Could you outline what kind of problems you had with android and integration? In my experience android is the superior platform for plugging in your own modules and your own data where you want it.
The way you describe it; I would agree. You can "do anything" on Android, but this leads to poor implementations for common things.
What I'm referencing is that the OS and Apples own applications are built to support what I would be consider very sane defaults (as in, it supports me doing my own thing, without the need for plugins/modules).
My experience is that on Android I had to have many third-party integrators to get things up and working, and they were very poor quality and would run in the background murdering my battery life. (and I had to pay for it: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=at.bitfire.dav...)
IMAP/SMTP Were less of a problem but it always /felt/ very third party when using tools for that purpose, where google mail was truly first class. On iOS I don't feel this way at all, once I had push notifications set up the experience was identical (if not a little better with my own server due to apples SMTP servers getting overloaded).
So, you're right when you say that Android is more modular and supports stronger composibility of the system. But the experience of actually using it is so incredibly poor that even with Apple doing it's bullshit (no small phones, no headphone jack, protruding camera) I have very little inclination to go back- the "feeling" I get is that it's funnelling me to third parties, whether it be google or samsungs awful "samsung cloud ecosystem"
> My experience is that on Android I had to have many third-party integrators to get things up and working
That you have to buy/install CalDAV AND CardDAV connectors is indeed a weird shortcoming of Android. On the flip-side you had the option to do so.
Also, in the age of everything-SaaS, a one time payment of $10 for basic infrastructure isn’t all that bad.
> IMAP/SMTP Were less of a problem but it always /felt/ very third party when using tools for that purpose, where google mail was truly first class.
What Email app did you use? Gmail (which obviously treats Gmail better) or something else?
> But the experience of actually using it is so incredibly poor
Different strokes to different folks I guess.
I never experienced Android to be that different (or worse) when using my own standards-based providers.
That said iOS feels a lot more coherent if you stick to Apple apps all the way. But not being able to set another default browser or email client is just weird.
> That said iOS feels a lot more coherent if you stick to Apple apps all the way. But not being able to set another default browser or email client is just weird.
in this, we agree.
> What Email app did you use? Gmail (which obviously treats Gmail better) or something else?
Samsung mail, I couldn't find any decent alternatives, maybe this is my shortcoming for not knowing what is available?
>Also, in the age of everything-SaaS, a one time payment of $10 for basic infrastructure isn’t all that bad.
Except I'm paying to use a connector to use /my/ infrastructure. But, I don't mind paying for software, so long as it's good and well integrated. DavDroid was half decent, worth the money if you consider the effort involved, but not "good".
