The Linux Terminal app that Google introduced earlier this year is one of the most exciting new features in Android, not for what it currently does but for what it can potentially do. The Terminal app lets you boot up an instance of Debian in a virtual machine, allowing you to run full-fledged Linux apps that aren’t available on Android. Unfortunately, the current version of the Terminal app is limited to running command line programs, but that’s set to change in the near future. In the new Android Canary build that Google released today, the Terminal app now lets you run graphical Linux apps.
↫ Mishaal Rahman at Android Authority
It comes with Weston, the reference implementation of a Wayland compositor, allowing you to run a basic graphical environment and accompanying applications. It won’t be long before you can take your Pixel, connect a display, and run KDE. Neat, but so many devils are in so many details here, and there’s so many places where this can fall apart entirely if the wrong decisions are made.
If this is based on the ChromeOS Linux terminal, which it looks like it is, then it’s pretty well architected. On ChromeOS you get a Linux VM with full network access, just enough of an OS to host a container, and a standard Debian Docker image running with systemd enabled. There’s a mountpoint to access your “regular ChromeOS” files similar to how Termux does it, which is a Docker volume mount under the hood. The VM even has Flatpak integration so you can install something like GIMP or Krita (or Android Studio!!!) from Flathub and it’ll show up as an app on your Chromebook.
This was always a pretty slick setup limited by the abhorrent spyware nature of ChromeOS, so putting it on top of Android instead is a major win.
The main problem is this is Google. Someone launched a new feature and got their promotion.
You don’t get promoted at Google for doing maintenance, so how long till this disappears because no one wants to work on it?
Agreed. They have different measures of success there. You might like it, but it’s not successful. Pull the pin. If you don’t like it KMA.
BBAP2005,
Google will find a way to ruin it.
They’ve essentially banned the APIs that termux relies on, leaving the project dependent on deprecated APIs that could soon be on the chopping block along with termux itself. It seems kind of rich of google to offer their own terminal after pulling the rug out from the competition. I don’t want to assume the worst, but I don’t have much faith that google aren’t taking the apple route here, giving themselves rich access to the OS while leaving everyone else within a limited environment. There’s nothing wrong with VMs when they are desired and called for, but just imagine other vendors like ubunto and redhat doing what google are doing and taking the keys away, declaring that owners are only allowed a full OS access inside a VM, but they are not allowed a root environment on the host. Everyone would rightfully be in an uproar.
The counterargument is usually that “normal” users don’t care about root access, and google aren’t targeting the power users who do. I feel this is on the wrong side of owner rights though, and that applification hurts our rights in the long run. It is especially problematic given their market duopoly, which clearly affects power users as much as everyone else. Not for nothing, but I’ve been forced to buy unmodded android phones by employers. When the duopoly is so strong that we’re deprived of being able to vote with our wallets, then I absolutely feel entitled to complain about the owner restrictions on these products.
Banks and some governments are already banning root and custom ROMs from their apps using Google Play Integrity. They clearly want nobody to have root access or to modify the device’s OS in any way so people can only use approved software.
Magnusmaster,
Yeah, I don’t know what to do about it, it’s a product of the times. I cannot use my bank’s mobile app nor do echecking because it requires the mobile app. Before the mobile app, my bank supported echecking on computer, but that’s gone now with everyone expected to have an IOS/android device. Not even android forks are allowed in. People like myself will raise our voices to be critical, but the vast majority of people just fall in line with the duopoly and accept the loss of control and freedoms. Welcome to the future.
I still stick to my guns when I can and give up features at my own inconvenience. but deep inside I understand I’ve lost and the tech giants won. For the most part, not even governments will step in to protect our ownership rights.
> giving themselves rich access to the OS while leaving everyone else within a limited environment
If they put it on Play Sevices maybe, but then we better don’t think of GPS as Android. Is Google slowly killing Android by increasing the reach of GPS? I’d say 100%. But since Android is open source, a fork can have this rich access to the OS or provide functionality Google does not want to add to the base OS.
> Yeah, I don’t know what to do about it, it’s a product of the times. I cannot use my bank’s mobile app nor do echecking because it requires the mobile app.
This unfortunately is completely right. My 2 cents is: I bought a cheap iphone. All the trash apps like banking, booking.com, games, bike renting, earphone configuring, airlines, food delivery, uber… you name it go on the iphone. The iphone is not my smartphone. It is a runner of crapware so I can interact with companies. And most of the times I don’t carry it with me. My smartphone is a Pixel with Graphene OS and zero crap. There are maybe a couple of closed source apps on the secret profile like spotify but nothing which requires GPS.
AOSP is largely incomplete and as you’ve noted google keeps pushing proprietary functionality that a lot of software requires. And another problem is that AOSP isn’t even supported by most phones, even those running android.
I’m a huge proponent of open source, but when the hardware isn’t open source-friendly, that becomes a serious impediment. Android is more open than IOS obviously, but that is a low bar for android to pass. IMHO Android also deserves a low grade on FOSS, but it’s the defacto FOSS winner in a market dominated by apple and google.
Yeah, I hate doing that, but you’ve got to do what you’ve got to do.
I intend to wait until my current phone dies, but I want to try GrapheneOS next. Everyone’s been talking it up. I’d like to buy a GrapheneOS phone outright without the unlock/invalidate warranty/flash firmware rigamarole. I don’t enjoy any of that. Last time I had to request an unlock code from the manufacturer but their server was programmed to wait two weeks before releasing it. Which meant I was forced to use the original firmware before reinstalling everything again.
Alfman, as I’ve explained to you before, you need to stop whining about termux. It’s shoddy software designed to work around Android’s security mechanisms. The whole point of Android (compared to traditional Desktop Linux) is that the executable code of apps is self-contained (inside the APK file): Apps should be able to download non-executable code (for example game assets), but not executable code.
Why is it important? It’s important because the trick termux was doing to download additional executable code completely bypassed Bouncer. Using the termux hack, devs could upload an installer shim to the Play Store as their “app” and have the entire executable code downloaded from a third-party source, completely bypassing Bouncer. Yeah, no, do not want. It’s not a “power-user feature”, it’s a security exploit. Glad it was patched.
Anyway, thanks to Android’s back compat, you can still install termux on your device, but can’t have it on the Play Store because it has to target an ancient API level. Good. I do not want unscannable installer shims pretending to be “apps” in the Play Store.
kurkosdr,
No, I will not stop complaining. Taking away owner rights has always been done in the name of protecting us from ourselves, but at the end of the day owners should have the right to use their hardware how they please. We paid for it, it’s not a god damn rental or lease. If it were then I’d have more respect for their stake in *their* hardware, but it’s not their hardware!!! I’m so sick of my interests on my hardware being dismissed by others who don’t have the same needs. I don’t care what you do or don’t do with your hardware, I’ll support you 100%, but when it comes to my hardware, GTFO telling me what I can do.
If you are a bit smart and buy a phone with an open bootloader, you can use your hardware how you please by loading a modified Android build that has the feature re-enabled for modern API levels or whatever.
But demanding that a mass-market OS works in a certain way that goes against the OS’s security principles, yeah no, they don’t have to offer you that.
Alfman,
Please don’t ignore the fact that users with phones running alternative operating systems have become increasingly discriminated against, often forcing alt-os users to have a second phone. This is objectively hostile, android used to be the hedge against restricted IOS phones. Having both dominant operating systems in the duopoly taking away owner control posses a very serious problem for openness and it would be very disingenuous to pretend this isn’t regressive for owner rights now and into the future.
s/Alfman/kurkosdr/
Also, for the record, I am aware that corporations don’t have to offer an open experience. However understand this: we’re still entitled to complain about it. The problem is not with us complaining about restrictions, but with the tech companies that would have owners be restricted on our own hardware.
And what you consistently fail to understand is that what termux did wasn’t exercising any openness but abuse a security exploit.
Again, the whole point of Android as an OS is that all executable code exists in the APK (and can be scanned by Bouncer and on-device by Play Protect prior to installation) and no additional third-party executable code is downloaded from wherever. What termux did was completely violate that principle.
You don’t have to use it, but It works they way every mainstream linux distro works. Google deprecating the functionality is the problem. It’s a shitty thing to do for those who want their linux expertise to carry across to android. Again, I know you don’t care because you don’t use android this way, but once again your opinion has no merit when it comes to my hardware. (Same as it would be the other way around)
I can’t stand Android and apps full of ads. I never install apps so this can be useful for me.
I want PC phone with Windows or Linux that I can carry around at work.