Weekly GNU-like Mobile Linux Update (20/2025): A Linux Phone From Africa and Phosh 0.47.0
Table of Contents
Some more future hardware, another great Phosh release, Plasma Mobile apps on video, a Ubuntu Touch Q&A, some Sailfish OS Community News and way, way more!
Commentary in italics.
Worth Reading
- Liliputing: Divine D. project is developing a Linux phone with a RK3588s processor
- Victoria Lacroix: Loss of Features is Progressive
- LINux on MOBile: GTK 4.18, the PinePhone and Megapixels
- Lemmy.ca - linuxphones: GTK 4.18, the PinePhone and Megapixels
Worth Watching
- UBports: Ubuntu Touch Q&A 165. Fixes to the Camera (EXIF data removed by default), .
- Continuum Gaming: Continuum Gaming E469: SFOS App "Fotokopierer"
- Alexander The Tech Guy: Phonebook - Every App on KDE Plasma Mobile on the PinePhone Pro
- Alexander The Tech Guy: Camera - Every App on KDE Plasma Mobile on the PinePhone Pro
- Alexander The Tech Guy: Dolphin - Every App on KDE Plasma Mobile on the PinePhone Pro
- Alexander The Tech Guy: Angelfish Browser - Every App on the PinePhone Pro with KDE Plasma Mobile
- Alexander The Tech Guy: Phone - Every App on KDE Plasma Mobile on the PinePhone Pro
- Alexander The Tech Guy: Discover - Every App on KDE Plasma Mobile on the PinePhone Pro
- CoolGuy7Tech: Mobile Linux Devices Tierlist
- RandomRepairs: Ubuntu Touch on Redmi Note 4 Review | Experimental ROM Test (Not Daily Driver)
Conference Corner
- Casey Conolly + Neil Armstrong: LIS25-125 U-Boot: a quick and painless bootloader for Qualcomm SoCs | Linaro Resources Hub
- Casey Connolly + Ameya Pandit: LIS25-129 TF-A and OP-TEE for Qualcomm IoT platforms | Linaro Resources Hub
- Luca Weiss: LIS25-222 Making Android phones Last | Linaro Resources Hub
Worth Noting
- justsoup: "Announcing MUD. MUD is an attempt to create an entirely new desktop based on philosophies from Lomiri, targeting mobile form factors only. The goal is to be as generic to Unix-likes as possible, only requiring wayland support and minimizing Linux-isms. Another major goal is to keep the project as simple and modular as possible to prevent feature creep and make dev easier.More information is coming soon...#MobileLinux #LinuxMobile #Linux". I am torn. I like seeing a new approach, but there's so many one-person mobile shells already (CutieShell, catacomb, etc.) ... hoping for the best!
- afranke: "Only 2 weeks after #Fractal 11, here’s 11.1 which fixes a crash on verification and a couple other bugs.https://discourse.gnome.org/t/fractal-11-1-released/28887#Matrix #GNOME"
- dos: Librem 5 protip: listening to music on a cheap pair of tiny in-ear headphones in a noisy environment? Enable HD Bass to wake the bass guitarist up:amixer -D hw:L5 sset 'HD Bass' on#librem5 #mobilelinux #linuxmobile #linuxphone #shotonlibrem5
- LaF0rge: "In case you haven't seen it yet, check out the analysis of the devastating state of [mostly] modern #OpenSSL by members of haproxy at https://www.haproxy.com/blog/state-of-ssl-stacks - hard to imagine such massive performance regressions getting into mainline linux distributions unnoticed by the distributors. #linux #ssl"
- @linmob@fosstodon.org: Last year, I tried to help #Librem5 users to have a better experience when using #flatpak apps by not wasting space due to an outdated, buggy release of flatpak.Today, I've added something else that should help on every distribution to that same post: Avoiding translations you don't need.https://linmob.net/how-i-fit-many-flatpaks-on-my-librem-5-with-pureos-byzantium/#configure-locales-to-waste-space-on-translation-you-don-t-need#LinuxMobile
Hardware
- dawndrums: "Meet Divine, a GNU/Linux Phone powered by Rockchip’s RK3588S. Divine D. will be our first variant, completely open for development, testing and debugging. It will bring interesting features on-board, from local AI to multi-standard connectivity. We also develop DawnOS, a mobian-based distribution tailored for our hardware, including custom Kernel and device tree.Check our documentation base for more:https://docs.dawndrums.tn#linux #opensource #embeddedsystems #privacy"
- dawndrums: We are constantly testing both KDE Plasma mobile and Phosh desktop environments on the Divine phone. We will provide dawnos images for both DEs. This is a photo of Plasma welcome screen running on Divine D.Stay tuned. #kde #plasmamobile #phosh #mobian #dawnos #linux #opensource #dawndrums #divine
- @linmob@fosstodon.org: It looks like the Liberux Nexx is no longer the only upcoming RK3588s #LinuxMobile phone:The dawndrums Divine D will use the same very SoC, running a Debian/@mobian based OS called DawnOS (with GNOME Mobile/#Phosh or #PlasmaMobile). (My D key needs a break now 😉 )Docs: https://docs.dawndrums.tn/docs/introduction Status page: https://docs.dawndrums.tn/docs/Current_state/ Github: https://github.com/dawndrums/dawndrums Subreddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/dawndrumsdev/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@dawndrums-o7m/ Mastodon: https://mastodon.social/@dawndrums/ They are in an early stage still, but from what I could take in, I think that their approach can work. The only thing that gives me pause (knowing the app ecosystem) is the 5.5" 16:9 display (see also https://www.reddit.com/r/dawndrumsdev/comments/1k18zcv/divine_d_next_generation_gnu_linux_phone/msgrq0d/). It's definitely nice to see a phone designed in Africa (Tunisia)!
Events
- LAS: Want to host Linux App Summit 2026 in your city?We’re looking for our next location—why not yours?Submit your proposal now: https://linuxappsummit.org/cfl/
- tbernard: "We finally have confirmed locations for #BoilingTheOcean next week!Join us in Berlin for hacking and discussions around local-first/p2p, image-based OSes, and other important problems in emancipatory software.This time we have a pretty complete MVP of Aardvark to play with 🐼🌈Saturday May 24th, from 11:00@101lab, Skalitzerstr. 100 (thanks @ben4climate)Sunday May 25th, from 11:00X-Hain, Grünbergerstr. 15 (thanks @ljrk)Sign up here: https://pad.gnome.org/enwydsh2RO2Dv4oOXBz4CQ##gnome #p2panda #localfirst"
More Software News
Gnome Ecosystem
- This Week in GNOME: #200 Two Hundred. Congrats on this milestone!
- Phoronix: Mutter SDK Merged For GNOME 49
Phosh
- Phosh.mobi: Phosh 0.47.0
- phosh: "phosh 0.47.0 is out 🚀📱:This release is a bit smaller than the previous two as we spent more time on other parts of the #LinuxMobile stack but there's still some 🐛 fixes and improvements, check out the full releasenotes at https://phosh.mobi/releases/rel-0.47.0/ for details or see 👇 for a short 🧵🙏 to everyone who contributed to this release.#phosh #Librem5 #PinePhone #gtk #wlroots #gnome #linux #mobile"
- Phosh (Mastodon): #phosh's Feedback Quick Setting now has a status page featuring a "Do not disturb" toggle (that sets the profile to "silent" and disabled notification banners) and button to quickly access to the Feedback settings (to e.g. tweak Feedback for individual apps or tune ring tones).1/x My favorite new feature!
- Phosh: On Screen Keyboard Text Correction and Completion
Plasma Ecosystem
- Nate Graham: This Week in Plasma: HDR calibration wizard
- Carl Schwan et al.: This Week in KDE Apps
- KDE Announcements: KDE Plasma 6.4 Beta Release
- KDE Mentorship: KDE & Google Summer of Code 2025
- Volker Krause: Transitous Hack Weekend in July
- Jakob Petsovits: Input handling in spring 2025
- Phoronix: KDE Plasma 6.4 Introducing An HDR Calibration Wizard
- Phoronix: FreeBSD 14.3 Beta 3 Brings KDE Plasma 6 Packages To The DVD ISOs
Sailfish OS
- Community News - Sailfish OS Forum: Sailfish Community News, 15th May 2025 - BeaconDB
- flypig's NewPipe log: Day 70
- flypig's NewPipe log: Day 69
- flypig's NewPipe log: Day 68
- flypig's NewPipe log: Day 67
- flypig's NewPipe log: Day 66
- flypig's NewPipe log: Day 65
Ubuntu Touch
- Ubuntu Touch Forums News: Ubuntu Touch Q&A 165 Saturday 17th May 19:00 UTC
- #UbuntuTouch: Experience wanted: Is anybody running #UbuntuTouch on a #Fairphone5?https://devices.ubuntu-touch.io/device/fp5/
Distributions
- postmarketOS Blog: Hardware testing automation: a status update
- Lemmy - postmarketOS: Hardware testing automation: a status update
- Lemmy.ca - linuxphones: Hardware testing automation: a status update
- craftyguy: "omg I totally forgot to announce this when I merged it but...#postmarketOS has a new installer for laptops and tablets! 🎉 You can find images at postmarketos.org/download. Currently only pre-built images exist for Lenovo X13s and Generic x86_64, but it's easy to enable building images for other devices if there's enough interest!It uses os-installer[1] on GNOME desktop, and is intended to be booted from USB disk to install pmOS onto local storage 🔥 1. https://gitlab.gnome.org/p3732/os-installer"
- postmarketOS pmbootstrap tags: 3.4.0
- gjdijkman: "My Gentoo PinePhone(Pro) overlay has been updated. It now features Megapixels 2 Alpha 1 and Phosh 46 im not 100% sure I can upate to phosh 47 when it will release, due to the fact that gnome on gentoo is always abit behind. I will keep you all updated on it.#gnome #phosh #PinePhonePro #Pine64 #linuxmobile"
- gjdijkman: I've updated the Pine64 Wiki with the up-to-date overlay and documentation locations. https://wiki.pine64.org/wiki/PinePhone_Pro_Software_Releases#Gentoo. I would stongly recommend using the binaryhost since it recudes the compile time on the PinePhonePro. The binaryhost is PinePhonePro Only since lets be real using a normal PinePhone with Gentoo is not really realistic. The Binaryhost is updating to Python 3.13.#PinePhonePro #Pine64 #linuxmobile
- Phoronix: Debian 13 "Trixie" Now In Hard Freeze: MIPS64EL Demoted, RISC-V 64-bit Promoted
- Phoronix: Debian Installer Trixie RC 1 Adds Rescue Support On Btrfs, Upgraded Linux 6.12 Kernel
- Phoronix: Debian 12.11 Pulls In Dozens Of Fixes
- Phoronix: Asahi Linux Highlights Recent Upstream Efforts In Linux 6.15, Other Ongoing Efforts
Apps
- LinuxPhoneApps.org: Apps: Nostalgia
- LinuxPhoneApps.org: Apps: Packet. Google Quick Share compatible!
- LinuxPhoneApps.org: Apps: Dolpin
- emersion: "The Goguma IRC mobile client now supports reactions!(This requires a modern server supporting IRCv3 client message tags, and is only enabled when the server allows reactions.)"
- camiloh: This is Station. The Maui convergent terminal emulator. Looking good for this month's release!@mauiproject #mauikit
- Jozef Mlich on Fosstodon: I was trying to fix alignment and padding on SportSummary and SportDetail in #Amazfish today.
Kernel
- phone-devel: Re: [PATCH v2 4/4] media: i2c: imx214: Remove hard-coded external clock frequency
- phone-devel: [PATCH 1/1] remoteproc: qcom_wcnss: Fix on platforms without fallback regulators
- Phoronix: Linux 6.14.7 & Other Stable Kernel Releases Bring ARM64 Security Fix
- Phoronix: Rockchip Open-Source NPU Driver "RKNN" Continues Making Progress
Stack
- emersion: wlroots 0.19.0 has been released!https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wlroots/wlroots/-/releases/0.19.0
- Phoronix: Rust Language Celebrates Ten Years By Releasing Rust 1.87
- Phoronix: Vulkan 1.4.315 With VK_EXT_zero_initialize_device_memory For VKD3D-Proton & More
- Phoronix: KDE Plasma 6.4 Beta Released With Aurorae & KWin-X11
- Phoronix: Niri 25.05 Brings New Features To This Innovative Wayland Compositor
- Phoronix: Arch Linux Installer Adds Labwc & Niri Wayland Compositor Options
Matrix
- Matrix.org: Matrix Governing Board report, May 2025
- Matrix.org: This Week in Matrix 2025-05-16
Thanks
Huge thanks to Plata for the nifty set of Python scripts that speed up collecting links from feeds by a lot.
Something missing? Want to contribute?
If your project's cool story (or your awesome video or nifty blog post or ...) is missing and you don't want that to happen again, please just put it into the hedgedoc pad for the next one! Since I am collecting many things there, this get's you early access if you will ;-) If you just stumble on a thing, please put it in there too - all help is appreciated!