MX Linux Forum

Posted: **Sun Aug 02, 2020 9:46 am**

I know that there are some Linux phones on the market right now but I do not think that their specs are good enough to be used as my daily driver.
Librem 5 - Sub-par phone for the extraordinary cost
PinePhone - More cost effective but still lacking usability (and it only has a 5mp camera)

I have (2) LGV20 phones. I know it's dated but I love this phone due to it's removable battery and external SD card options.
My young son broke the screen on the first one but it still usable, so I wanted to try to put Linux on that phone.
As far as software goes, I am not into social media so I could care less about Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat or anything else like that.
However, I do use a popular VPN software on my phone.
I like the resolution of my LGV20 camera. Although It doesn't have the resolution my DSLR has, it is always available when I need it.

I saw a video on YouTube about putting Linux on top of an Android device using (3) apps: Andronix, Termux, and VNC Viewer.
I also saw some information about the Sailfish OS.

With that said, is it possible to put MX Linux on a phone? Has anyone done this yet? Have the developers enterntained MX Linux for phones?
If not, can you guys/gals tell me what's been your best success stories (or failures) using any Linux option on a phone?

I love the freedom of Linux and absolutely have loved my journey using MX Linux ever since I found this Linux distro.
Thank you for your input!

Posted: **Sun Aug 02, 2020 10:57 am**

No currently we do not support ARM, so it couldn’t be installed on a phone right now if we wanted to.

I think good Linux phones are a year or two, maybe more away. They are, like you said lacking, or it’s a bunch of nonsense hackery to get Linux installed and usable.

Posted: **Sun Aug 02, 2020 11:01 am**

I wouldn't even dream of MX Linux on a phone, I don't think it's the right tool for the job. Microsoft have tried the idea of making an OS for smartphones, tablets, and the desktop, all at the same time, and the end result is now a complete usability nightmare.
There is already a Linux distro out there that is well suited for use on a smart phone, called Android.

Posted: **Sun Aug 02, 2020 11:43 am**

Yes. I am aware that Android is Linux based. Some people like me are not big fans of Google though, which is the reason why I'm looking for an alternative.
I'll keep my eye's on the phone market for alternative OS's and maybe try a Linux mod on my own in the meantime.
I appreciate the developer's input on this matter.

Posted: **Sun Aug 02, 2020 11:55 am**

This may be of interest:

https://mobian-project.org/

Debian for mobile.
It is built with the PinePhone in mind.

Posted: **Sun Aug 02, 2020 12:19 pm**

Just ordered a pine64 there are a couple of OS's to try. MX would be a dream, a good dream,but still a dream :]

@AK-47 Calling Android a proper Linux distro is like calling an Orc a misguided Elf ;}

Posted: **Sun Aug 02, 2020 12:29 pm**

Looks like the Pinephone is the only viable option for me if and when a fully functional release is available. I would definitely get the Pinephone when that happens so I can throw out Google.

Posted: **Sun Aug 02, 2020 12:35 pm**

heywoodidaho wrote: Sun Aug 02, 2020 12:19 pm Just ordered a pine64 there are a couple of OS's to try. MX would be a dream, a good dream,but still a dream :]

Anyone that wants to help us with getting MX ready for ARM devices is more than welcome to put in some time and effort to make this a reality. It isn't really about dreaming, its about time and resources.

Posted: **Sun Aug 02, 2020 12:39 pm**

jeffreyC wrote: Sun Aug 02, 2020 11:55 am This may be of interest:

https://mobian-project.org/

Debian for mobile.
It is built with the PinePhone in mind.

Indeed a-wai has done quite a job piloting the initial Pine Phone releases; it is working quite reasonably on the Pine Phone. Glad to see it become official and several people starting to work together on it.

It is nowhere near comparable with phones currently on the market... it is quite usable but if you rely heavily on a phone it is currently not up to the task. If you need the camera; it is working but extremely laggy (~ 1fps and ~1-2 seconds delay behind reality) and low resolution at the moment (not even full ability of the hardware). Switching to video crashes the camera app. Phone calls are working well, though sometimes in a low signal area there is a fair amount of drop out in the audio on your end and popping on the other. The phone gets warm quickly if this is the case. SMS is working well. MMS is not (well manually with alot of effort). Data is working well. Bluetooth and Wifi are working well. Battery life is poor, it is better when automatic suspend is used which can get me through a day but nowhere need the 3-4 days with regular use of my old phone.

For software... You quickly become aware of the difference between desktop needs and mobile needs as AK-47 is saying. Alot of the standard apps are really painful to use on a phone. There is a scaling feature now available, but with some applications the content becomes incredibly small. More applications will need to have 2 separate graphical implementations such as seen with what is already available via websites featuring mobile vs desktop views. It is quite nice to be able to do whatever you like with the phone... and if you mess up it is easy to restart by booting off another sd card (or even have multiple os implementations on several sd cards). There has been extremely good progress however, every day there are updates that improve the os. Though some more noticeable than others. Being in development still there is unfortunately also some regressions... so be aware of this when updating.

Posted: **Sun Aug 02, 2020 1:24 pm**

SwampRabbit wrote: Sun Aug 02, 2020 12:35 pm
heywoodidaho wrote: Sun Aug 02, 2020 12:19 pm Just ordered a pine64 there are a couple of OS's to try. MX would be a dream, a good dream,but still a dream :]
Anyone that wants to help us with getting MX ready for ARM devices is more than welcome to put in some time and effort to make this a reality. It isn't really about dreaming, its about time and resources.

There is an xfce recipe for mobian on the pinephone (as well as others).
EX: https://gitlab.com/rrico542/mobian-x-recipes
Prebuilt images are/were available via rico but I have not looked recently.
I was considering modifying the openbox recipe and trying to make a custom one that does away with systemd and instead works with runit (with sysv as a fallback if the runit build did not work) but have not found the time to do so.

Posted: **Sun Aug 02, 2020 1:34 pm**

antiX-Dave wrote: Sun Aug 02, 2020 1:24 pm There is an xfce recipe for mobian on the pinephone (as well as others).
EX: https://gitlab.com/rrico542/mobian-x-recipes
Prebuilt images are/were available via rico but I have not looked recently.
I was considering modifying the openbox recipe and trying to make a custom one that does away with systemd and instead works with runit (with sysv as a fallback if the runit build did not work) but have not found the time to do so.

Thanks for sharing that!

Question is, what kind of effort would come of having to built and maintain another version off of a different base?

Could we do the same thing off the Debian base but pull things from Mobian if needed?

Posted: **Sun Aug 02, 2020 4:56 pm**

SwampRabbit wrote: Sun Aug 02, 2020 1:34 pm
Thanks for sharing that!

Question is, what kind of effort would come of having to built and maintain another version off of a different base?

Could we do the same thing off the Debian base but pull things from Mobian if needed?

1. A considerable amount would be needed. Especially if you do not have the appropriate hardware from my experience, however I have just started in the arm department.

2. Mobian is debian... just the mobile version from what I perceived. It used to be sort of abandoned in the main debian wiki IIRC. (Edit: I may be incorrect in this according to here https://wiki.debian.org/PinePhone)
They have a separate repository, mostly for Pine Phone specific items / tweaks as far as I know. The goal is to push everything upstream and move toward the normal debian repo/system. From what I can tell, the difficulty is that most of the current Debian packages are set in such a way where they are mostly for "computer" systems and not so much "mobile/phone" as well as "computer" systems. So the seperate repository is used till the changes can be made in the official debian repo. I am not 100% on this though. Maybe the best is to consult on their matrix chat.

The debian repository in use is bullseye, then the mobian is repo.mobian-project.org

So, yes in theory the same could be done as MX/antiX on arm as already done for i386/amd64. It just needs someone with time and hardware to start taking on the project I suppose. Clearly though it will be quite rough compared to the current versions.

inxi output if it helps.

Code: Select all

System:    Kernel: 5.7-pinephone aarch64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 9.3.0 
           parameters: console=ttyS0,115200 no_console_suspend panic=10 consoleblank=0 loglevel=7 root=/dev/mmcblk2p2 rw 
           splash plymouth.ignore-serial-consoles vt.global_cursor_default=0 
           Console: tty 0 Distro: Debian GNU/Linux bullseye/sid 
Machine:   Type: ARM Device System: Pine64 PinePhone Braveheart (1.1) details: N/A serial: <filter> 
Battery:   ID-1: axp20x-battery charge: 32% condition: N/A volts: 3.9/2.9 model: N/A type: N/A serial: N/A status: Charging 
CPU:       Topology: Quad Core model: N/A variant: cortex-a53 bits: 64 type: MCP arch: ARMv8 family: 8 model-id: N/A 
           stepping: 4 microcode: N/A 
           features: Use -f option to see features bogomips: 0 
           Speed: 480 MHz min/max: 480/1152 MHz Core speeds (MHz): 1: 480 2: 480 3: 480 4: 480 
           Vulnerabilities: Type: itlb_multihit status: Not affected 
           Type: l1tf status: Not affected 
           Type: mds status: Not affected 
           Type: meltdown status: Not affected 
           Type: spec_store_bypass status: Not affected 
           Type: spectre_v1 mitigation: __user pointer sanitization 
           Type: spectre_v2 status: Not affected 
           Type: tsx_async_abort status: Not affected 
Graphics:  Device-1: sun50i-a64-mali driver: lima v: kernel bus ID: N/A chip ID: allwinner:1c40000 
           Device-2: sun50i-a64-dw-hdmi driver: sun8i_dw_hdmi v: N/A bus ID: N/A chip ID: allwinner:1ee0000 
           Device-3: sun50i-a64-display-engine driver: sun4i_drm v: N/A bus ID: N/A chip ID: allwinner:display-engine 
           Display: server: No display server data found. Headless machine? tty: 171x47 
           Message: Unable to show advanced data. Required tool glxinfo missing. 
Audio:     Device-1: sun50i-a64-dw-hdmi driver: sun8i_dw_hdmi bus ID: N/A chip ID: allwinner:1ee0000 
           Device-2: simple-audio-card driver: N/A bus ID: N/A chip ID: simple-audio-card:hdmi-sound 
           Device-3: simple-audio-card driver: asoc_simple_card bus ID: N/A chip ID: simple-audio-card:sound 
           Sound Server: ALSA v: k5.7-pinephone 
Network:   Device-1: regulator-fixed driver: reg_fixed_voltage v: N/A port: N/A bus ID: N/A chip ID: regulator-fixed:vbat-wifi 
           Device-2: sun50i-a64-emac driver: N/A port: N/A bus ID: N/A chip ID: allwinner:soc 
           IF: wlan0 state: up mac: <filter> 
           IF-ID-1: wwan0 state: unknown mac: N/A 
Drives:    Local Storage: total: 22.08 GiB used: 4.42 GiB (20.0%) 
           SMART Message: Required tool smartctl not installed. Check --recommends 
           ID-1: /dev/mmcblk0 model: SU08G size: 7.40 GiB block size: physical: 512 B logical: 512 B serial: <filter> 
           scheme: MBR 
           ID-2: /dev/mmcblk2 model: N/A size: 14.68 GiB block size: physical: 512 B logical: 512 B serial: <filter> rev: 0x8 
           scheme: MBR 
Partition: ID-1: / raw size: 14.56 GiB size: 14.27 GiB (98.03%) used: 4.36 GiB (30.6%) fs: ext4 block size: 4096 B 
           dev: /dev/mmcblk2p2 
           ID-2: /boot raw size: 121.1 MiB size: 113.3 MiB (93.53%) used: 47.6 MiB (42.0%) fs: ext4 block size: 1024 B 
           dev: /dev/mmcblk2p1 
Swap:      Kernel: swappiness: 10 (default 60) cache pressure: 100 (default) 
           ID-1: swap-1 type: partition size: 1.91 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) priority: -2 dev: /dev/mmcblk0p2 
Sensors:   Missing: Required tool sensors not installed. Check --recommends 
Repos:     Packages: apt: 1173 lib: 716 flatpak: 0 
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list 
           1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian bullseye main
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/extrepo_mobian.sources 
           1: deb deb-src [arch=amd64 arm64 armhf] http://repo.mobian-project.org/ mobian main non-free
Info:      Processes: 177 Uptime: 5h 22m Memory: 1.88 GiB used: 615.7 MiB (31.9%) Init: systemd v: 245 runlevel: 5 Compilers: 
           gcc: N/A Shell: Bash v: 5.0.16 running in: tty 0 (SSH) inxi: 3.1.05

Posted: **Mon Aug 03, 2020 8:44 am**

I'll check out mobian as soon as I complete the hardest part. Getting the thing in my hands.

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