I think for those concerned, it might be however worth clarifying warranty v. sideloading clause, for example by providing a list of apps that are tested and officially claimed as ok to sideload without worrying about phone damage, warranty break or something. Can even stick to those which are tools (like Signal, WA, 2FA, etc.), and not brainrot drug openers (such as browsers?, social media apps etc.). @urszula
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@buiosu Weāve already posted about this back in OCTOBER.
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Gotcha!
I needed this because there were mixed signals circulating at some point:
While sideloading will not harm the device and any resulting issues can be resolved by restoring factory settings, it is not covered by the warranty. For example, if a sideloaded app causes unexpected battery drain or other performance issues, these would not qualify for warranty claims.
TL;DR sideloading does not void the warranty, just reset the phone. But rooting does void warranty
What might still be helpful for some (I donāt need that personally) is a list of field-proven apps - or the users simply could run a thread where OP would keep the first post updated based on othersā reviews of how certain apps perform. Yeah, that might be the best way to guide people who need to sideload something.
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@buiosu giving people a list of āsafeā apps is a slippery slope. There are just so many out there from different countries, it would be nearly impossible for one person (Iāve been uploading APKs to my Kompakt to check if they will work for our Mudita Community) to sideload apps to see if they are OK.
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Theoretically, Mudita could implement some kind of āApp Download Appā which could make verified APK files available. But it would be a big effort for the team, and personally, I would assume that anyone technology-savvy would be able to do the same with Aurora or Obsidian.
Signal, for example, can download its own updates if you use the APK file from their website (however, due to lack of Google Play services, thereāll be no push of messages). This will probably confuse users.
Currently, SMS is gradually replaced by RCS. It would be great if this could be fully implemented in Mudita Android. Even this āopen standardā will be a little tricky as Google hasnāt opensourced its RCS messaging app and also relies on Google Play etc. 
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So is it possible for me to update Signal directly via the Signal app itself?
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@s_micn I downloaded the Signal app directly from the Signal website.
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Exactly, as @urszula also mentioned, you can go on their website directly to get the .apk file. AFAIK it has a built-in self-update mechanism (Signal does not auto update Ā· Issue #11866 Ā· signalapp/Signal-Android Ā· GitHub). But still, as Google Firebase Messaging is missing on the Kompakt (part of Google Play Services), you do not get push messages.
As alternative, you could use Molly, an open-source implementation of Signal. It circumvents this limitation on devices without Google Play, by polling Signal servers. However at the price of modest battery usage: https://molly.im/
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Thats exactly what i want, checking for any updates twice a month is absolutely OK for me. And i donāt like notifications at all. Itās getting better and better.
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this is the reason i use molly on my de-googled phone. do you (or anyone here) know if it would somehow show notifications on the Kompakt (i would actually appreciate notifications in this case, similar to the ones for sms).
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