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Would you like a browser to be available for your XC40 on Google Play?

A browser for the XC40?

1757 Views 32 Replies 13 Participants Last post by  Xc40forumuser
No browser is available on Google Play for the XC40 Recharge. I suspect that is true for any Volvo. Polestar has offered Vivaldi for a while, and I’ve read that it is quite capable as a browser. It makes sense for a connected car with a nice center console to have a browser - and even if it is not as large as the Polestar screen, the XC40’s center console could fit a browser without any problem.

Starting this thread to see if anyone has heard from Volvo whether a browser (Vivaldi, Chrome, or other) is going to be added anytime soon, or otherwise found reasonable DIY ways of installing a browser.

Would also be good to see who agrees/disagrees that a browser would be a good app to add to add.
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Hi Paolo, in Europe you benefit from the truly adaptive pixels. In the US and Canada, the functionality has been toned down considerable because of differences in regulation. High beams turn on/off automatically, but the truly adaptive feature (pixels turning off to block the light for incoming cars) has been disabled.
Just an FYI - it's possible to enable the adaptive Pixel functionality on North American cars using OrBit.
Are you sure any Android app can be simply rebuild for AAOS ?
You are not rebuilding it, Firefox is open source so the source code is provided online. You just build it yourself and publish your app to your dev account. You can't publish it to the playstore cause it won't pass Googles checks but they allow anything for your own private dev builds.

You can only do this with Firefox as it's the only open-source android browser I know of.
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I've done the same - here's a slightly more in depth post: Help sideload apps Polestar 2
Very interesting, they mention needing the Polestart SDK which may not work with Volvo, but I've seen a Volvo SDK available so guess that's doable.

Ok got the SDK installed and running the Volvo Emulator now. Lets see what apps I can port. Won't have time to look into it until this weekend.
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It's a fair concern, but at the same time polestar already has it and there's really no drive related functions that could be "hacked" from the infotainment. Except, one pedal drive.
Just because you can’t adjust it from settings doesn’t mean that it can’t be accessed. Don’t know if you looked in on the conversation about the tool to adjust the pixel matrix lighting, but there’s a company that has built an app that allows the user to access the car via the OBD dongle in the same way that Volvo’s VIDA tool does. As you may know, Volvo refuses to support dongle access, so things like ABRP have limited use in our cars, while Polestar has allowed an embedded version on theirs. I spent many years working for a government organization that takes security very seriously. I don’t pretend to be an expert, but I built my share of systems protecting sensitive assets, vetted by national security people who were. I’d hope that the Google AAOS is to some extent ‘stovepiped’ from critical safety features in the stop and go bits of the car, but for me at least, an Internet browser - an I/O interface, is a potential threat if someone can load malicious code into it. Maybe I’m old school and paranoid, but I feel more comfortable physically separating something I don’t entirely trust like a browser from my car’s computer systems. Perhaps as their platform become more robust, Volvo may relent, so we’ll have to wait and see. As for Tubi, isn’t that a video streaming app?
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Just an FYI - it's possible to enable the adaptive Pixel functionality on North American cars using OrBit.
Well that's tempting. I'm pretty annoyed that the functionality exists on non-US cars, and it was made legal in the US a year ago, but they haven't turned it on for us.
Well that's tempting. I'm pretty annoyed that the functionality exists on non-US cars, and it was made legal in the US a year ago, but they haven't turned it on for us.
My (limited) understanding is while adaptive high-beams have been legalized, the testing requirements are still being worked through. So I suppose it's theoretically possible the "current" versions of Pixels may not meet the "TBD" test requirements.
Just an FYI - it's possible to enable the adaptive Pixel functionality on North American cars using OrBit.
Oh yes, I’m aware. I’m giving Volvo until version 3.0 to enable adaptive headlights (because I’m an optimist), then OrBit it will be!
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No browser is available on Google Play for the XC40 Recharge. I suspect that is true for any Volvo. Polestar has offered Vivaldi for a while, and I’ve read that it is quite capable as a browser. It makes sense for a connected car with a nice center console to have a browser - and even if it is not as large as the Polestar screen, the XC40’s center console could fit a browser without any problem.

Starting this thread to see if anyone has heard from Volvo whether a browser (Vivaldi, Chrome, or other) is going to be added anytime soon, or otherwise found reasonable DIY ways of installing a browser.

Would also be good to see who agrees/disagrees that a browser would be a good app to add to add.
Chrome is a natural as it's already Google but I have Google so many places every time I have to change my password that includes in my car!!!!! THAT needs to be addressed!
When you said Volvo made apps available that do video streaming, do you mean they are available now or there were at some point in time but been removed since then?
Tubi and MGM+ (formerly EPIX+) are available for video streaming.
Tubi and MGM+ (formerly EPIX+) are available for video streaming.
Well, not on my French C40. :)
Very interesting, they mention needing the Polestart SDK which may not work with Volvo, but I've seen a Volvo SDK available so guess that's doable.

Ok got the SDK installed and running the Volvo Emulator now. Lets see what apps I can port. Won't have time to look into it until this weekend.
I got the game 2048 to build and launch on the Volvo Emulator, that was surprisingly simple. But spent 5 hours trying to publish the app on Google Play (as a test app), still no go. Not sure I will keep going. Plans to go talk to Lexus this week, want to get rid of the XC40 R. So I don't see why I would spend time porting some app on the Volvo. A guy ported Firefox on Polestart. So now that seems possible for the Volvo as well.

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I got the game 2048 to build and launch on the Volvo Emulator, that was surprisingly simple. But spent 5 hours trying to publish the app on Google Play (as a test app), still no go. Not sure I will keep going. Plans to go talk to Lexus this week, want to get rid of the XC40 R. So I don't see why I would spend time porting some app on the Volvo. A guy ported Firefox on Polestart. So now that seems possible for the Volvo as well.
Nice job. Over the weekend I was able to compile Firefox, which did run on the Volvo emulator. Unfortunately (?), an important piece of "publishing" to the Play store testing environment requires renaming the package. My "test" laptop was not able to do so within Android Studio given memory constraints (the Firefox source is pretty large!). Going go try again later but bump the JVM heap size to something meaningfully higher.
Nice job. Over the weekend I was able to compile Firefox, which did run on the Volvo emulator. Unfortunately (?), an important piece of "publishing" to the Play store testing environment requires renaming the package. My "test" laptop was not able to do so within Android Studio given memory constraints (the Firefox source is pretty large!). Going go try again later but bump the JVM heap size to something meaningfully higher.
I believe you can just change the name in the gradle file or something like that than build.
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