Live data from Hacker News

Termux and Android 10

github.com

111–120 of 329 posts

Re: Termux and Android 10

#111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

where do chrome books fall on this spectrum?

Depends on whether you have bothered to open them up and remove the hardware-based firmware write protect. The process is highly device-dependent, and seems to be entirely undocumented for many Chromebooks and other ChromeOS devices. YMMV.

It's pretty well documented on the Chromium OS site: https://chromium.googlesource.com/chromiumos/docs/+/master/d...

If there's devices missing, send a PR to that repo: https://chromium.googlesource.com/chromiumos/docs/+/master/R...

Re: Termux and Android 10

#112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

where do chrome books fall on this spectrum?

Depends on whether you have bothered to open them up and remove the hardware-based firmware write protect. The process is highly device-dependent, and seems to be entirely undocumented for many Chromebooks and other ChromeOS devices. YMMV.

Note also that you can install Linux on your Chromebook in a container without having to put the device in developer mode: https://support.google.com/chromebook/answer/9145439

Re: Termux and Android 10

#113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Developer mode" is incredibly brittle. If you don't press the right key combination at boot, your user partitions get formatted without warning and you lose all data. That makes it essentially a toy, not a real "developer" device.

Has anyone stuck a Teensy or arduino or something inside of a Chromebook to automatically send the right key combo? Seems fairly simple to me to do, but I don't have a Chrome device to test that on.

If you're opening up and messing with the hardware, why not remove the write protect and flash the firmware instead?

Re: Termux and Android 10

#114
post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But you pay 750$ for a 3GB quad core phone; I've got these specs on a 300€ OnePlus One five (six?) years ago. Sure, replaceable battery and open hardware are a _very_ good thing, but the value/$ of these phones are horrendous. That's not to defend OnePlus or any other manufacturer, but when I can get a high end Samsung or Xiaomi device with 4 times the specs at every corner for the same price or less and simply insta…

These phones are primarily about user-freedom, privacy and my ability to do whatever I want with a device that I've purchased, without restrictions imposed by the OEM. Also, honest question; What do you actually 'use' the latest specs for? These Android/iOS phones are basically all about media consumption, something that has been sufficiently performant for years. You have great hardware, but no software to take real…

> Also, honest question; What do you actually 'use' the latest specs for?

Browsing, chatting, navigating and some smaller task. Don't get me wrong, the hardware specs aren't _bad_ and 3G are okay now, but this phone costs as much as all three smartphones I've owned combined and I don't think this will be enough 5+ years in the future, which would by my expected lifespan of this device. Adding to that are the singular speaker and, by todays standard, rather weak camera offering.

Again, don't get me wrong: I'd love to buy one of those and support their (absolutely great!) cause. It's simply hard to justify the investment, when 700$ are a lot to me.

Re: Termux and Android 10

#115
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who has been on Linux a long time, but still has to support family members using Windows, here's my perspective: 1) Linux is usually easier in the "happy case", where everything works as it should, and it supports everything that the user needs. 2) Linux is way way way less likely to just change something and break the whole system while the user is sleeping. (This was REAL fun with my grandparents-in-law…

> 9) The few times I've gotten family members to try Linux, they called me LESS often for support. Even on laptops! This is so true. All my family members are on Ubuntu, and it just works without any support. For many many years. Sometimes when I visit them I click on update to the next LTS. By the time I have to leave it is updated and runs again for 2 more years.

Debian Stable is king when it comes to the "just works" POV. They only release a new stable version after every known update bug has been ironed out, so the process is consistently flawless. Recent versions will even install security updates for you, with no user interaction required.

Re: Termux and Android 10

#116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, there's a market for these phones and I absolutely do not speak for everyone :) Still, I can get a Samsung Galaxy A20e for 150€ right now, which has about the same specs (actually slightly better) and spend two hours to get Lineage on it. My point is, I do value my privacy a lot, even to the point of running my phone without GApps (which drops a lot of features), and I think these projects are absolutely awesom…

Your cheap Samsung phones are not running open firmware with mainline Linux, nor have hardware kill switches. A PinePhone/Librem 5 will also always be capable of running emacs/golang etc. which is not easily doable on Android if termux isn't possible anymore.

A rooted Android will probably still be able to run termux and most other software. But fair point.

Re: Termux and Android 10

#118
post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tablet companies really need to realize that a decent tablet with a decent dev experience is going to lead to an explosion of developers on their platform and result directly in way higher quality apps and therefore way better sales and brand. Imagine if websites couldn’t be developed on normal desktop computers and you had to run an extremely inefficient emulator every time you wanted to make a small notification.

That would be ChromeOS tablets. Full linux terminal in container and all. Hasn't really made any difference.

>Android 10 Is killing Termux terminal app

Remember who owns Android.

It's not worth investing time into a platform that will be further restricted sooner or later. Why should they treat the tablet differently?

Re: Termux and Android 10

#119
As a heavy Termux user and one who describes Termux as "the killer app for Android" this makes me sad and angry. I was very irritated when they broke ability to send SMS from the termux CLI (in fact I forked and currently build my own version with that patch reverted).

If I wanted a paternalistic platform I would be an iOS user (I don't mean that as a slam, iOS obviously has its place, but it's not for me).

Re: Termux and Android 10

#120
post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only "real" solution is to get an actual Linux phone, such as the PinePhone[1] or Librem 5[2]. 1 - https://www.pine64.org/pinephone 2 - https://puri.sm/products/librem-5

But you pay 750$ for a 3GB quad core phone; I've got these specs on a 300€ OnePlus One five (six?) years ago. Sure, replaceable battery and open hardware are a _very_ good thing, but the value/$ of these phones are horrendous. That's not to defend OnePlus or any other manufacturer, but when I can get a high end Samsung or Xiaomi device with 4 times the specs at every corner for the same price or less and simply insta…

The PinePhone is $150.
Post reply on HN