LINux on MOBile - RedditLINMOB.net is a blog about LINux on MOBile devices. With the PinePhone (Pro) and Librem 5 shipping it is back to report on GNU+Linux on mobile devices.Zola2021-09-29T21:35:00+00:00https://linmob.net/tags/reddit/feed.xmlLinBits 64: Weekly Linux Phone news / media roundup (week 38/39)2021-09-29T21:35:00+00:002021-09-29T21:35:00+00:00https://linmob.net/linbits-64-weekly-linux-phone-news-week38-39/<p><em>This week in mobile Linux:</em> Android kernels adopting a more mainline approach, Waydroid running on SailfishOS and Ubuntu Touch, libcamera, how to cross compile for Plasma Mobile (this time with a tool that should help a lot), a GTK app to browse LINMOBapps and more! <span id="continue-reading"></span> <em>Commentary in italics.</em> </p>
<h3 id="software-releases">Software releases</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://twitter.com/ManjaroLinux/status/1443263810589102080">Manjaro Phosh beta 16 for the PinePhone</a> has been released, delivering a few things early: MMS support, splash screens for Phosh — features that at least partly have not even been merged into their upstream projects. <em>While it's nice to be have these things early, please don't bug upstream with bug reports concerning these unmerged features.</em></li>
<li>Gtkeddit is now <a href="https://gitlab.com/caveman250/Headlines">Headlines</a>!</li>
</ul>
<h3 id="worth-noting">Worth noting</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://github.com/Speiburger/LINMOBappsBrowser">LINMOBappsBrowser</a> is a new project that's building a more performant, native GTK way to browse apps.csv on your Linux Phone! <em>It's early days, but I love what Speiburger has built so far!</em></li>
<li>Maemo Leste have made progress <a href="https://twitter.com/maemoleste/status/1443180939144740868">around email</a>!</li>
<li>Popcorn Computers (who are making the <a href="https://pocket.popcorncomputer.com/">Pocket P.C. hacker terminal</a> are <a href="https://twitter.com/tuxphones/status/1443270015441113091">collaborating with postmarketOS</a>.</li>
<li>Waydroid of the week: <a href="https://twitter.com/adampigg/status/1442379954386255873#m">Sailfish OS on PinePhone now with networking</a>.</li>
</ul>
<h3 id="worth-reading">Worth Reading</h3>
<h4 id="hardware">Hardware</h4>
<ul>
<li>Liliputing: <a href="https://liliputing.com/2021/09/gpd-pocket-3-handheld-computer-will-be-a-convertible-tablet-with-stylus-support-and-a-modular-feature.html">GPD Pocket 3 handheld computer will be a convertible tablet with stylus support (and a modular feature)</a>. <em>Nice hardware!</em></li>
<li>TuxPhones: <a href="https://tuxphones.com/cadmium-linux-for-chromebooks/">Cadmium is a Linux distribution to liberate ARM Chromebooks</a>. <em>Cadmium is seriously nice, only kernel upgrades aren't fun (yet)!</em></li>
</ul>
<h4 id="software">Software</h4>
<h5 id="software-progress">Software progress</h5>
<ul>
<li>Claudio Cambra: <a href="https://claudiocambra.com/2021/09/26/turbocharging-kalendar-kalendar-devlog-15/">Turbocharging Kalendar — Kalendar devlog 15</a>. </li>
<li>Alberto Mardegan: <a href="http://mardy.it/blog/2021/09/mitubo-03-brings-basic-rss-support.html">MiTubo 0.3 brings basic RSS support</a>. <em>MiTubo is not just for Ubuntu Touch, hint hint.</em></li>
<li>Phoronix: <a href="https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=libcamera-2021">Libcamera Maturing Well As Open-Source Camera Stack</a>. <em>I look forward to libcamera support landing for the Librem 5!</em></li>
<li>Jolla Blog: <a href="https://blog.jolla.com/whats-up-with-sandboxing/">What’s up with Sandboxing?</a>. <em>These plans sound promising!</em></li>
<li>UBports Blog: <a href="https://ubports.com/blog/ubports-news-1/post/ubuntu-touch-ota-19-release-3779">Ubuntu Touch OTA-19 Release</a>. <em>I missed this last week, do read it!</em></li>
<li>This Week in GNOME: <a href="https://thisweek.gnome.org/posts/2021/09/twig-11/">#11 Forty-one!</a>. <em>Some nice, new apps!</em></li>
</ul>
<h5 id="mainline-all-the-things">Mainline all the things</h5>
<ul>
<li>Phoronix: <a href="https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Android-Linux-Upstream-First">Google Finally Shifting To "Upstream First" Linux Kernel Approach For Android Features</a>. <em>Now this is going to take a while to really make an impact, but I am glad to see this happen anyway. Thanks to PizzaLovingNerd for making sure that I would not miss this!</em></li>
<li>TuxPhones: <a href="https://tuxphones.com/10-year-smartphone-initiative-right-to-repair-lifecycle/">The "10 Year Smartphone" initiative aims for a sustainable mobile ecosystem</a>. <em>This feels really important, although the idea <a href="https://ollieparanoid.github.io/post/postmarketOS/">is not exactly a new one</a>. To be fair: This is a different, political approach.</em></li>
</ul>
<h5 id="distro-future">Distro future</h5>
<ul>
<li>Christian F.K. Schaller: <a href="https://blogs.gnome.org/uraeus/2021/09/24/fedora-workstation-our-vision-for-linux-desktop/">Fedora Workstation: Our Vision for Linux Desktop</a>. <em>Now this is not about phones per se, but what's attractive about Silverblue or Kinoite would be great for phones, too.</em></li>
</ul>
<h5 id="development-news">Development news</h5>
<ul>
<li>Gunibert: <a href="https://www.gunibert.de/posts/gnome_builder_41/">GNOME Builder 41 Highlights</a>. <em>Look at this!</em></li>
</ul>
<h5 id="cross-compiling">Cross Compiling</h5>
<ul>
<li>Han Young: <a href="https://www.hanyoung.uk/blog/cross-compile-to-pinephone-part-three/">Cross Compile to PinePhone Part Three</a>. <em>Awesome!</em></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="worth-watching">Worth Watching</h3>
<h4 id="phosh">Phosh</h4>
<ul>
<li>Geotechland: <a href="https://tilvids.com/w/613e1cc2-fd9d-477a-b0a0-ebfae26668d4">Manjaro Phosh - Pinephone BETA 15</a>. <em>Great video! Sadly I doubt too much of an app startup time improvement is going to happen for big apps like Firefox. But, with e.g. with the <a href="https://gitlab.gnome.org/World/Phosh/phosh/-/merge_requests/886">splash screen</a> feature, perceived app load time is going to be reduced. It's landed in Manjaro beta 16, BTW.</em></li>
</ul>
<h4 id="plasma-mobile">Plasma Mobile</h4>
<ul>
<li>Nat Tuck: <a href="https://odysee.com/@NatTuck:9/nat-quick-look-pinephone-plasma:7">A Look at Plasma Mobile on the PinePhone</a>. <em>Great in depth video review!</em></li>
</ul>
<h4 id="gnome">GNOME</h4>
<ul>
<li>mzeinali: <a href="https://odysee.com/@mzeinali:c/PinePhone:a">PostmarketOS with Gnome desktop on Pine phone</a>. <em>Seems to work well!</em></li>
</ul>
<h4 id="fun-projects">Fun projects</h4>
<ul>
<li>Martijn Braam: <a href="https://spacepub.space/w/xpkUVzdVBvGLka8yfZg2k5">Running Octoprint on the PinePhone with camera</a>. <em>If the PinePhone does not work for you as a phone (or you have to many PinePhones), and you like 3D printing, here's a use case for you!</em></li>
</ul>
<h4 id="tutorials">Tutorials</h4>
<ul>
<li>(RTP) Privacy & Tech Tips: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZ8BjLjl7EA">SSH Passwordless Logins & Avoid SSH MITM Attacks</a>. <em>Great howto by RTP!</em></li>
</ul>
<h4 id="ubuntu-touch-corner">Ubuntu Touch corner</h4>
<ul>
<li>UBports: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nca_5_k4cH8">Ubuntu Touch Q&A 109</a>. <em>Dalton is back and joined by Alfred and Marius to discuss OTA 19, current challenges around Miracast and Miroil. Also: A new stable release for the PinePhone is going to land this week, yay!</em></li>
<li>anino207: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dyOgI8PRt9w">Early Preview of Waydroid on Ubuntu Touch (Pixel 3a)</a>. <em>Waydroid is just soo smooth, even for gaming!</em></li>
<li>Wolf Fur Programming: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFvwAaMC17U">Ubuntu Touch Oneplus 6</a>. </li>
</ul>
<h4 id="sailfish-os">Sailfish OS</h4>
<ul>
<li>Adam Pigg: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZ8BjLjl7EA">Pinephone /home encryption using SailfishOS</a>. <em>I missed this last week, but it's just to nice!</em></li>
</ul>
<h4 id="shorts">Shorts</h4>
<ul>
<li>5ilver: <a href="https://imgur.com/a/FhAdJby">Pinephone mms via matrix</a>. <em>If you want to know how to do this, ask on <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/PinePhoneOfficial/comments/pxoou1/video_of_mms_images_working_on_mobian_via_matrix/">Reddit</a>. I guess that this uses <a href="https://gitlab.com/untidylamp/mmmpuppet">MMMPuppet</a>, but I am not sure.</em></li>
<li>Sailfish official: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5aGZPo-AuE">xz2 sailfish os 4.2.0.21</a>. <em>Don't believe that channel name!</em></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="stuff-i-did">Stuff I did</h3>
<h4 id="linmobapps">LINMOBapps</h4>
<p>This week I've been tackling the <a href="https://framagit.org/linmobapps/linmobapps.frama.io/-/milestones/1">"overhaul" milestone</a>, a bit more, 4 of 7 issues could be closed.
Also, a few apps were added, and more are to follow shortly:</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://gitlab.com/greenbeast/run-free">Run Free!</a>, a running log app built for Phosh with some basic analysis of your running schedule, submitted by its creator — thank you very much again, Hank! </li>
<li><a href="https://github.com/DiegoIvanME/plano-rewritten">Plano</a>, a cartesian plane calculator that uses GTK4 and libadwaita</li>
<li><a href="https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gnome-software">GNOME Software</a>,</li>
<li><a href="https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gnome-calculator">GNOME Calculator</a> and</li>
<li><a href="https://gitlab.com/mardy/mitubo">MiTubo</a>, a native (QML) video player for YouTube videos.</li>
</ul>
<p>Because of a few apps that were archived the week before (don't worry, they are going to show up on LinuxPhoneApps too), the total app count of apps.csv is now at 314.</p>
<p><a href="https://framagit.org/linmobapps/linmobapps.frama.io/-/commits/master">Read here what (else) happened</a> on LINMOBapps this week. And please <a href="https://framagit.org/linmobapps/linmobapps.frama.io/-/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.md">do contribute!</a></p>
<h4 id="linux-phone-apps">Linux Phone Apps</h4>
<p>Not much happened here, aside from thinking about how to implement a few things. I am hoping to make some progress with this project on the coming saturday.</p>
Building Software from the AUR, Part 2: Reddit clients for the PinePhone2020-10-06T17:32:00+00:002020-10-06T17:32:00+00:00https://linmob.net/reddit-clients-for-mobile-linux/<p>Reddit may not be the social network that has the friendliest reputation, but at least since Google sunset Google+, Reddit's many technical subreddits have become one of the best places to talk about new software, hardware and other nerdy things. So let's have a short overview about software that may or may not work great on a phone.</p>
<span id="continue-reading"></span><h2 id="general-instructions">General instructions</h2>
<p>You will need to have an AUR helper installed or know how to install packages from the AUR without such a software. For that, you can follow the instructions of my <a href="https://linmob.net/2020/09/05/pinephone-building-plasma-mobile-apps-from-the-aur.html#preparations">previous post</a>, although I would now recommend to now clone <code>git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/yay-bin.git </code> instead, because it is just faster to not build the <code>yay</code> binary on device.</p>
<h2 id="gtk-based">GTK based</h2>
<h3 id="giara">Giara</h3>
<p><a href="https://gitlab.gnome.org/GabMus/giara">Giara</a> is a relatively new client developed by <a href="https://gabmus.org/">Gabriele Musco</a>, who has <a href="https://gitlab.com/gabmus">already developed</a> a number of phone-compatible GTK+ apps. Giara will eventually be available on Flathub and thus be easily installable on pretty much every other distribution, but for now, you will have to follow one of the ways to install it below:</p>
<h4 id="installing-from-the-aur">Installing from the AUR</h4>
<p>Install is easy enough on Arch Linux (ARM) and Manjaro, as you will just have to install <code>giara-git</code> from the AUR. </p>
<h4 id="installing-from-flathub">Installing from Flathub <sup class="footnote-reference"><a href="#1">1</a></sup></h4>
<p>Giara is now also <a href="https://flathub.org/apps/details/org.gabmus.giara">available from Flathub</a>. Flathub has instructions on how to enable it, and if these aren't enough, I wrote a <a href="https://linmob.net/2020/07/27/pinephone-daily-driver-challenge-part2-flatpak-and-scaling-in-phosh.html">blog post</a> a while back. </p>
<h4 id="screenshots">Screenshots</h4>
<p><img src="https://linmob.net/reddit-clients-for-mobile-linux/giara_overview.jpg" alt="Giara: Overview" />
<img src="https://linmob.net/reddit-clients-for-mobile-linux/giara_overview_post.jpg" alt="Giara: Overview with Post menu" />
<img src="https://linmob.net/reddit-clients-for-mobile-linux/giara_thread_view.jpg" alt="Giara: Thread View" />
<img src="https://linmob.net/reddit-clients-for-mobile-linux/giara_new_post.jpg" alt="Giara: New Post" /></p>
<h3 id="something-for-reddit">Something for Reddit</h3>
<p><a href="https://github.com/samdroid-apps/something-for-reddit">Something for Reddit</a> is an older client and does not work too well on mobile, but it still is worth a mention, as it is pretty nice on the desktop. </p>
<p>It is available on the AUR (<code>something-for-reddit</code>) and can be installed on OpenSUSE, Fedora and as a Flatpak. As the screenshots show, it works after a <code>scale-to-fit reddit-is-gtk on</code>, but everything is quite small.</p>
<h4 id="screenshots-1">Screenshots</h4>
<p><img src="https://linmob.net/reddit-clients-for-mobile-linux/reddit-is-gtk_overview.jpg" alt="Something for Reddit: Overview" />
<img src="https://linmob.net/reddit-clients-for-mobile-linux/reddit-is-gtk_landscape.jpg" alt="Something for Reddit: Overview with Thread (landscape)" />
<img src="https://linmob.net/reddit-clients-for-mobile-linux/reddit-is-gtk_post.jpg" alt="Something for Reddit: New Post" /></p>
<h3 id="work-in-progress-reddit-client-gtk">Work-in-Progress: reddit-client-gtk</h3>
<p>This is another project, written in Rust, which is not feature complete yet. You can't login yet and thus not do anything which would require logging in. You can find instructions to build it <a href="https://github.com/johan-bjareholt/reddit-client-gtk">on the projects GitHub repository</a>.
I actually build it by running <code>cargo build</code> which led to a binary called <code>reddit-client-gtk-rs</code> in the target/debug/ subfolder. </p>
<h4 id="screenshots-2">Screenshots</h4>
<p><img src="https://linmob.net/reddit-clients-for-mobile-linux/reddit-client-gtk_overview.jpg" alt="reddit-client-gtk: Overview" />
<img src="https://linmob.net/reddit-clients-for-mobile-linux/reddit-client-gtk_going_to_subreddit.jpg" alt="reddit-client-gtk: Going to Subreddit" />
<img src="https://linmob.net/reddit-clients-for-mobile-linux/reddit-client-gtk_thread_view.jpg" alt="reddit-client-gtk: Thread View" />
<img src="https://linmob.net/reddit-clients-for-mobile-linux/reddit-client-gtk_not_implemented.jpg" alt="reddit-client-gtk: Not implemented" /></p>
<h2 id="qt-based">Qt based</h2>
<h3 id="quickddit">Quickddit</h3>
<p><em>Please note: Quickddit is now available on the <a href="https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/quickddit/">AUR</a>. If you are running Arch Linux ARM, you won't need to follow the following instructions and can just install it with</em> <code>yay -S quickddit</code><em>. I also made <a href="https://fosstodon.org/@linmob/105424788379486065">newer screenshots</a>.<sup class="footnote-reference"><a href="#2">2</a></sup></em></p>
<p>Finally, we will try to build <a href="https://github.com/accumulator/Quickddit">Quickddit</a> (<a href="https://open-store.io/app/quickddit">OpenStore</a>) for Ubuntu Touch on ArchLinuxARM. There's also a more advanced version of <a href="https://openrepos.net/content/accumulator/quickddit-0">this client for Sailfish OS</a>, but we would need to use the proprietary UI components of Sailfish, which as far as I know don't even exist for ARM64/aarchv8 systems. </p>
<p>First, dependencies: All of the packages I installed for <a href="https://linmob.net/2020/09/05/pinephone-building-plasma-mobile-apps-from-the-aur.html#installing-software-from-the-aur">my last building tutorial</a> were still installed. Not all of them may be needed, but unless your SD card is tiny: Just install them.</p>
<p>Next, were going to need <code>qqc2-suru-style</code>. This is how you get installed: </p>
<pre><code>git clone https://github.com/ubports/qqc2-suru-style
cd qqc2-suru-style
qmake
make -j4
sudo make install
</code></pre>
<p>Now that we have all the dependencies, we can get started with building Quickddit. We are building the Ubuntu Touch variant, reasons explained above.</p>
<pre><code>git clone --recurse-submodules https://github.com/accumulator/Quickddit
vim [or nano] Quickddit/src/quickdditmanager.cpp #add API keys here, the project readme describes how to get them
</code></pre>
<p>After adding the API keys (which unfortunately did not lead to a working result for me), we can now build the app:</p>
<pre><code>cd Quickddit/ubuntu-touch
qmake
make -j4
</code></pre>
<p>Normally we would run <code>sudo make install</code> now. But this install script is made for UBports Ubuntu Touch, which packages apps as <em>click</em> packages (a precursor to snaps), and I did not even look into fixing it for "normal" distributions. Just run <code>./quickddit</code> to start the app and try signing into Reddit. To install it permanently, you would have to create a desktop file and you might want to move it to <code>/opt/quickddit</code> or something.</p>
<h4 id="screenshots-3">Screenshots</h4>
<p><img src="https://linmob.net/reddit-clients-for-mobile-linux/quickddit_overview.jpg" alt="Quickddit: Overview" />
<img src="https://linmob.net/reddit-clients-for-mobile-linux/quickddit_menu.jpg" alt="Quickddit: Subreddit Menu" />
<img src="https://linmob.net/reddit-clients-for-mobile-linux/quickddit_info.jpg" alt="Quickddit: Thread View" />
<img src="https://linmob.net/reddit-clients-for-mobile-linux/quickddit_sadface.jpg" alt="Quickddit: Sad face" /></p>
<h2 id="conclusions">Conclusions</h2>
<p>While there aren't too many reddit clients for mobile linux OS, the situation is not too bad. Giara is shaping up to be really good, and Quickddit is pretty great too (assuming logging-in would be possible like on Ubuntu Touch). "Something for Reddit" is rather a client for the desktop power-redditor than a good mobile alternative, and reddit-client-gtk, (being Rust based) is super fast and hopefully sees more development in the future. </p>
<p>What do you think? Did I miss a client? If so, please get in touch on Reddit, via Twitter or Mastodon or just send me an email.</p>
<div class="footnote-definition" id="1"><sup class="footnote-definition-label">1</sup>
<p>This section was added on October 15th, 2020.
<sup class="footnote-reference"><a href="#2">2</a></sup>: This section was added on December 25th, 2020.</p>
</div>