The current interface options are all going through telepathy-ofono, which works with group MMS messaging and attachments, but can't really handle attachments the right way because the telepathy IM framework itself has no notion of media messages (as mentioned at e.g. https://github.com/TelepathyIM/telepathy-morse/issues/21#iss...). Ubuntu Touch replaces MMSd with a Go rewrite called `nuntium` but still relies on telepathy-ofono for plumbing: http://docs.ubports.com/es/latest/systemdev/mms-infrastructu...
I think the right way to handle SMS+MMS, for now, would be to just write a dedicated GUI client for it that communicates with ofono MMSd via dbus. I'm thinking about doing it with Rust+GTK.
What do you need help with?
What is your opinion on the hardware and build quality between the two? The Librem 5 seems so expensive for the hardware it includes, but I also don't have a baseline for knowing what is reasonable (since comparing against Android device makers isn't fair).
My huge annoyance with my Librem 5 is that the Wifi Signal is terrible. I literally have to be within 5 ft of my Wifi AP to have even a useable signal. It won't work if there's any obstruction or if it's beyond 15 ft line of sight. I have tried all of the suggested fixes, but this is still a pervasive issue. I hope it's fixed in a later batch.
The Pinephone has much more of a plastic feel. I have a Google Pixel 3a, and half the time I have to do a double take to see which is which. But the build quality on that is very nice too.
If you have other questions, feel free to let me know!
Have you tried a variety of distributions on each phone? Is there one that runs better/worse on each? Is there one that works good on both?
It seems like there's a very friendly but intense arms race to get stuff working (which I think is awesome) :-)
On the Pinephone I tried a whole bunch at first, but i haven't done that in a while. So far the front runners for a useable phone seem to be Ubuntu Touch and PostmarketOS. I want to try Sailfish OS again, as that seems very tempting as well. But in either case, I like to see the diversity in the OSes for the Pinephone.
I've got my PinePhone early mostly to play with and to support the company, but I feel like it'll probably be at least a year before I'm confident in carrying it around as a daily driver.
Battery life will get there, as will apps I'm sure. The real killer feature will be when Android apps are runnable.
Probably the toughest thing to lose will be my bank's app... I was used to not having it when I was on Windows Mobile, but mobile check desposit has been really nice to have since I've been on my little iPhone lifeboat.
Don't get me wrong, I'm really excited about both projects! But in my area (east coast US), people tend to just assume that you can receive MMS/group texts, they'll send them to you without a second thought, and the idea that you might not receive them won't even be on their minds.
If a user complains that 'this commonly used feature no longer works,' it is never a solution to tell them they shouldn't use that feature.
It makes it even more difficult as so many of the OS and vendors advertise SMS and voice call support (which they have), so I have had to play the guessing game on a lot of the OSes that advertise SMS as working to discover this.
That being said, it is really exciting to see how far both have come, and I do think they both will be an awesome replacement to an Android phone sooner than later. Even more exciting is that they both are close to and will have mainline (EDIT: Mainline Linux) support, so they will be supported for a long time and not depend on a vendors willingness to support it.