Quick feedback on Sailfish OS 4.4.0 "Vanha Rauma"
Jolla recently released Vanha Rauma to Early Access subscribers, here's my take after a day.
Vanha Rauma?
I didn't find an entry for "Vanha Rauma" in Wikipedia, but it is mentioned in
the Rauma, Finland page, and of
course has its own page on Wikipedia
Finland.
It is an "old wooden architecture of the city centre which is a UNESCO World
Heritage site".
Changes
Release notes are available here.
As usual, I'll list the most interesting changes/improvements, and will introduce a new section "What I like/don't like" further down below.
Stop Release
Yep, 4.4.0 is a Stop Release (meaning when you restore Sailfish OS on a device that was running 4.4, you won't have to upgrade say from SFOS 4 then 4.1 etc.)
Android App Support
- App launcher for e.g. Slack fixed (Slack's icon disappeared in 4.3, making it painful to launch it - you had to find it and launch it from Aurora Store, or tinker with desktop files)
- Video calls for Telegram/WhatsApp work over Wifi
- Updated to r62 security patch level
- Connectivity problems between 4G/Wifi fixed
Bluetooth
- Fixed issue with some headsets/car audio where making calls didn't work (no
sound/microphone)
- See "What I don't like" below, this comes with a caveat
- Bluetooth Secure Simple Pairing via NFC - I haven't tried yet, but it's
supposed to make pairing simpler
- Some users reported it doesn't work
Browser
- Firefox upgraded to ESR78!!! (instead of ESR60 previously)
Camera
- New filter: "Simple Colors"
- Include Greyscale, Sepia, Posterise, Whiteboard and Blackboard
Gallery
- Date scrollbar showing Year/Month when scrolling
- Launching a video from Gallery now includes media controls
Sandboxing
- Now enforced for all applications
- A notification appears upon first launch, asking for permissions
What I like/don't like
What I like
- Browser: it is faster, and the few websites that didn't work for me now work
flawlessly!
- Score on html5test.com: 495
- Calls using a Bluetooth headset (or car audio): this now works, cool!
- But see below in "What I don't like"
- Sending/receiving MMS now works!
- Not that I'm using it a lot, but sometimes I need it, especially with people who are only using WhatsApp (and not Telegram nor Signal) - since I have deleted my WhatsApp account, MMS is the only option (apart from email of course). So it's nice to have it back!
What I don't like
- Bluetooth Audio playback broken: it looks like the fix for Bluetooth calls has broken it - playing does nothing (I have opened a bug report on the Forums about it).
- As usual with a new SFOS release, especially an EA one, multiple apps don't
work, e.g.:
- Storeman
- Whisperfish (Native SFOS Signal client)
- ownKeepass cannot read from SD Card
Wrap Up
A nice update, not a huge leap forward, but nonetheless nice changes, mainly the Browser, but also other welcome fixes/additions.
As usual, install this EA release only if you know what you're doing, as it's meant to provide feedback to Jolla!
You can read the whole release notes page, to see more details.
Tags: SailfishOS