I've been just not updating Nova as I haven't had a ton of time to research this, I really like the GUI, what are my privacy friendly/FOSS options for an android s21 5G?
Update:
Went with Neo launcher. It's got enough of the features that I'm willing to use it.
There are a few spots where padding can't be removed that is obnoxious, FF search bar and dock are what I have noticed so far.
I also don't like that I can't continuosly scroll through my home screens.
Its completely different. Cool for sure but completely uncomparable. Nova is a default launcher experience but customizable. Kvaesito has no app widgets and webapp support afaik, which was a nogo for me.
I keep using Nova as my nasty app, even on GrapheneOS. Would never use it with network permissions, and I also dont have other nasty apps installed
(apps can communicate how much they want, if both are coded to do it. If one has network permission, it can be used as a channel)
Fossify forked all the Simple Mobile Tools apps and are working on open source, free and ad-free apps with that as the foundation. They have published a few already, Launcher is in the pipeline:
https://github.com/FossifyOrg/Launcher
I haven't found one that I like as much. My biggest hangup, and this is probably dumb, is the ability to edit the icons for PWAs so they don't show the stupid browser icon that screams "I'm a web shortcut!!!". I tried Hermit as a PWA/lite app replacement and Android just slaps the hermit badge on it instead. For whatever reason that annoys me enough to stick with Nova.
Could shove it in a folder and then make the tap action open the first item in the folder, then set the folder icon to whatever your want. Disadvantage is that if it's already in a folder you can't do that because it would require nested folders
Not a bad idea. I get picky about aesthetics though. Dumb, I know. But I'll give it a try. Just seems silly to me that default launchers can't manage editing the dang app shortcuts
edit: Samsungs OneUI launcher does not put the badge on a PWA. But I'm not sure I trust them any more than Nova at this point....
Lawnchair hasn't had a release since 2018. I find it to be a bit buggy and sometimes won't redraw the home screens. This makes me need to force close the launcher from the settings. I usually clear the cache too, just to be safe.
Just tempering expectations for anyone else looking at it. If anyone knows of a fork that is more recent let me know. Maybe someone else is maintaining somewhere.
They actually kept developing it, with the last release in August 2022, and, even though those releases were tagged as Alpha, I've only had some (not more than a couple times a year) freezes with crash of the launcher since. Tested on two different phones with two different ROMs
I don't know if there's still someone developing it, but until something else just as good (for me) pops up, I'm sticking to Lawnchair
I really enjoy one called Discrete Launcher from fdroid. It's meant to be pretty minimalistic and does not support widgets from what I can tell, but you swipe up from the bottom with one finger for AppDrower and swipe down with one finger for a favorite spar at the top. But neither are shown normally, just your wallpaper. You can also program swipe left to open an app swipe right to open an app and several other gesture actions to open things or do things
Yeah I've been looking for an alternative to Nova myself. I've tried many but I just keep coming back for one reason or another.
.I have graphene os but the default launcher is a little too plain for me. The search continues I guess. I'll check some listed here that I haven't tried. Maybe lawnchair will be worth it when they put out a new release.