For my birthday I recieved a wonderful Android based phone. This was a very nice upgrade from my old 1.5G CDMA clamshell. The only problem was that it was of the "with Google" variety, and as regular readers know I like to live [Google-free].

As this was a gift I had to wait a resonable amount of time before doing serious hacking on it and risking bricking the device. The first thing I did once enough time had paased, and I was fairly comfortable with the phone (and had upped it to Android 2.3), was to use super-one-click to root the phone. This was a huge joy as I could now run things like [Droidwall] and other utilities that required root access. After about another week of having root access and getting used to the deeper guts of the phone I decided it was time for a new recovery rom. After much reading to ensure that I'd not brick my device I installed the appropriate version of clockworkmod.

I can not stress strongly enough how nice having this recovery rom on my device is. It gave me the ability to completely back-up the phone which opened the door to my ultimate goal. Getting Google out of my phone!

The first thing I tried way Cyanogenmod but it seems that it is currently alergic to my specific model of phone (p500h). So I reverted to my clockworkmod saved backup and was none the worse for wear, other then still being stuck with Google.

As I had already used my root powers to remove some crappy bloat that came with the phone (Twitter app and Facebook app were the first to go). I reasoned that it should be possible to purge the Google apps in a similar manner. I tried with a few obvius examples (Gmail app and Maps) to see if anything broke. Nope. O.k. now I was excited. But what could be safely removed and what all was Google?

After more reading I came across the [Barebones] wiki entry which has a very nice chart as to what all is Google related and what can be safely removed. With this info in hand I started whole scale purge of the Google systems in my phone. (By this time I had several clockworkmod back-ups I could revert to if I nuked the phone.). It should be noted that due to my personal aversion to Google I was willing to loose certian functionality to get Google the hell off my phone. So everything Google went including the calendar app.

This left me with a [Google-free] phone but no maps, no contacts, no calendar, no market, no network location, etc. The contacts and calendar I was more then willing to loose. As I see it as a large privacy risk to be keeping such on my phone anyways. Maps I kinda regretted the lose of, as the phone has really nice GPS and it's just really handy to have that. Also due to my recent discoverry of Wyrd (see /Wyrd is Wonderful) I had a way to have appointment reminders come up on my phone (thanks to Yaxim).

I already knew about [Fdroid] so it was a simple matter of using things from there to replace things I had taken out. I was already using a lot of the apps from there as I like to support the FaiF communit anyways.

Here is a list of the apps from [Fdroid] and what they replace:

 yamix    -> gtalk (works great with my talkr.im account)
 osmand   -> maps/navigation 
 fdroid   -> market (all fiaf software)
 Slideme  -> market (not all FaiF but handy to have)
 mustard  -> g+/twiter (I use Identi.ca)
 zirco    -> browse (You can't  remove the browse app without breaking bookmarks etc but I refuse to use it)
 acal     -> For those with an online calendar and who want to access it form their phone

I don't use acal as I like my calendar to be text-centric (see /Wyrd is Wonderful). I use many of the other apps from [Fdroid]. One can have an extremely functional phone with the possible exception of contacts (I know that is huge to most people). For me I's not such a big thig as I prefer my contacts to not be on my cell. Also the contacts app will still work you just need an Exchange server or equivelent to sync it to. You could also install some other sync transport (there is a non-free ldap sync for android but I wouldn't use it (again my personal bias)).

From testing I have done with Droidwall logs there is currently no data going from my phone to Google. This makes me a very happy man. I will however do a full test via a packet capture set-up I made to see how leaky the Android device was (surprisingly little) (see /An Android Afternoon (when I get it posted)).

So, if you are willing to live by your principals. And want, like I do, to live Google-free it is possible to do with an Android phone. Even one running stock Android. Granted the skill required to get to that point is probably above the skill set of the average user. But then I'm guessing that most average users aren't as concerned as I with living [Google-free]

You may have noticed that I rather glossed over the steps reqired to do this. This is because I do not want this to be a howto. Partly because that would be a huge blog entry, and partly because I don't want some well meaning and overly enthusiastic person to brick their phone based on my instructions.

If you are going to do this Read Up!!! I can not stress that highly enough. Know what you are getting into, Know what the pitfalls are (dead phone is a real possibility). This is definitely not something that you should knock off in a single afternoon (unless you are one of those people that roots/and roms Android phones all the time).

If you are going to do this use every means at your disposal to back up the phone. And do so often during the proceedure. Test what you have done to be sure nothing you need broke (there is nothing worse then finding out that something is broken 5 steps after you broke it). I'm not saying don't do it. I'm saying don't do it if you don't know FOR SURE what you are doing and that you can reverse it if you have to. Don't e-mail me about broken phones. Consider yourself duely warned.

Now that I've said all that. Being free of Googles spying eyes is a wonderful thing. There is no reason people shouldn't be albe to enjoy their Android phone without Google. It should be noted that Google is not the only one spying on your Android phone. The Facebook app is known to be very generous about handing over your entire list of contacts. Stock andrid roms have Closed source firmwares in them and who the hell knows what those will do. In the USA many phones come with Carrier IQ spyware pre-installed which is exceedingly difficult to remove even when rooted. Just because your smartphone is Google free doesn't mean it isn't spying on you. (just so no one thinks that's waht I'm saying)

Happy Hacking!!!

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