Has lack of 3rd party "official roms" changed much?

Snow_fox · Jul 9, 2014

So generally speaking I've always stuck to sister phones of nexus devices. My Samsung Captivate was sorta the "nexus with an SD card" in terms of being identical to the Nexus S, the LG Optimus G was "4g + SD Card Nexus" and I never really had any problems running roms with the latest version of Android. Running nightlys and experimental software wasn't such a big deal because it allowed me to keep my phone up to date long after it would have been updated otherwise.

The general lack of desire to stand behind the stability of a particular version coupled with a general lack of "stable" releases kinda has me jaded when I can just keep rolling with the newest version of Android officially.

It has made me wonder if there are any "stable rolling release" versions of roms? Like "here is the stable rolling release, once a week we push the latest stable versions and features from our nightles over the last month!" Letting those who want to try the newest upgrades immediately have nightly and letting people who want the latest version of android with more tweaks get the version that suits them the most?

Edit: I'm not really asking for specific ROM recommendations so much as ROM trends in general.

danarama · Jul 9, 2014

Many AOSP roms do this.. We can't recommend Roma to you because those comparisons are against the rules but the ROM I use (slim) has weekly builds and then a monthly stable.

The stable has a code freeze a while before release to extend testing to ensure it is stable but the weeklies are stable too.

The devs also post personal test builds in between the weeklies for those who want to test particular new functions.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

Snow_fox · Jul 9, 2014

rootSU said:
Many AOSP roms do this.. We can't recommend Roma to you because those comparisons are against the rules but the ROM I use (slim) has weekly builds and then a monthly stable.

The stable has a code freeze a while before release to extend testing to ensure it is stable but the weeklies are stable too.

The devs also post personal test builds in between the weeklies for those who want to test particular new functions.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

My mistake I should have phrased the original thread more carefully and I'll edit it after this.

I was more looking at general ROM trends as opposed to looking for a specific ROM.

danarama · Jul 9, 2014

Many AOSP roms do this

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simms22 · Jul 9, 2014

Snow_fox said:
So generally speaking I've always stuck to sister phones of nexus devices. My Samsung Captivate was sorta the "nexus with an SD card" in terms of being identical to the Nexus S, the LG Optimus G was "4g + SD Card Nexus" and I never really had any problems running roms with the latest version of Android. Running nightlys and experimental software wasn't such a big deal because it allowed me to keep my phone up to date long after it would have been updated otherwise.

The general lack of desire to stand behind the stability of a particular version coupled with a general lack of "stable" releases kinda has me jaded when I can just keep rolling with the newest version of Android officially.

It has made me wonder if there are any "stable rolling release" versions of roms? Like "here is the stable rolling release, once a week we push the latest stable versions and features from our nightles over the last month!" Letting those who want to try the newest upgrades immediately have nightly and letting people who want the latest version of android with more tweaks get the version that suits them the most?

Edit: I'm not really asking for specific ROM recommendations so much as ROM trends in general.

your "sister" phones in reality have nothing to do with the nexus, and are not similar. the only similarities they have is using the same kind of cpu, but tweaked completely differently. maybe the same screens as well. all the other internals are completely different. completely different as in your "sister" phones are nothing like their nexus counterparts. so unlike nexus, that i would never call them a "sister" phone.

and there are many completely stable aosp roms out there for the n5.

jsgraphicart · Jul 9, 2014

I really don't see a point in releasing "Stable Releases" with a nexus device. With a Nexus device, the whole source is there for developers and the device is fully unlocked. So most likely, if a dev knows what they are doing, there shouldn't be very many bugs, if any at all. It would be mainly feature additions and whatever else the dev wants to add.

Now with Non Nexus devices, it's a little harder to get EVERYTHING working since the devices are usually locked down and all. So "Stable releases" are kind of a bigger deal.

That's my view on it anyway.

gamer.11 · Jul 9, 2014

the thing about android is that someone somewhere is finding something new everyday, and waiting around for the release of monthly releases of roms kinda puts the users off("ohh active notifications!" "wow heads up notification" "can i get the <insert fancy OEM specific feature here> in my device?"). I for one, coming from an XMP which had rom's being updated once every two week found it hard in the N5 community where the nightlies where more common.

The thing is you have to keep changing fast and there is always room for improvement so there can never be a "stable" version just short term triumphs.

Elluel · Jul 9, 2014

The thing is, there isn't much need for "stable" builds anymore, the nightlies for most ROMs are really stable and daily driver capable (of course sometimes something doesn't work right here and there, but generally). Some have Delta updates too so you don't need to flash the entire ROM over each nightly, kind of like daily OTAs.

Snow_fox · Jul 9, 2014

jsgraphicart said:
I really don't see a point in releasing "Stable Releases" with a nexus device. With a Nexus device, the whole source is there for developers and the device is fully unlocked. So most likely, if a dev knows what they are doing, there shouldn't be very many bugs, if any at all. It would be mainly feature additions and whatever else the dev wants to add.

Now with Non Nexus devices, it's a little harder to get EVERYTHING working since the devices are usually locked down and all. So "Stable releases" are kind of a bigger deal.

That's my view on it anyway.

Out of curiosity is the same true for the Play edition devices? With that said I was thinking about ROMs in general not ROMs specific to devices. I'd also argue (having worked QA professionally) the need to check new features added ranges drastically depending on what you want to add to the device.

gamer.11 said:
the thing about android is that someone somewhere is finding something new everyday, and waiting around for the release of monthly releases of roms kinda puts the users off("ohh active notifications!" "wow heads up notification" "can i get the <insert fancy OEM specific feature here> in my device?"). I for one, coming from an XMP which had rom's being updated once every two week found it hard in the N5 community where the nightlies where more common.
The thing is you have to keep changing fast and there is always room for improvement so there can never be a "stable" version just short term triumphs.

As someone who loves new features I find the "additives" as great. I've also found just having the latest version of Android with a working stable feature set is pretty cool too.

Lethargy said:
The thing is, there isn't much need for "stable" builds anymore, the nightlies for most ROMs are really stable and daily driver capable (of course sometimes something doesn't work right here and there, but generally). Some have Delta updates too so you don't need to flash the entire ROM over each nightly, kind of like daily OTAs.

I might look into the Delta Updates. There are a few things I do miss about ROMs such as being able to close all active windows and stuff. I just don't miss how some ROMs basically were just a conglomeration of shoving as much stuff into one ROM as possible regardless of how it ended up.

Elluel · Jul 9, 2014

Snow_fox said:
Out of curiosity is the same true for the Play edition devices? With that said I was thinking about ROMs in general not ROMs specific to devices. I'd also argue (having worked QA professionally) the need to check new features added ranges drastically depending on what you want to add to the device.

Google Play Edition devices aren't the same as Nexus devices, they just use a more "AOSP-like" ROM that doesn't have the respective OEM skin on top of it. Not sure if bootloader unlocking process is different (Nexus devices have fastboot oem unlock) but the stock ROM on them still has some parts of the OEM framework underneath (like double tap to wake and duo camera editing on HTC One M8). The Nexus 5 is more popular then Google Play Edition devices and which is why it subsequently has more developer support.

Snow_fox · Jul 9, 2014

Lethargy said:
Google Play Edition devices aren't the same as Nexus devices, they just use a more "AOSP-like" ROM that doesn't have the respective OEM skin on top of it. Not sure if bootloader unlocking process is different (Nexus devices have fastboot oem unlock) but the stock ROM on them still has some parts of the OEM framework underneath (like double tap to wake and duo camera editing on HTC One M8). The Nexus 5 is more popular then Google Play Edition devices and which is why it subsequently has more developer support.

This makes sense. I didn't know if the Play Edition devices still had OEM fragments or if they were as free as the Nexus series.

danarama · Jul 9, 2014

Heavy oem frameworks

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raptir · Jul 9, 2014

To be fair, there was a pretty significant gap between 4.2 releasing on the Nexus 4 and Cyanogenmod releasing 10.2 stable. As mentioned though, many of the ROMs have released stable versions and those that haven't are still fairly stable despite not having an "official" stable release.

I will say that I'm less likely to stick with a ROM despite bugs on Nexus devices than on other devices for two main reasons. With other devices, you're often getting rid of a manufacturer skin (so it's a completely different interface, instead of just having some tweaks) or you're moving up an Android version early.

danarama · Jul 9, 2014

Its worth pointing out that some devs only call their last ever release "stable" when they absolutely won't add or change anything again.

I think it's too easy to get wrapped up in the terminology and not appreciate the development we have

What a stable release means to 1 dev, means something else to another.

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simms22 · Jul 9, 2014

nearly every single ROM that I've ever used that has been titled "stable", has been less stable then the regular builds. especially with cm. a real ROM is neither called " stable" nor "experimental", its just called by its name and released. people add the word "stable" to them just to trick a few into a few more downloads.

JohnnyHempseed · Jul 10, 2014

There number of quotation marks in here is too damn high.

danarama · Jul 10, 2014

For good reason...

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Has lack of 3rd party "official roms" changed much?

Snow_fox

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danarama

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Snow_fox

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danarama

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simms22

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jsgraphicart

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gamer.11

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Snow_fox

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danarama

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raptir

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simms22

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