android/Pixel but conveniently forgot to respond how iOS is crippling options itself. Don't even want to start with all browsers being wrappers of Safari.
I'm more than happy to give up a little choice in exchange for not having every aspect of my life uploaded to google's servers with a promise they won't do anything I don't like with it.
> I'm more than happy to give up a little choice in exchange for not having every aspect of my life uploaded to google's servers with a promise they won't do anything I don't like with it.
Android is the platform that gives you some actual control over this. Buy a Pixel, trivial bootloader unlock, and then install Replicant [0] or any of the several other privacy-first ROMs.
If you don't want to go that far, you can replace Google's proprietary APIs/system services with components from MicroG [1]. There are many implementations of the location APIs that can be configured to ping back to a personal server or log to a local file rather than submitting the data to Google, for example. Pull up F-Droid and they're all over the place.
If you want to stop an app from talking to the outside world, get NetGuard (100% free software, buy the pro version instead of chickening out and building it yourself to save 8 bucks) or AFWall+. These are advanced apps that allow users to control and monitor network activity closely, applying rules that allow/disallow network access at given times or on given connections (e.g., "never let Signal use my work's wifi network"), reports consumption, and even allows the user to collect pcaps.
There are many similar options for all kinds of things on Android. I admit that I have never used an iOS device full-time, but it's always because every time I consider it and start to do any of the basic research to see if any of this is tenable, the answer is always an immediate and loud "no, Daddy Apple wouldn't let anything bad happen, so all of that is silly". Please let me know if things have changed.
The point is that it's your choice how much you're going to disclose/transfer on [unlockable] Android hardware. On an iPhone, you are stuck with "Apple knows best". If you actually care about control of your data, it seems you'd prefer the platform that gives you control over it, rather than the one that just says "Hey, we're not as bad as Google, so you can trust us!"
Google is so far behind on faceID it's laughable. And this is coming from someone who switched from an iPhone 6 to a Pixel and stuck with google all the way until the Pixel 4. Sorry - the hardware is getting worse, not better. And the spying/data collection has become too much. When you've got a CIO that says he'd let any house guest know he's got devices recording them and would suggest anyone that has google devices in their house do the same - you lost me.