F-Droid which is an open source alternative to Google Play that only contains FOSS (Free and Open Source Software) apps.
F-Droid utilizes something called repositories. The official repository is very strict about which apps can be included so you can add other repos to get more FOSS apps. Izzy's repo is a popular one.
If there are some apps that you can't replace with FOSS ones and need Google Play for that then you can just use Aurora Store. Aurora Store is a FOSS client to access Google Play without an account.
What are some of the FOSS apps you use and would recommend? Oh and how do we feel about a FOSS comm? Here is a request for one
yes. Install Aurora Store and then install Signal from there
edit: ah hold up, you mean by "google blocked" that you have no Google Play Services/gapps installed? or just that you're not signed into your google account etc
Yeah sorry I wasn't clear, I can install it no problem just from the downloaded apk, but then the initial sign-in thing says it's having problems with google play services and refuses to proceed.
I have 1e100 dot net etc firewalled so my phone can't talk to any of the google services and I feel like it would be incredibly counterproductive to unfirewall it for the sake of a "privacy" app
have you tried MicroG? p sure I used signal with microg but it's been a while since I had that set up
Oh that looks awesome, thanks!
MicroG has a repo for F-Droid btw and it's included in Aurora Droid