[HN Gopher] NewPipe on Linux, Using Android_translation_layer
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       NewPipe on Linux, Using Android_translation_layer
        
       Author : FuturisticGoo
       Score  : 117 points
       Date   : 2024-10-27 16:58 UTC (6 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (flathub.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (flathub.org)
        
       | yjftsjthsd-h wrote:
       | I feel like the interesting part is mostly
       | https://gitlab.com/android_translation_layer/android_transla...
       | which is probably an alternative to waydroid, but maybe more like
       | WINE so it doesn't need the binder kernel module?
       | 
       | EDIT to add: I also think packaging up an application plus the
       | compatibility layer using flatpak[0] is a really nice idea; it
       | lets you 1. make those apps available in a way that nearly
       | appears native, 2. lets you get users/testers on your compat
       | layer easily, while 3. scoping it to a single app at a time to
       | make it easier to do things like "well we've got this one app
       | working, but how do we tell people that without them expecting
       | other things to work that aren't implemented yet?". Excellent
       | symbiosis:)
       | 
       | [0] Strictly speaking there shouldn't be anything requiring
       | flatpak here... I _think_ there 's no technical blocker
       | preventing you making a debian package for the ATL and another
       | for NewPipe and sticking them in a repo/PPA that people could
       | add. But I do somewhat feel that flatpak lends itself to this
       | usecase.
        
         | bubblesnort wrote:
         | It's conceptually similar to wine, but rather a
         | reimplementation of the reference Android, which is AOSP.
         | 
         | See
         | https://gitlab.com/android_translation_layer/android_transla...
        
           | NoahKAndrews wrote:
           | Better link: https://gitlab.com/android_translation_layer/and
           | roid_transla...
        
         | NoahKAndrews wrote:
         | Definitely. I'd never heard of this one before; I'd love to
         | read a full comparison between the two.
        
         | sigh_again wrote:
         | Trying to reimplement Android without Binder is a doomed plan.
         | Everything about Android is so intrinsically linked to having
         | Binder available that you're just going to end up piling hacks
         | on hacks to have anything working. At this point, an x86
         | Android image will be better and more reliable. Somewhat just
         | as fast.
         | 
         | Services ? Binder. Intents (even internal ones) ? Binder. Play
         | Services / microG which 90% of apps use ? Binder. Permissions ?
         | Binder.
        
           | yjftsjthsd-h wrote:
           | > At this point, an x86 Android image will be better and more
           | reliable. Somewhat just as fast.
           | 
           | You mean a full VM?
        
             | sigh_again wrote:
             | No, merely using the standard Android emulator, as well as
             | the x86_64 images that have been available for a while (or
             | the ARM64 ones if you're on an M1 and others). With
             | hardware acceleration properly setup, it's a nice
             | experience.
             | https://developer.android.com/studio/run/emulator-
             | commandlin...
             | 
             | It does tend to be very unhappy when the system gets under
             | load though, and might be sluggish if you're running a
             | dozen IDEs on the side.
             | 
             | (Which, as comment under says, is technically a VM. But
             | QEMU gets a pass at pretending not to be a VM and rather
             | just black wizardry that makes bytes happy)
        
               | NoahKAndrews wrote:
               | The Android Emulator is a full VM under the hood.
               | Waydroid is a lighter-weight alternative that uses the
               | Binder implementation in the Linux kernel.
        
           | mappu wrote:
           | For most of Wine's life it was sufficient to implement the
           | system library ABI, but recent developments mean they also
           | have to trap the (unstable) syscall ABI with ptrace. You
           | could mimic Binder in userspace the same way, without the
           | kernel module. But even that's not a problem since Binder is
           | upstream and enabled by default in many distro kernels now.
        
             | ronsor wrote:
             | When did WINE start doing this? I always love a good read
             | on ptrace hacks.
        
               | lights0123 wrote:
               | https://github.com/wine-staging/wine-
               | staging/commit/595f2f98...
               | 
               | A new strategy is used that is much faster:
               | https://www.phoronix.com/news/Syscall-User-Dispatch-
               | Queued
        
         | charlieboardman wrote:
         | I have been hoping for compatibility layer + application
         | flatpaks for a while so it's nice to see someone doing it. My
         | dream is to have a bunch of flatpaks for the Microsoft office
         | suite
        
       | antics9 wrote:
       | Why would one want NewPipe on desktop when there's
       | https://freetubeapp.io/
        
         | ravenstine wrote:
         | Perhaps because one is accustomed to the NewPipe experience and
         | would prefer consistency across devices?
         | 
         | Never heard of Freetube, but it looks pretty snazzy.
        
           | ugjka wrote:
           | I tried it, it didn't feel like what you get on android and
           | had ui glitches
        
             | mastazi wrote:
             | I have been enjoying the new version that just came out
             | yesterday, they implemented a new video player and IMHO the
             | user experience is much improved, if the UI glitches you
             | mentioned were related to the player, maybe you could give
             | it a try.
        
           | anthk wrote:
           | Parabolic it's far better for desktop users.
        
           | prmoustache wrote:
           | I don't know, it makes sense that UI between desktop and
           | mobile would be different. I use Freetube on desktop and
           | newpipe on mobile.
           | 
           | Having said that, newpipe is not only a youtube client but
           | also a soundcloud, bandcamp and a few others too.
        
         | mixmastamyk wrote:
         | Doesn't work well on Wayland unfortunately. Don't know if this
         | one does but worth a shot.
        
           | EffrafaxOfWug wrote:
           | I have used FreeTube on wayland now for a long time without
           | any issues. Electron still uses x11 as the default on wayland
           | so you need to enable the wayland mode manually. You can
           | easily do that by setting the
           | ELECTRON_OZONE_PLATFORM_HINT=auto environment variable.
        
           | BadHumans wrote:
           | I use Freetube on Wayland with 0 issues.
        
             | prmoustache wrote:
             | Same here.
        
         | 3np wrote:
         | You know you could drop a recommendation without being so damn
         | submissive of OP. Let a thousand alternative clients bloom.
        
       | reify wrote:
       | for me freetube in the arch repo works great
       | 
       | https://github.com/FreeTubeApp/FreeTube
        
         | ugjka wrote:
         | I think it is in the AUR not arch official repos
        
       | varbhat wrote:
       | https://gitlab.com/android_translation_layer/android_transla...
       | 
       | https://gitlab.com/android_translation_layer/android_transla...
       | 
       | I wonder how well this approach works over anbox/waydroid's
       | approach.
        
       | sureglymop wrote:
       | This is amazing! Have been using Newpipe for years because of its
       | ability to group subscribed channels into different feeds.
        
         | throwaway81523 wrote:
         | On the desktop, youtube in the browser is tolerable with ublock
         | origin, so I use it in preference to youtube because of the
         | ability to show search results most recent first. Newpipe
         | (maybe due to technical obstacles, idk) doesn't do that and it
         | makes things harder.
        
       | clfdev wrote:
       | If you have a device running postmarketOS or Alpine Linux you can
       | try this out yourself with other Android apps. Just "sudo apk add
       | android-translation-layer" and then run
       | 
       | $ android-translation-layer some-app.apk
       | 
       | I tried a few (F-Droid, Spotify, Megalodon) but they all failed
       | with various issues, looks like there's a lot of API surface
       | still not covered. Hopefully a lot of it is fairly easy to add
       | now that the foundational work has been done!
        
       | KetoManx64 wrote:
       | Very cool stuff! I wonder if you can switch out the newpipe app
       | for the Tubular (https://github.com/polymorphicshade/Tubular)
       | fork which has SponsorBlock and ReturnYoutubeDislike built into
       | it.
        
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       (page generated 2024-10-27 23:00 UTC)