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TIL about Android Translation Layer (ATL), a way to port Android apps to Linux Mobile (gitlab.com)
submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by to c/technology@lemmy.world
43 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

I was searching for YouTube clients on my KDE Plasma Bigscreen GNU/Linux TV box, and found NewPipe, a popular Android YouTube frontend. Turns out this tool is how they moved it over.

Great solution alongside projects like Waydroid, as you can post individual apps to Flathub or other Linux storefronts, rather than needing to install a whole ROM to get your Android apps to appear in your Linux app tray.

It doesn't work like Wine, but I suppose the goal one day is to be able to click .APK files to install like you can with .EXE files with Wine. Currently developers need to integrate it for their (or their favourite open source) apps to install on Linux.

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[–] 214 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (4 children)

With Google attempting to further lockdown Android, the time is ripe for Linux Mobile. Projects like this can help make it a viable alternative.

Thank you so much to everyone working on this!

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  • [–] 45 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    Was just gonna say this. I'm currently using GrapheneOS and am concerned about how long my pixel 8a will last with Google being such assholes. But if this app can solve the issue of not having android, then I'd definitely switch to a Linux phone (with further research of course).

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  • [–] 38 points 1 year ago (4 children)

    Graphene is working with a major phone Maker and will be releasing a Graphene compatible phone in 1-2 years

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  • [–] 13 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    I've heard, which would be mega awesome when it does come out. Maybe I wouldn't have to fight RCS so hard lol. Unfortunately this Pixel 8a I used is only a year old, so getting a new phone in 1-2 years seems like a waste. But if Google goes nuclear in a few years, it's either Graphene hardware, Linux phone, or dummy...

    I refuse to go back to Apple, and I didn't come to GrapheneOS just to go back to stock Android.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago

    I'm on a pixel 8 with GrpaheneOS and was hoping not to have to worry until 2027 or whenever the updates end. I would hope the devs at least consider a few years of updates for pixels after they release a me wphone but I guess time will tell.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Genuine question, how do you do banks and Netflix on your phone?

    Both apps and others with similar paranoia are my biggest hold ups for rooting or custom ROMs. And nope, laptop is not an option for me, I spend too many work hours on it.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago

    I don't use official streaming apps, I basically pirate everything on a Fire stick TV. Idk if anyone has reported issues with them on GOS. Some of my banking apps work, others don't. I just do the ones that don't work online in browser instead, I feel like it shouldn't be a problem tbh.

    If you need tap to pay/Google wallet then you unfortunately can't use GOS due to not being approved by Google or smth. Like SafetyNet issues or smth.

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  • [–] 10 points 1 year ago

    You should be fine on gOS for 6 yrs+, which is how long google promised to keep up with security updates. The device tree (think hardware drivers), which is what google removed with pixel 10 is what is causing grief, is already there for lower pixels. Unless, of course, google comes up with some new fuckery to invalidate the usability of the security updates (pray I don't alter the deal further...)

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  • [–] 9 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    I'm afraid with how insecure mobile networks are, modem manufacturers will never dare to open or document their mobile drivers to Linux. And we'll continue to be stuck in this perfectly controlled and planned scenario.

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  • [–] 6 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Ideally, the cellular modem just looks like a network device and usb sound card to the OS. Jail it as much as possible.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago

    also networks. on my network i can't use volte or 5g with a google pixel 5 because they did not "certify" that.

    They "certify" a handful of samsung + the iphones, no fairphone and they would absolutely never "certify" stuff like the pinephone, if they could i think they would even blacklist their whole IMEI range

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  • [–] 8 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    It would likely increase adoption of the OS on people's computers too.

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    • [–] 85 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    This would be a game changer, like how Steam brought games to Linux, that could bring mobile apps to Linux.

    I wish Linux mobile becomes a real option soon

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  • [–] [S] 19 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Steam could make this happen faster if more of their user base requested the ability to play (x86 compatible) Android games on their Deck.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago

    The Android dev kit includes a copy of QEMU that's set up to emulate ARM with a selection of popular screen sizes and revisions of the OS, so that you can test your app on a variety of 'potential phones' before you upload it to the marketplace. Snapdragons are amazingly performant CPUs for how gently they sip at the battery, but they're not that strong in the big scheme of things - any random x86 processor should be able to emulate them while using fifty times the power. A Steam deck ought to be able to do it; the request will then be 'we'd like to play Android games better', which to me is a much more reasonable ask.

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    • [–] 41 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    You can just open an apk file with this tool; apps don't need to be integrated with it. It's just that the implementation is far from complete and most apps will not work (correctly) right now.

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  • [–] [S] 12 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Oh good to know! If you've tried it with any specific apps this way, would love to hear which ones work well and in what ways.

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    • [–] 28 points 1 year ago

    Just to point out a potential misunderstanding: NewPipe devs did not use ATL to move it over, the developers of ATL chose NewPipe as the first app and extend the tool around getting more features of NewPipe to work

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    [–] 15 points 1 year ago

    I've been following this since the initial Newpipe Linux flatpak release. I find it more exciting than Waydroid even though Waydroid is way more functional today

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    [–] 15 points 1 year ago

    This is the way.

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    [–] 14 points 1 year ago

    I enjoy learning about this topic - I’m kinda tired of iOS/android os.

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    [–] 5 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    my Plasma Bigscreen Linux TV Box

    Nice! What distro are you on? Or did you compile it yourself?

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  • [–] [S] 14 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    FYI, as well if you're looking for a good remote for a GNU/Linux TV box (or Android, Windows, etc), this remote is the best one I've tried from Amazon.

    https://www.amazon.ca/Backlit-Keyboard-Backlight-Learning-Voogoo/dp/B09Z2X4WGB

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  • [–] [S] 4 points 1 year ago*

    I'm currently using a Raspberry Pi with their Debian based OS. It is on Bookworm, but there are major improvements to Plasma Bigscreen on QT6. They didn't make the updates before it was removed for Trixie, and Trixie is still in beta for Raspberry Pi, so doing an in place upgrade for the OS and compiling Plasma Bigscreen for it to see the improvements.

    I think Manjaro (which works well on mobile too) has the latest one in their repos, and the KDE ARM OS may have it too if you want to try it without compiling it.

    I want to see how difficult it is to drop in OVOS/Neon modules to replace Mycroft ones for voice control too.

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    • [–] 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

    Linux mobile is the way

    Lets goo.

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    [–] 4 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    How did you get Plasma Bigscreen? Last time I checked it said that it was "still in development" and the website didn't provide any builds.

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    • [–] 3 points 1 year ago

    Oh dang this might be just what i need !

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    [–] 3 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    what about waydroid? I'm thinking of installing chimera linux with phosh as a de, and for the apps I was thinking mostly linux programs and maybe some android apps with waydroid, but I'll also try this!

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago

    I tried it a few times, did not work for me, I've had android emus on windows work fine, I'm pretty sure I followed the setup correctly, but I couldn't get apps to launch.

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    • [–] 2 points 1 year ago

    There's some good potential here for sure. I use a project called Sober to run Roblox on my Linux PC, which runs the Android version. It works incredibly well.

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