I know there are more important things in the world, but in case you happen to be thinking about getting a new smart phone, just know the #Google apps on the Pixel 3a are garbage, so you'll have to install, for instance, a file browser that isn't garbage.
@2ck I would recommend that you look into Fdroid.
@AmpBenzScientist thanks. I'm familiar with that. I'm merely lamenting Google's failure to make something as basic as a file browser not crappy. Like, I can't even get it to not autoplay videos - I can press a button if I want to play it! Stop interrupting my freaking podcast while I'm browsing files! jeez
@2ck Android is getting worse imo.
@AmpBenzScientist not just your opinion. my frustrations were motivated by an upgrade to v11. it messes with the parts of the UI I use most (media player, file manager, and notifications) but doesn't make them better: just different or worse.
@2ck I was referring to the "open" aspect of Android and developing for it.
@AmpBenzScientist ah. I don't know much about that. I tried making an Android app once, but found simple things too tedious to deal with for what I wanted to build.
@2ck If I recall correctly, the screen can be locked in one position in the code. Oddly enough this was an issue that turned me off of developing apps. I did make a couple of Android Apps but they were very simple as I saw it more as a waste of time.
@AmpBenzScientist I don't think that aspect of it was as much of a pain point for me. The one thing I recall is that I lost state in a really surprising way when the screen rotated. Viewing that attempt with experience I have now, I'm struck by how the Android app development process wants to give you (or fit you into) a framework when what I would have preferred was a library of objects that let do what I wanted. I think the latter is a more obvious way to present the system vs giving developers object "life cycles", so I'd be curious to know what motivated the construction they have. It's also possible I just had the wrong aspect of the interface and something closer to my ideal was already available.