[HN Gopher] Android's desktop interface leaks
___________________________________________________________________
Android's desktop interface leaks
Author : thunderbong
Score : 116 points
Date : 2026-01-28 03:34 UTC (19 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (9to5google.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (9to5google.com)
| Klaster_1 wrote:
| I don't want a "PC future" where you can't just install software
| without OS vendor blessing.
| netdevphoenix wrote:
| Neither do I. But with Windows slipping badly, Google could
| start encroaching on their core tech.
| kace91 wrote:
| Linux seems to be gaining a lot of traction, both with the
| fall of windows and gaming being more than feasible.
|
| It makes sense for the tech savvy option to succeed, now that
| personal computing is disappearing. Average folks won't use a
| windows/macbook, they'll use phones and tablets.
|
| My only concern is ending in a macOS+asahi situation where
| supporting a single device requires mountains of effort.
| Loughla wrote:
| The fall of windows and Linux gaining traction.
|
| I've seen that written on here, Reddit, /., digg, hell even
| on usenet back in the day. . . .
| LorenDB wrote:
| And yet it's undeniable that 2025 had some of the biggest
| Linux hype in recent times:
|
| - Windows 10 went EOL and triggered a wave of people
| moving to Linux to escape Windows 11 - DHH's adventures
| in Linux inspired a lot of people (including some popular
| coding streamers/YouTubers) to try Linux - Pewdiepie made
| multiple videos about switching to Linux and selfhosting
| - Bazzite reported serving 1 PB of downloads in one month
| - Zorin reported 1M downloads of ZorinOS 18 in one month
| and crossed the 2M threshold in under 3 months - I
| personally recall seeing a number of articles from
| various media outlets of writers trying Linux and being
| pretty impressed with how good it was - And don't forget
| Valve announced the Steam Machine and Steam Frame, which
| will both run Linux and have a ton of hype around them
|
| In fact, I think that we will look back in 5 or 10 years
| and point at 2025 as the turning point for Linux on the
| desktop.
| kace91 wrote:
| Yes, but have you seen you real life non tech friends
| move to Linux?
|
| I'm seeing it now, and this is new.
| pjmlp wrote:
| Yes, and I also have seen they come back to Windows, when
| they got into issues sharing software or files with
| friends, or local goverment requirements, and didn't had
| a relative to do their IT support for free.
| pjmlp wrote:
| The cycling speech since Window XP Toy's R US L&F days,
| unfortunely.
|
| Less fragmentation, more focus, OEM support on devices
| selling on regular stores is needed, otherwise we won't get
| away from the yearly meme.
| flohofwoe wrote:
| > otherwise we won't get away from the yearly meme
|
| What's different in the last decade is that Windows is on
| an undeniable quality downward spiral, it's simply not
| important anymore for Microsoft.
|
| E.g. desktop Linux doesn't even need to improve, it just
| needs to wait for Windows to become worse ;)
| pjmlp wrote:
| Unless it becomes available for normies to buy laptops
| with it pre-installed at Saturn, Media Market, FNAC, Cool
| Blue, and co, it won't matter.
|
| They aren't going to buy them from Tuxedo.
| flohofwoe wrote:
| "Normies" buy smartphones and maybe a tablet, neither of
| those has Windows preinstalled either.
| pjmlp wrote:
| Available at Saturn, Media Market, FNAC, Cool Blue show
| floor.
| flohofwoe wrote:
| ...and a market share of 0.02% ;)
|
| https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-
| share/tablet/worldwide
|
| (I guess those 'Windows tablets' are running under
| convertible laptops or something...)
| pjmlp wrote:
| Where do you think normies that don't live in cities with
| Apple stores, or with salaries unable to afford Apple
| tax, get their smartphones and tablets?
|
| I have made zero mentions of Windows tablets, that market
| died with Windows 8, replaced by 2-1 laptops.
| fc417fc802 wrote:
| So just don't use windows? The only reason I use android to
| begin with is because the mobile centric distros I looked
| into didn't appear to be to the point I would want to daily
| drive them yet. If and when that changes I'll switch.
|
| The only real issue is sourcing good mobile hardware that
| isn't locked down. At least for the time being the pixel line
| satisfies that.
| direwolf20 wrote:
| This is why Valve invested so much in Linux. They saw the
| writing on the wall of Microsoft becoming Apple (but shittier).
| Now they have an alternative. If Microsoft charges a 30% tax on
| all Steam transactions and won't let Steam run unless they do
| that, Valve can heavily push Linux and Steam Machine sales.
| pjmlp wrote:
| And yet they failed to get game devs to natively target
| SteamOS.
|
| As long as they depend on Proton, they haven't fully solved
| their problem.
| flohofwoe wrote:
| Tbh, why bother?
|
| kernel32+user32+gdi32+d3d[11|12]+dxgi is a pretty great API
| abstraction for game development. And unlike Linux desktop
| APIs the Win32 APIs are actually stable, so those games
| will also work in 5 years, and most importantly,
| performance is the same or better than on Windows. It's
| unlikely that game devs directly targeting Vulkan would do
| any better, and when using a high level engine, any
| layering overhead in Proton is negligible anyway. And don't
| even get me started about the state of audio APIs on Linux
| ;)
|
| Also don't underestimate the amount of workarounds and
| tweaks that (most likely) go into Proton for games that
| make poor system API use. Without Proton those game-
| specific hacks would need to go into MESA, Wayland, X11 or
| various system audio libraries. At least Proton is one
| central place to accumulate all the game-specific warts in
| some dusty corner of their code base.
|
| TL;DR: just think of Proton as an extremely low level and
| slim cross-platform API for games (not all that different
| than SDL), and suddenly it makes a lot of sense. And I bet
| that in 5..10 years Windows will have regressed so much
| that it might actually be better to run games through a
| Proton-like shim even on Windows (assuming Windows hasn't
| become 'yet another Linux distro' by then anyway) ;)
| LtWorf wrote:
| Try running a directx 5 game and let me know how it goes.
| flohofwoe wrote:
| 29 years is a lot more than the 5.. years time window I'm
| talking about. 3 decades is basically "I will need an
| emulator for that" ;)
|
| But I think even a lot of D3D9 games should still work,
| and that's 2002 stuff. Also try running a 1997 Linux game
| binary on a modern Linux distro without recompiling, I
| doubt that's works all that well...
| Const-me wrote:
| > run games through a Proton-like shim even on Windows
|
| Already happening, to an extent. Specifically, modern
| Intel GPUs do not support DirectX 9 in hardware, yet
| legacy apps run fine. The readme.txt they ship with the
| drivers contains a paragraph which starts with the
| following text: "SOFTWARE: dxvk The zlib/libpng License"
| DXVK is a library which implements Direct3D on top of
| Vulkan, and an important component of SteamOS.
| pjmlp wrote:
| With game studios using Windows + Visual Studio, what a
| win!
| flohofwoe wrote:
| VS2026 is actually quite decent again (surprising tbh),
| but the good thing today is that a lot more UI apps
| support Linux than 20 years ago. E.g. I would just give
| my artists a Linux desktop running Blender, and generally
| test on a connected min-spec PC (also for the devs even
| if they are working on a high-end Windows PC in VStudio).
| E.g. similar to console-development, the low-end PC is
| essentially the devkit. Also has the advantage that there
| will be no performance surprises on release when most
| gamers try to run the game on their laptop or RTX2060 ;)
|
| One thing I would definitely do is to replace MSVC with
| Clang, MSVC is just too far behind and it almost looks
| like MS abandondend it.
| direwolf20 wrote:
| Are we boycotting shit software, or the entire company
| that produced it?
| anonymous908213 wrote:
| I'm not sure how they could have failed that if that was
| never their goal in the first place. The entire point of
| Proton is that the Win32 API is infinitely more stable and
| worthwhile to target than anything Linux distros offer, and
| that the financial incentives aren't there for developers
| to 5x their platform distribution effort to reach 1% more
| users. An approach that relies on developers doing that
| would never work, and fortunately for Valve that _isn 't_
| their approach.
| TheCraiggers wrote:
| You're thinking of now. Proton didn't exist yet the first
| time they tried Steam OS.
|
| To be fair to Valve though, back then, there was a lot of
| movement in direct ports for Linux games. Humble Bundle
| (before they were bought) was spending real money on it
| and companies like Feral sprang up to help with titles
| like Mordor. It looked like there was going to be some
| real change.
|
| But for various reasons the momentum waned. One of those
| reasons might be the existence of Proton itself. Some
| people were very against it because they thought it might
| lead to less native ports.
| anonymous908213 wrote:
| Oh, right. I _completely_ forgot SteamOS 1 existed, haha.
| pjmlp wrote:
| Which is exactly my point, keeping game studios on
| Windows + Visual Studio acomplishes nothing in regards to
| cut the dependency on Windows gaming.
| TheCraiggers wrote:
| I wouldn't say that. Software support for Linux is a
| chicken and egg problem. No software because there's no
| users because there's no software.
|
| Proton helps fix the users part. If a critical mass is
| accomplished, that can have real long-term impact.
| pjmlp wrote:
| Helps as much as it helped OS/2.
| palata wrote:
| > As long as they depend on Proton, they haven't fully
| solved their problem.
|
| Maybe not, but they fully solved my problem with games,
| which was that I could not play on Linux. I started playing
| again just because of the SteamDeck, I think it's a pretty
| big achievement :-).
| pjmlp wrote:
| Hardly any different than running MAME.
| palata wrote:
| Never heard of MAME before :-)
| badsectoracula wrote:
| MAME is an emulator running games in fully emulated
| machines, Proton/Wine is a compatibility layer that runs
| games natively by the interfaces they expect.
|
| The _closest_ situation would be with comparing Wine
| running via CPU translation under ARM or RISC-V with how
| RPCS3 recompiles PowerPC games to native x86 code, but
| even then the comparison wouldn 't be accurate as RPCS3
| still does full system emulation whereas Proton/Wine
| integrates with the underlying OS.
|
| Proton/Wine is closer to Java/JVM than MAME (or any other
| emulator) and that is when running on a different CPU
| than x86/x86_64 as on the latter it is just a PE loader
| with a bunch of DLLs reimplementing various APIs.
| beAbU wrote:
| What's the purpose of a native build if the windows build
| runs just as good, or even better?
|
| They ensured that the devs need not worry about another
| build target that requires extensive QA. Maybe in the
| distant future we will get ubiquitous native builds, but
| honestly and again, who cares?
|
| Proton and Wine means there is a single target now, instead
| of the fragmented mess that is Desktop Linux today.
| sofixa wrote:
| > Microsoft becoming Apple (but shittier)
|
| At least Microsoft haven't fallen so low as to fail basic
| design principles like having transparent on top of
| transparent buttons, having disappearing controls depending
| on window size (scrollbars), or having corners so rounded
| that the click to drag mostly being outside the actual
| window.
|
| The Windows 11 UI is annoying, but at least it doesn't look
| like a kid's toy.
| direwolf20 wrote:
| Apple's bad ideas look ugly. Microsoft's bad ideas lock you
| out of your computer, delete your files and give the
| undeleted files to the FBI.
| flohofwoe wrote:
| > At least Microsoft haven't fallen so low as to fail basic
| design principles like having transparent on top of
| transparent buttons
|
| That's just because Microsoft has been there done that
| already 2 decades ago ;) (IIRC in Windows Vista).
|
| Same with the fine-grained in-your-face permission popups.
| Introduced by Microsoft in Vista, copied by Apple in Mojave
| ;)
| pjmlp wrote:
| One more reason for Apple to actually have delivered it
| properly, given that they had Microsoft's failures to
| learn from.
| sofixa wrote:
| Not really, Apple permission prompts aren't different
| enough. It's just a random prompt to put in your
| password, with limited information why.
|
| The Windows ones look very different, dim the rest of the
| screen, and have more info.
| JCattheATM wrote:
| > At least Microsoft haven't fallen so low as to fail basic
| design principles like having transparent on top of
| transparent buttons,
|
| They did that but made it work well all the way back with
| Windows 7, maybe even Vista.
| sunaookami wrote:
| Having a mandatory sign-in prompt when opening Notepad and
| two context menus is way worse than anything Apple did in
| Tahoe.
| palata wrote:
| Same, but my PC runs on Linux so I don't feel threatened.
|
| I feel like at some point normies may end up just using iPadOS
| or Android as a "convergent" device: a tablet/phone that they
| can plug into a docking station and use as a computer.
|
| I am sort of hoping that it will work with something like
| GrapheneOS, so that I will be able to benefit from it on my
| phone.
| orev wrote:
| > my PC runs on Linux so I don't feel threatened.
|
| Well, you _should_ feel threatened. Where do you think the
| push towards TPM and secure boot is heading? Microsoft is
| insanely envious of how Apple and Google locked down their
| platforms and have total control over app stores, and that's
| what Microsoft wants too. It's a huge revenue stream they're
| leaving on the table. Now that there's precedent on mobile,
| they'll have no problem pushing it through on desktop.
|
| And once all the normies have moved to iPads, there won't be
| a big enough market for anyone to manufacture PC hardware for
| hobbyists anymore.
| palata wrote:
| Right, I guess we agree but I was not clear.
|
| In general, I don't care so much if Windows or macOS become
| as locked as Android or iOS, _as long as I can install
| Linux on my hardware_.
|
| My point is that many people seem to complain because they
| want to be root on the Google-certified Android. I disagree
| with that: Google makes an OS where you cannot be root. If
| you want an OS where you can be root, you _should be able_
| to install another OS on the hardware you bought. Because
| you _should own that hardware_. But you don 't own Google.
| Aldipower wrote:
| No thanks.
| daoboy wrote:
| Many years ago I used to play around with CyanogenMod and Linux.
|
| Life with work and a family became too busy to fuss with that
| stuff, but I'm rapidly approaching the point where abuse from
| android and Microsoft make using a less polished OS worth the
| bother.
| mhitza wrote:
| You'll be happy to hear then that the experience has improved
| significantly over the past decade.
| esperent wrote:
| Eh, it's better. But it's still a mess unless you're using a
| device specifically designed for Linux like a Steamdeck or
| Framework. Expect to spend a _lot_ of time messing around in
| the console if you install on an arbitrary laptop that came
| with Windows installed. Wifi problems, sleep problems,
| external monitor problems, laptop screen brightness problems,
| graphics card problems.
| GreenVulpine wrote:
| Does it still require wiping your drive and enabling developer
| mode to install software outside the Play Store like ChromeOS
| does? DOA if so.
| skybrian wrote:
| I believe you can run Linux in a container and use apt-get.
|
| https://chromeos.dev/en/linux/setup
| g947o wrote:
| Using applications with a GUI isn't a very enjoyable
| experience in that environment.
| N_Lens wrote:
| Google's entire business is predicated on collecting as much data
| on users as possible. This OS will be the worst spyware
| imaginable.
| titzer wrote:
| No, only the 85% or so of it that's accreted since about 2008.
| Prior to that it actually made money by offering useful search
| results without infringing on user privacy. That core business
| model could still work to power a company about 1/8th the size
| of current Google. Current Google cannot survive on that model.
| Something went really wrong when it put growthism above all
| else.
| pwg wrote:
| > Something went really wrong
|
| What went wrong was Google (the old 'do no evil' Google)
| bought the ad network DoubleClick. The acquired DoubleClick
| side then took over old Google from the inside out such that
| what we have today is Doubleclick calling itself "google", no
| more 'do no evil' old Google anywhere, and all the evil that
| exists on the advertising side infesting everything they do.
| g947o wrote:
| That ship sailed many years ago with Windows 11, and Windows 10
| to some extent.
|
| By the way, you forgot Android itself.
| Imustaskforhelp wrote:
| If this allows one to still have (linux terminals?), then its
| (fine?) but Klaster_1 suggests that installing software would
| become hard without OS vendor blessing.
|
| I mean, is this OS literally just android with a more desktop
| like UI?
|
| Didn't Samsung have something like this called (just searched)
| Samsung Dex?
|
| https://duckduckgo.com/?q=Samsung+DeX&t=ffab&ia=images&iax=i...
|
| What I would prefer is a linux device phone being more widespread
| than Android PC. Linux in PC is mostly pretty good.
|
| We probably need some good linux phones. One of the biggest
| issues I find is that they are really price-y so even though I
| don't want much specs, I find it troubling to justify a 2x price
| increase in such sense.
|
| > Didn't Samsung have something like this called (just searched)
| Samsung Dex?
| realusername wrote:
| Samsung Dex still exists and still sucks. It's probably the
| best desktop experience available on Android but it's nowhere
| near usable as a daily driver. It feels a like a lightweight
| window manager from the 2008 era.
| pjmlp wrote:
| It is good enough that a Samsung tablet has replaced my now
| dead netbook.
| monologue6894 wrote:
| Some "first look"
|
| It's just a slightly different showcase of the same UI shown in
| this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yzDO-GS-Bm8
|
| That UI is available to test on any Pixel 10 (maybe even any
| Android 16 device?)
| jakub_g wrote:
| I do have it in Pixel 8 after enabling in developer options.
| It's a bit buggy and low resolution, but does the job when e.g.
| I want to connect some video I'm already watching on mobile to
| the external display via USB-C. (You can connect a mouse via
| Bluetooth to the phone, or via a USB dongle plugged into your
| monitor, to control it.)
|
| An interesting thing is that you can run apps X and Y on
| desktop screen while also run app X on mobile screen
| independently.
| ndr wrote:
| Chrome and Android look like yin and yang: one never knows which
| one is planned to run inside the other.
| fanatic2pope wrote:
| I have absolutely no interest in expanding the use of Android in
| my life. I am, in fact, far more interested in going the other
| way and trying to reduce my reliance on any locked down
| platforms.
| Ronsenshi wrote:
| Is it going to be the same future as Fuchsia OS? There were some
| good ideas in that one, but then one day it sort of disappeared.
| Not that that was surprising - Google is good at that.
| bossyTeacher wrote:
| I believe the Google Nest devices ship with Fuchsia
| LtWorf wrote:
| I'm sure they will be discontinued in a few days.
| pjmlp wrote:
| See Android Things, does anyone still remember it, or
| Brillo that was originally supposed to be it?
| IshKebab wrote:
| Yeah they failed pretty hard at least three times on the
| IoT front. To be fair I think they're _finally_ making
| some kind of progress with Matter. About 10 years late,
| but still.
| poisonborz wrote:
| It was an experiment to keep bright engineers busy with cool
| ideas to show off.Even back then they could have known that it
| is not a viable idea to make a tectonic platform switch with
| not much business arguments for it.
| IshKebab wrote:
| I don't think so. Feels like it was more about getting away
| from Linux and all the driver issues it entails.
|
| It's a very long-term bet for sure.
| jillesvangurp wrote:
| Unless Google reorganizes and gets more focused, I'd say they
| are highly likely to repeat their mistakes.
|
| IMHO both Apple and Google are missing a big opportunity here.
| Both are doing work to blur the lines between desktop and
| mobile. Both are targeting laptops, ar, phones, and tablets.
|
| These are multiple modalities. Or they should be. But because
| the way both are structured, these are isolated islands with
| some interoperability but the whole experience is very device
| centric.
|
| What's nicer is when you have multiple devices and a clean
| handover between them. You basically sign in and all your apps
| and data are there. All the open apps have the same state. They
| just adapt to the formfactor.
|
| Apple has been taking babysteps here but it's still hopelessly
| compartmentalizing the market. So switching between devices is
| a lot of setup and install friction.
|
| And for Google, they've been banging the drum that everything
| is cloud based since forever. Yet they can't figure out a cross
| device UX that makes sense. It should be as simple as sign in
| and all your stuff is there. That was the vision with ChromeOS
| at some point but then they lost interest, got distracted by
| Fuchsia, went off and created Flutter and also forgot that
| Android was the thing that actually has an enormous amount of
| users and OEMs shipping it.
|
| The trillion dollar opportunity here: if devices become like
| shoes, many people probably have more than one. Some people
| have many pairs of shoes for different occasions. But they have
| only one phone. Because switching between devices is painful.
| Adding another OS to the mix just kicks that can down the road.
| Multi device, multi modal access to your stuff is the key thing
| that they should be nailing. If e.g. Apple were to nail that,
| some people might have many different devices in different
| sizes and form factors. The main decision as to which one to
| use would be based on which is most appropriate for the
| context.
|
| If you take something like that as the starting point, the
| logical conclusion is that Google should evolve Android to run
| on any type of device and make sure that everything plays nice
| together. Switching between your Android phone(s), tablet, TVs,
| car, AR/VR goggles, or laptops should not be hard. Devices
| running a version of Android exist in all those categories. But
| there's very little/no integration across these.
| attendant3446 wrote:
| What is Apple doing to blur the line between desktop and
| mobile? Is it the abomination they call iPadOS? It's a joke,
| it's nothing more than iOS+.
|
| They've made it perfectly clear that they want to keep
| desktop and mobile separate in order to convince their
| customers to buy all their devices.
| g947o wrote:
| I don't think nobody has solved the problem of mobile/desktop
| split so far.
|
| Microsoft's Surface Pro line barely made any difference --
| nobody buys it to use it as a tablet, and generally the touch
| experience is just bad if you have ever used a real tablet.
|
| Apple pretends to try and market iPad as your next computer,
| but we all know how it works. (They also have this thing that
| allows phone apps to run natively on MacOS, but that has got
| near zero traction.)
|
| Samsung tried as well, half-mindedly, and I can confidently
| say a Samsung phone doesn't work as well as a PC in DeX mode.
|
| So now it's Google. I don't think they can come up with some
| magic solution to change this.
| jauntywundrkind wrote:
| This effort is the abandonment. This is ChromeOS bring shut
| down, this is the one taking over the many.
| DeathArrow wrote:
| I don't want any kind of store on my PC.
| Moomoomoo309 wrote:
| Oh, I see Google's angle now. They want to make android a viable
| desktop OS in order to have more users using android Chrome
| rather than Windows Chrome, because the former lacks extension
| support, and thus ad blockers. Of course, you can still install
| brave or kiwi browser or Firefox to your heart's content, but
| most people won't. It's brilliantly simple. It's not too bad for
| power users, they'll probably use a different browser, or for
| developers, given the work they're putting into the Linux
| containers, but for most users...we'll see the expected result.
| yjftsjthsd-h wrote:
| This shows a version of Chrome with extensions.
|
| > The Google Chrome interface mostly aligns with the current
| large-screen Android version except for the Extensions button,
| which is currently only available on the desktop browser.
| solarkraft wrote:
| The Android system is such a pain to work with. I'm curious to
| see whether they actually fixed the fundamentals making it
| unappealing for general purpose computing or they just stuck
| Android onto Chromebooks (guessing the latter).
| dfajgljsldkjag wrote:
| This looks like it will help a lot of students and families who
| are on a budget. If you can just plug your phone into a screen
| you do not need to buy a separate laptop anymore. The browser
| extensions are the most important part because that is what makes
| a computer useful. I am glad to see they are thinking about this.
| ashleyn wrote:
| How will this succeed where the Motorola Atrix failed way back
| in 2011?
|
| https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2011/03/the-motorola-atrix-4...
| ortusdux wrote:
| How as adoption been for Samsung's DEX?
| wronglebowski wrote:
| I've only used it when I'm in a pinch but it's handy.
| Blowing up mobile apps to a larger screen and multitasking
| isn't ideal certainly but I've been able to handle "email
| job" type activities while out of pocket. That said I've
| never heard of anyone else who's actually used it.
| bsimpson wrote:
| ChromeOS has a bigger influence on the market than a random
| phone model from CES when Android was still establishing
| itself.
| wat10000 wrote:
| Phones were way less powerful 15 years ago and native
| software was much more important. A modern phone CPU running
| a browser on a larger screen takes care of a lot of what you
| need these days.
| duffyjp wrote:
| My Moto Edge 2024 has "Ready For" which is basically this
| still today. I plug in the USB-C cable normally connected to
| my work MacBook and I instantly get a full desktop
| experience; mouse, keyboard and sound included.
|
| It's how I play Minecraft with my kids when they get the
| itch. Sometimes if I know I'm only gonna be zoning out on
| Youtube at night I'll use to to save a few watts too.
|
| It can do 1440p at 120hz, all on a really affordable phone.
| It's nice.
| Zak wrote:
| Android Chrome _not_ having extensions is just a build option
| toggle. It doesn 't have extensions because Google doesn't want
| it to, not for technical reasons.
| NewsaHackO wrote:
| Yea, I very much doubt they would ever put a browser
| extension on this. It's funny, I feel as though reading some
| Google dev's response on reddit about why mobile chrome
| didn't have extensions was my inflection point when I started
| to realize they were becoming evil.
| izacus wrote:
| There's literally a screenshot of Chrome with extensions in
| the article you're comenting on.
|
| Why are you confidently commenting if you didn't even
| attempt to read the article?
| NewsaHackO wrote:
| >Android Chrome not having extensions is just a build
| option toggle. It doesn't have extensions because Google
| doesn't want it to, not for technical reasons.
|
| The leak screenshots are from the dev version of the app.
| It has not been confirmed to actually have extensions
| enabled in the prod version, which is what the parent
| poster was talking about. It would have been prudent to
| actually read the post I was replying to and the actual
| article, not just look at pictures.
| yencabulator wrote:
| It'd be really weird if extensions got enabled/disabled based
| on whether the USB cable is plugged into a monitor or not.
|
| I expect the eventual production version of this will have
| extensions _if and only if_ the normal Android Chrome has
| extensions at that time.
| echelon wrote:
| As Google's domination continues, the US and EU need to force
| mobile OS vendors to open up platforms for third party app
| installation without gatekeeping, deep menu toggles, or scare
| walls.
|
| You already need a phone to pay for parking, order at
| residents, identify yourself with the government, etc. Two
| companies should not dictate essential life function
| interaction.
|
| The monopoly grip on this is so tight that it's almost
| impossible to compete.
| joe_mamba wrote:
| _> This looks like it will help a lot of students and families
| who are on a budget. If you can just plug your phone into a
| screen you do not need to buy a separate laptop anymore._
|
| Except that android phones with display output are mostly
| flagships with flagship prices.
|
| But 50 Euros on the used market got me a retired corporate
| HP/Dell laptop with 1080p screen, intel 8th gen i5 quad core,
| 8GB RAM and 256GB NVME on which I put Linux. Way better for
| studying and productivity than my android phone hooked up to
| the TV.
|
| It's a nice feature to have as a backup in case my laptop dies,
| but I wouldn't daily drive an android phone as a desktop
| computer for productivity.
| gf000 wrote:
| A 2-3 generation old pixel on the second hand marker is not
| expensive at all though.
|
| And you easily add a mouse/keyboard just fine to it.
| jeffbee wrote:
| Note that such capabilities were added to the 8 _after_ it
| launched. When they launched it they did not even mention
| that it contains displayport alt mode.
| joe_mamba wrote:
| _> A 2-3 generation old pixel on the second hand marker is
| not expensive at all though._
|
| Sure but at around 300 bucks is still way over 50 bucks.
|
| And even if you get a used Pixel 8, having separate phone
| and computer adds a priceless layer of redundancy and
| flexibility.
|
| If someone steals my phone, I don't want to also loose my
| work PC with it.
| cogman10 wrote:
| You are also buying a soon to be unmaintained device
| which will fall out of security support.
|
| That $50 PC can run linux with the latest kernel for the
| next 20 years (maybe longer).
| joe_mamba wrote:
| There's lineageOS for outdated pixel device, but I think
| you loose device attestation if you flash that, so your
| banking, payment and digital-ID apps won't work anymore
| which is kind of important features for a lot of people.
|
| I still think separating a phone for phone apps and a PC
| for productivity, is the best choice even if that PC is a
| 20 year old rustbucket from the dumpster, it will still
| do more tasks than a phone. You can't learn photoshop on
| a phone.
| cogman10 wrote:
| The lineageOS kernel isn't guaranteed to be super up to
| date. It's often based on the manufacturer's kernel.
| There's also possibly binary blobs involved which can't
| be checked or updated.
| joe_mamba wrote:
| If your device is on the official supported list then it
| will always be up to date to a point. You're not gonna
| get android 16 on 10+ year old phones.
| IncreasePosts wrote:
| Your banking app might not work but your bank probably
| also offers a web page that you can just load up in your
| browser
| semi-extrinsic wrote:
| Isn't Pixel 10 the first one with fully supported desktop
| mode?
|
| I remember I was very confused when buying a Pixel 7 to
| replace my (then 3 year old) Huawei P30 Pro, and the
| inferior camera + lack of desktop mode made it feel like a
| net downgrade.
| ThePointed wrote:
| I use it on my Pixel 8 Pro too It's a toggle in Developer
| options, Local Desktop.
| adrian_b wrote:
| According to Google's help site, no Pixel has a desktop
| mode (like you can find at Motorola, Samsung and others).
|
| The latest Pixel models have DisplayPort, but their
| operating system only provides screen mirroring or app
| window mirroring on an external monitor. Unlike Pixel,
| the phones with a true desktop mode can display multiple
| windows on the monitor, and presumably they can have a
| selectable resolution for the monitor. I assume that for
| screen mirroring the monitor is used at the same
| resolution as the phone screen, i.e. either 1080 lines or
| only slightly more.
|
| Moreover, while the help site states that DisplayPort
| exists in Pixel 8 and newer, Google does not bother to
| advertise the existence of this feature in its online
| shop, where there is no mention about this in the phone
| specifications.
| okokwhatever wrote:
| Do you understand how much are 50 bucks in a third world
| country? I mean, Android phone is not the cheapest solution
| for the poor (obviously) but it helps a lot having this kind
| of features for a family.
| joe_mamba wrote:
| _> Do you understand how much are 50 bucks in a third world
| country?_
|
| Yes I do, no need to patronize us with that since even in
| 3rd world countries people have access to old computers
| from ewaste imports at a reasonable price, we don't all
| live in straw mudhuts wearing loincloths swinging from
| branch to branch.
|
| Now tell me which 50 euro phone ships with display output
| and is readily available. AFAIK Oneplus 7T I had is the
| cheapest with that feature but still over 50 and official
| SW goes to Android 12. Not sure if flashing lineage will
| still keep display output feature.
|
| Then there's the issue of availability in 3rd world
| countries, where it might be easier to find some scrapped
| Dell optiplex with a core 2 duo, or a beat up Acer from the
| windows 7 era for cheap at your local market versus a cheap
| android with display output capabilities being more of a
| unicorn. Sure you'll find your Pixel 8s and or Samsung S24s
| too, but those imports don't come cheap there, compared to
| the masses of lesser known cheap chinese phones but those
| don't have display output and their software is shit.
|
| Plus, if you go that route of Pixel 8 as a pc, you still
| need the budget for an external display, mouse and keyboard
| and your battery will wear out much faster. So then why not
| get a cheap laptop which has all the peripherals?
|
| Plus 2, old phones age very poorly performance wise, they
| slow down a lot due to thermal paste and battery
| degradation and nobody makes quality OP 7T batteries
| anymore to do a swap and get back to out of the box
| performance. What you find on Aliexpress now are fakes or
| poor quality clones. While a laptop is much easier to
| repair and maintain as parts wear out or break.
| drecked wrote:
| This is mistaken in a few way.
|
| 1. In 3rd world countries everyone has a phone, usually
| android, no matter how poor the are. Irrespective of
| whether or not it has desktop capabilities. So any phone
| purchase is already part of their baseline expenses.
|
| 2. Any desktop/laptop purchase, even if it is $1, is an
| extra $1.
|
| 3. The screens/keyboards/mouse again will not likely be
| purchased by individuals themselves. They will have
| "Internet cafes", libraries, schools, etc where those
| screens will be provided.
| joe_mamba wrote:
| _> This is mistaken in a few way._
|
| Only when you ignore the numbers.
|
| _> 1. [...] So any phone purchase is already part of
| their baseline expenses._
|
| Yeah but that base line expense can be 50$ or $300. Big
| difference. Not everyone in 3rd world countries has 300
| for a Pixel 8. That's the biggest flaw in your argument.
| That, and the fact that walking around with an exotic
| 300$ Pixel 8 flags you as a potential target for mugging
| in the wrong neighbourhoods, verus a beat up 50$ Samsung
| or Huawei.
|
| _> 2. Any desktop/laptop purchase, even if it is $1, is
| an extra $1._
|
| Hence why a 50$ laptop and a 50$ android phone leaves you
| better off than blowing 300$ on just the phone alone. And
| if even 1$ is THAT critical to your daily survival, then
| you're not buying 300$ phones anyway to begin with.
| You're buying the cheapest you can get so that in case it
| gets stolen you don't lose 6 months of savings.
|
| _> 3. The screens/keyboards/mouse again will not likely
| be purchased by individuals themselves. They will have
| "Internet cafes", libraries, schools, etc where those
| screens will be provided._
|
| You think in 3rd world countries people just have
| displays with USB-C docks, keyboards and mice everywhere
| in public and at home? I know it's getting difficult to
| tell them apart these days, but we're talking about 3rd
| world countries, not the bay area.
| kasabali wrote:
| you've missed:
|
| 4. used electronics in 3rd world countries are much more
| expensive compared to developed ones (because not as much
| units were sold when they were new to begin with), so 50
| euros will get you a 3rd gen in a poor condition at best
| (or some shit tier Celeron N-thousand something with a
| soldered 4GB RAM)
| joe_mamba wrote:
| Few issues with that.
|
| For one, PCs still make it there via ewaste shipments
| that then get repaired and sold for cheap, so you can
| have decent variety of old stuff.
|
| And secondly, even a "3rd gen in a poor condition at best
| (or some shit tier Celeron N-thousand something with a
| soldered 4GB RAM)" as you call it, is better for learning
| marketable skills and making stuff, than whatever you can
| do on your phone, since office jobs will ask for skills
| with using a PC, not how skilled you are using a phone.
|
| But hey, if you think you can pass through engineering
| school with only a phone and no computer, then all power
| to you.
| kasabali wrote:
| > For one, PCs still make it there via ewaste shipments
| that then get repaired and sold for cheap, so you can
| have decent variety of old stuff.
|
| No you can't. Unlike you, I'm talking from experience
| when I'm telling what EUR50 gets you in used marked in a
| non-developed country.
| joe_mamba wrote:
| ok, as you say, I'm not gonna argue about it
| izacus wrote:
| Can you be specific which countries are you talking
| about?
|
| Because you seem to be in a word fight with very vague
| arguments and with someone else with very vague arguments
| and it's not even clear you're talking about same things.
|
| So can you be clear on:
|
| - Which counties you're talking about? - Why are those
| countries important to think about in this case? - Why
| doesn't this feature help people from regions that can
| afford a mid-to-top range smartphone?
| joe_mamba wrote:
| _> - Which counties you're talking about?_
|
| Pick any you like, Income/GDP is more important metric
| rather than which specific country.
|
| _> - Why are those countries important to think about in
| this case?_
|
| Why are you asking me? Ask the people who brought up
| third world countries as the target user base for phones
| with display output. I'm the one not agreeing with this
| point since it's stupid.
|
| _> - Why doesn't this feature help people from regions
| that can afford a mid-to-top range smartphone?_
|
| I explained already below in detail why. But to reiterate
| in short, if your monthly income is in the ~200$ a month
| ballpark, you're not gonna be spending 300$ on a mid-to-
| top range smartphone just for the display output feature
| even if you managed to save up that money. Even in Europe
| some people skoff at paying 300 Euros for a phone but
| some here think people in nations with 10x less income
| are somehow the userbase for this feature because in
| their mind those people can't afford a 20$ dumpster PC,
| but somehow they can afford a 300$ pixel 8 and external
| monitor.
| LoganDark wrote:
| I have some friends in Argentina where even just a few
| USD goes a long way. I occasionally throw them something
| like $10 USD and that gets them GPU, disk upgrades, etc.,
| it's nuts.
| jeroenhd wrote:
| If you can't find an affordable phone with DP-Alt mode,
| you can get it working by getting clever.
|
| Any Android phone with a USB port can have a dock
| attached with ethernet, a keyboard, and a mouse. Connect
| a Chromecast to any HDMI display. Cast to that display.
|
| Then install 1) a taskbar app (there are dozens on Google
| Play), 2) enable freeform windows in the device and 3)
| cast your phone to your Chromecast.
|
| Alternatively, even the shitty phones with just USB 2
| dongles can enable their desktop mode by using
| DisplayLink; no DP-Alt mode necessary. Worse on the
| battery, but works over USB micro if need be.
|
| The biggest hurdle is software support. For getting the
| display to work, there are plenty of workarounds
| possible.
| nutjob2 wrote:
| You don't wired need display output, just WiFi. Motorola's
| Smart Connect desktop uses Miracast for using TVs and the
| like as desktop monitors as well as wired.
|
| I got my moto g84 5G with 8/256 GB for about 170 euros new
| and it supports it (not wired). Seems to work fine.
| joe_mamba wrote:
| Is it any good? Last time I tried miracast the framerate
| and video quality was total garbage due to shit
| compression. Barely worked for streaming youtube videos to
| the TV but no way I could do it for productivity.
| cromka wrote:
| Same here. The only way to make streaming between devices
| is the way Apple does it, directly, not via Access Point.
| LoganDark wrote:
| Doesn't Apple do it by having the AirPlay receiver be its
| own access point? LAN in comparison indeed isn't ideal.
| jeroenhd wrote:
| Mirecast (when done properly) is basically a video stream
| over a peer-to-peer WiFi Direct connection.
| H.264+AAC/AC3/PCM audio sent over RTSP/RTP using a
| standard IPv4 stack. Better codecs are available on newer
| devices. Two modern WiFi 6 devices can stream gigabits
| per second that way if configured right, there's no need
| for the typical low FPS, lag, and desynchronised audio
| from a protocol standpoint.
|
| For some reason, a lot of implementations (especially on
| the receiving end) suck at this. The latency seems to be
| terrible and TVs and displays seem to care more about
| reassembling old frames than about showing the latest
| good signal. However, it's not all that different from
| what Apple is doing.
|
| Miracast over ethernet/via an access point is something
| different (something I've never really seen used myself).
| adrian_b wrote:
| Actually many ridiculously expensive "flagship" smartphones
| do not have DisplayPort and some do not have even USB 3.
|
| The chances to find DisplayPort in what nowadays have become
| medium-price smartphones, i.e. $500 to $600, are about as
| good as finding DisplayPort in a "flagship".
| LoganDark wrote:
| > Except that android phones with display output are mostly
| flagships with flagship prices.
|
| My Motorola Photon Q 4G LTE was like $80 in 2015 and had a
| mini HDMI. I expect nowadays most phones can output display
| over USB-C.
| jeroenhd wrote:
| Some "flagship" and higher-end-midtier phones cheap out on
| the USB connection. USB 2 over USB-C with USB-PD for fast
| charging. No video out, slow data transfers.
|
| Maybe when desktop mode becomes more common there will be
| an incentive to fix the shitty USB situation.
|
| Cheap phones probably won't really have the power to
| effectively multi-task so I imagine cheap models would
| rather disable the feature than leave the user with a bad
| UI.
| LoganDark wrote:
| > USB 2 over USB-C with USB-PD for fast charging.
|
| Sometimes you're lucky to even have conformant USB-PD.
| For example, OnePlus for a while had "Warp charging" and
| the phones wouldn't accept high power over regular USB-C
| PD.
| nosrepa wrote:
| I'm ignorant on this topic, can you not just plug a USB dock
| with HDMI out in any android phone and get a display out? I
| do it all the time on the previous three pixel phones I've
| had, but I didn't know that this was limited to those?
| jerlam wrote:
| I don't think this leak implies that (all/some) Android phones
| will get desktop projection. It just means that Android has a
| desktop OS and is likely replacing ChromeOS as has been rumored
| for a while.
| lifetimerubyist wrote:
| Yeah and we'll be forced to do this because nobody can afford
| computers anymore because of Ram and SSD prices because of
| companies like Google buying it all up at extortionist prices.
|
| We're going backwards by putting all of our compute back in the
| warehouse.
| bigstrat2003 wrote:
| What makes a computer useful is the form factor (decent size
| screen, mouse and keyboard instead of touch controls) and
| having full control of the system. It has nothing to do with
| browser extensions.
| giancarlostoro wrote:
| Is this going to mean ChromeOS is going to eventually die or be
| merged with Android? Curious.
| ashleyn wrote:
| It appears ChromeOS is being killed and they're porting much of
| its feature set into Android. This may be marketed as
| "ChromeOS", with identical functionality, and consumers won't
| be none the wiser.
| d_silin wrote:
| Well, that would be nice, honestly - to have Android as another
| option for desktop OS.
|
| I remember there were some experiments to create a hardware
| laptop shell to insert smartphone into.
| d_silin wrote:
| Yep, it is called a "lapdock" now.
| ivell wrote:
| If it comes with fully functional command line, unix utils and
| ability to install linux apps from different stores, that would
| be great OS.
| gf000 wrote:
| That's already here. Android has native terminal in the
| developer settings and it even has a Wayland graphical
| environment. I have run Weston with a desktop chromium inside,
| playing a youtube video with sound.
| dizhn wrote:
| But no root.
| charcircuit wrote:
| A root account violates principle of least priviledge. With
| proper design a root account should not be needed.
| dizhn wrote:
| True but accessing your own files, pinging, network
| management etc aren't included in the things an Android
| terminal user can do. Hence the need for root.
| charcircuit wrote:
| That sounds like more of a need to be able to share files
| and folders with the terminal app and for there to be a
| ping command callable from nonroot added.
| augusteo wrote:
| The Chrome Extensions support is the interesting part here.
| That's often the dealbreaker for using mobile devices as computer
| replacements.
|
| Google's had this weird situation where Android and ChromeOS
| overlap more every year. At some point maintaining two operating
| systems with converging feature sets seems wasteful.
|
| My guess: ChromeOS probably survives for the education market
| where manageability matters more than capabilities. But for
| consumers? Android on a big screen with keyboard and mouse might
| just be good enough.
| oaiey wrote:
| It will not survive. No point in maintaining both. Just costs
| money. Device management for mobile phones is also a huge
| point.
|
| My educated guess: tablet/laptop hybrids with Android OS. Not
| that Apple has huge success with the same move
| supernes wrote:
| Any extensions that do something really "interesting" will be
| disallowed, cf. Manifest V3.
| zb3 wrote:
| I'm running AdGuard in Chromium right now. I don't see any
| ads, even on YouTube. May I ask what did you mean?
|
| Not that I don't think MV3 is limited, but.. we're comparing
| this against MV2, right? It was already missing basic
| functionality like full filtering of http responses, I
| remember a bug about not seeing POST bodies being open for
| 10+ years..
| theLiminator wrote:
| I wonder what gogole's strategy with fuchsia is going to be.
| Grazester wrote:
| What is currently is? As OS for home devices with a screen?
| spwa4 wrote:
| So I'm guessing ... no full adblockers allowed?
| yjftsjthsd-h wrote:
| Android runs Firefox.
| SimianSci wrote:
| It really does look to be a rewrite of ChromeOS to make it a
| native Android experience with very few tweaks to the User
| experience that I can see.
|
| I think it's a good idea on Google's part. The trend of consumers
| using mobiles as their one and only computing experience is still
| strong. This will blend the experience consumers have between
| desktops and their primary computing platform.
| evanjrowley wrote:
| It's a trend with Apple as well. It can be seen in iOS/macOS 26
| Tahoe. There's lots of untapped potential in those iPads with
| M-series CPUs. We've also had rumors of a "MacBook Air Lite"
| sporting a cellphone A-series CPU. The convergence is
| happening.
|
| I would love to be able to do more with my Google Pixel phone.
| Right now, the MacBook is my primary workstation, but the
| possibility of an even more "mobile" productivity setup is very
| enticing. Now if only I could get an Android tablet with the
| new "Terminal" feature in Android 15...
| gessha wrote:
| It is interesting to consider the different developments
| happening with the big mobile orgs regarding the convergence
| computing paradigm:
|
| - Samsung's Dex has been out for a while - independent devs have
| been working on Linux "as an app" for some time - Android desktop
| interface in this article - Apple developing video output on
| iPhones - Apple working on a Macbook with a mobile chip
|
| - another exciting thing is XR devices and mobile computing
|
| - my concern is convergence computing will reduce the importance
| of desktop interfaces and the freedom we have to install whatever
| applications we want
| freedomben wrote:
| > my concern is convergence computing will reduce the
| importance of desktop interfaces and the freedom we have to
| install whatever applications we want
|
| Yep, it absolutely will I expect. All the pieces are being or
| have been laid to build the new world where only a "trusted"
| device will be able to use the internet. Us nerds can still
| have our Linux, but it won't work with much of the internet
| because we won't be able to pass attestation.
|
| Building to that future is exactly what I would expect from
| Apple, but Google doing so has surprised me. Google doing so is
| also the thing that will bring it to pass, so there's a special
| seed of hatred for them germinating in my heart right now.
| Hopefully I'm just being alarmist and paranoid, but I really
| don't think I am.
|
| Some Refs:
|
| Web Environment Integrity:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_Environment_Integrity
|
| Private Access Token:
| https://developer.apple.com/news/?id=huqjyh7k
| NewsaHackO wrote:
| I think tech companies are realizing that the biggest
| "mistake" they have ever made was giving so much freedom to
| the desktop user. They hate that we can look into, modify,
| and delete files, hate that we can add custom-made software,
| and hate that we can identify and turn off
| tracking/telemetry. They realized this with the mobile
| platform and locked everything down, but by that time it was
| already too late.
| Elfener wrote:
| Authoritarian governments (that is, what unfortunately all
| governments want to be) also love this, since if a few big
| companies control all computing, they can regulate them to
| control the public.
|
| Fortunately, there are many computers already in the
| public's hands (which they can use to perform any
| computation without government restrictions and without
| paying/sending data to a company); but more and more people
| are switching to mobile platforms (and kids start out on
| these platforms) that I'm worried about the future.
| evanjrowley wrote:
| If this trend continues, then self-hosting may become the
| final bastion of hobbyist FOSS.
| WarmWash wrote:
| >my concern is convergence computing will reduce the importance
| of desktop interfaces and the freedom we have to install
| whatever applications we want
|
| The final nail was drilled into the coffin when a judge ruled
| Google a monopoly with Android a year or so ago.
|
| You would think this is good but:
|
| Apple _was not_ found to be a monopoly with iOS. Why?
|
| Because iOS doesn't allow any competitors, how can they be
| anti-competitive?
|
| The judge explained this Google when they raised the issue, and
| just like that, Android wants to become iOS.
|
| Good fucking job judge. 10,000 IQ ruling.
| mmmlinux wrote:
| I don't want a Chromebook with extra steps I want a real
| computer.
| whalesalad wrote:
| so... gnome?
| kelnos wrote:
| I enjoy cool features like this, but as usual, I'm wary of the
| consequences.
|
| Android is becoming more and more locked down like iOS. Even if
| it weren't, it's still always been more locked down than a
| standard desktop or laptop machine running an operating system of
| the user's choice.
|
| With the advent of smartphones and tablets, already I see non-
| and semi-technical users often dropping their laptop or desktop
| and just using their phone or tablet. (I know people who don't
| even have a laptop/desktop anymore.)
|
| Android having a full desktop interface will just add fuel to
| this fire, and further normalize running a locked-down OS and
| device that users don't truly own or control as their only
| computing platform.
| ssl-3 wrote:
| It wasn't always so locked-down as it is today.
|
| The OG Motorola Droid, for example: While it clearly wasn't a
| design intent, there was really nothing of any gravity to stop
| people from using it in any way they wished.
|
| Rooting was a simple matter of running a hacked _su_ command,
| and voila: One becomes root. The bootloader wasn 't locked at
| all. Custom kernels and userlands were normal. It was a great
| little pocket computer to goof around with for anyone who cared
| enough to give it a swing.
|
| Just install the "missing" su binary and...done.
|
| At the time, I felt that this was a perfectly acceptable way to
| keep it working reliably for regular folk.
| palata wrote:
| In a way I don't know what I think about them preventing me
| from modifying "their" certified OS. Many products do that
| (if I buy a Marshall smartspeaker, it's not like if I can
| modify the software, is it?).
|
| What I want is to be able to properly install an alternative
| OS (just like I don't care about what Windows or macOS do, as
| long as I can install Linux), and that goes with the
| bootloader unlocking/locking.
| bluGill wrote:
| The problem is for every person who wants to do this, there
| are hundreds (thousands?) who wouldn't want to - and these
| people are vulnerable various security exploits that would
| allow someone evil to take over their device.
|
| This isn't just a made up situation: There are nations that
| have large teams of people who's job is to figure out how
| to get software installed on your device of their
| choice/make/design, allowing them to do whatever they want.
| palata wrote:
| This isn't quite true. The Google Pixels allow me to
| unlock the bootloader, install my own system, and relock
| the bootloader. As a result, I run an alternative OS
| called GrapheneOS which is more secure than Android.
|
| The fact that I can unlock and relock the bootloader is
| not a security issue or a risk. People who don't know
| what that means cannot possibly do it by mistake.
|
| Now allowing root access to users on Android, that's a
| security risk because a user can be tricked into giving
| root access to some evil app. I don't have root access on
| my GrapheneOS, even though I chose to install it myself.
| Because it is more secure like this.
|
| So it sounds like a fair compromise to me: they make
| Android the way they want, and if I don't like it I can
| install an alternative OS. Just like I can install Linux
| if I don't like Windows. What I don't like is that most
| Android manufacturers actively try to prevent me from
| doing that, and I don't like it.
| bluGill wrote:
| There are options. However security has consistently
| found subtle things about most answers and so I hesitate
| to suggest any.
| makeramen wrote:
| > The fact that I can unlock and relock the bootloader is
| not a security issue or a risk. People who don't know
| what that means cannot possibly do it by mistake.
|
| The second sentence is false. Lots of people blindly
| follow things and don't understand consequences until
| they brick their devices. Those who don't break something
| won't notice if they've silently backdoored themselves.
|
| People asking for support after getting themselves into
| some weird hole they never should have been in because
| some friend or online article said so is super common.
| Anvoker wrote:
| > The second sentence is false. Lots of people blindly
| follow things and don't understand consequences until
| they brick their devices. Those who don't break something
| won't notice if they've silently backdoored themselves.
|
| "Lots of people", how many though? Can that number be
| reduced? What number would be acceptable?
|
| I feel like it _has_ to be possible to devise an
| unlocking procedure that dissuades most people from self-
| harm.
|
| The problem is often treated as intractable, but
| intuitively this seems really unlikely to me. I don't
| think more than a tiny percentage of Xiaomi owners, for
| example, would go through the bootloader unlock process
| which often has a mandatory wait period attached to it
| without a reason more compelling than an impulse to
| randomly and blindly follow instructions on the internet.
|
| I would like to see user studies with good methodology
| before other people decide to barter long-term freedoms
| away for insufficient benefit.
|
| Why do I so rarely see people who are concerned about the
| security issues of bootloader unlocking calling for
| designing hassle and warning into the process. Instead,
| it's more common to hear that in the name of the average
| user, all escape hatches must be removed.
| palata wrote:
| When you reboot in fastboot mode and enter the commands
| that break your phone, I think you're responsible.
|
| If you take a hammer and destroy your phone, I think
| you're responsible.
| palata wrote:
| I have mixed feelings as well.
|
| The security model of Android and iOS is vastly superior, and
| for "normal" users it is not so much of a problem if they don't
| have control they neither need nor want.
|
| On the other hand, I obviously don't like it when I don't have
| control over my hardware. But what I hate the most is when the
| manufacturers prevent me from installing an alternative OS. I
| like being able to install something like GrapheneOS.
|
| Also the fact that I'm forced (in practice) to use the Play
| Services is not really about the device being locked down.
| ece wrote:
| Vastly superior security doesn't make you give up freedoms
| for security. But do tell me how successful the war against
| scams has been for the average user.
| palata wrote:
| I am not sure what you are trying to say.
|
| Convincing a user to give their password will always be an
| issue, that's fundamental. But because phishing exists does
| not mean that security does not matter.
|
| Without security, there is no need to phish, because the
| system does not protect anything. Once you have a good
| security, then the best attack is phishing because it's
| easier to trick the human than the system. This means that
| the security is good, not bad.
| ece wrote:
| This level of security exists on open as well as closed
| platforms, the problem is the closed platforms not
| allowing you to do things that aren't giving your
| password away (like installing fdroid or using beeper
| easily). I just have a hard time believing this is
| superior in any way.
| palata wrote:
| I think you're confused.
|
| I you run GrapheneOS, it is an open source platform built
| on top of AOSP (the Android Open Source Project). Part of
| the security model is that you don't run as root. I am an
| advanced user and I don't want to run as root on my
| phone, I am happy with GrapheneOS as it is distributed.
|
| Now if you want to be root, you can install an OS that
| allows you to be root. Just like I unlocked my
| bootloader, installed GrapheneOS and relocked my
| bootloader, you can do that and install whatever you
| please. I will keep using GrapheneOS because that is the
| most secure OS I can find for my phone.
|
| The problem, IMO, is not that "some OS are opinionated
| and don't give you root access while other OSes do give
| you root access". The problem is that on many phones, you
| are not free to install the goddam OS you want (e.g.
| because you can't unlock or relock the bootloader).
| AuthAuth wrote:
| The visual design is just so bad. Its so ugly and souless. I
| actually feel bad for the UI designer that had to put their name
| behind that.
| peyton wrote:
| Looks great. Hope the team polishes it up before release. The
| visual nits in shipping Google products make my eyes bleed.
| WarmWash wrote:
| Unfortunately, it's just generally true that when a bunch of
| engineers complain about your UI, it probably will be well
| received by regular people.
| tty456 wrote:
| What would you want to see different from this? is there an OS
| that actually looks good?
| nish__ wrote:
| It looks really good.
| mvdtnz wrote:
| I don't even want Android on my phone. I cannot imagine a
| universe where I want it on my computer.
| SirMaster wrote:
| So would it make sense to sell a folding plastic shell with
| screen, keyboard and trackpad in it that you can bring in your
| bag and pull out to plug your phone into it?
| 46493168 wrote:
| This form factor was tried before and it didn't stick. Why
| should it be brought back now?
| neals wrote:
| I think the point is that software wasn't ready and now it
| might be.
| SirMaster wrote:
| I guess I fail to see where people will use this then.
|
| Where are there going to be setups where they can plug the 3
| things into their phone that aren't already a computer that
| you can just use as-is?
| 46493168 wrote:
| This is to replace ChromeOS.
| kohbo wrote:
| I'm using this right now on a work trip. Since I don't want
| to use my work computer for personal stuff, I carry a small
| bag that has a mouse, small keyboard, USB-C hub, and USB-C
| to HDMI cable. I set that up while I'm in my hotel room and
| use my Fold7 as a personal laptop. The items mentioned are
| all kept neatly in that small bag and it just sits at the
| bottom of my work bag until I want to use them.
| ghostly_s wrote:
| As mentioned in TFA, Android has had a "desktop" phone
| projection mode for years and it doesn't seem to have caught
| on. This seems to be a distro for dedicated desktop devices,
| I'm not sure what the point is when its main competitor would
| be the other OS Google already makes for those devices.
| pedalpete wrote:
| Google is transitioning from ChromeOS to desktop Android by
| 2028.
| HPsquared wrote:
| You mean a laptop?
| nomel wrote:
| Mini laptops have been a thing for decades [1], some with
| cool expanding keyboards [2]. They generally kinda suck.
|
| If I wanted a weird small portable computer, I would buy a
| steam deck with a "Decktop" [3]. Or, this awesome modern
| thing [4].
|
| [1] Mid 2000 Sony model: https://www.ebay.com/itm/38837616273
| 5?chn=ps&mkevt=1&mkcid=2...
|
| [2] IBM model with expanding keyboard:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvcl4kmOxPo
|
| [3] Desktop steam deck keyboard stand...thing:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HXZuAWYujm4
|
| [4] https://www.amazon.com/lanruo
| HNisCIS wrote:
| I've always wanted a keyboard+screen with a slot for a phone as
| the trackpad. Saving any money over a regular trackpad? No.
| Cool as hell? I think so at least...
| gman83 wrote:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67Jm8IiwURQ
|
| That's 14 years old. Kind of crazy this concept hasn't
| developed more in the meantime.
| 46493168 wrote:
| Why do you think it's crazy?
| gman83 wrote:
| I feel like the market for this product is definitely out
| there, but manufacturers don't want to cannibalize their
| own laptop margins.
| hahn-kev wrote:
| I had that it was a cool concept but it kinda sucked. It
| would have been great for doing stuff over SSH but not much
| else as the hardware was lacking at the time
| nix0n wrote:
| This exists, it is called the NexDock[0]. I have never tried
| it.
|
| [0]https://nexdock.com/explore-nexdock/
| esperent wrote:
| Portable monitor + mouse + keyboard makes more sense to me.
|
| But this can also be cast to a tv, for example. I assume you
| can use the phone itself as a trackpad. So the only extra
| hardware you need is a cheap Bluetooth keyboard which you can
| get for $15.
| guerrilla wrote:
| God this looks like a nightmare. Using Android on a desktop would
| be a fascist dystopia. Using it on phones is bad enough,
| computing while wearing a straight-jacket, but now they're going
| to have complete control of our computers and spy on everything
| we do on it? I can't imagine a worse outcome for the PC.
| lolcw wrote:
| It has windows, icons, taskbar and chrome. Seems like desktop to
| me!
| Dig1t wrote:
| What ever happened to fuscia? Wasn't that supposed to be their
| long term OS for desktop?
| unixhero wrote:
| I already have Samsung Dex. Is that the same as this?
| modeless wrote:
| They ought to put the status bar at the bottom. All the designers
| using Macs probably forgot, but Chrome's tab interface was
| designed for Windows where it could be all the way at the top of
| the screen. And in general it's more common for desktop apps
| designed for mouse and keyboard to have frequently accessed UI
| elements at the top of the window than the bottom. So desktop
| apps would benefit from being able to use that real estate at the
| very top of the screen.
|
| This is what you lose when you take a team developing a desktop
| OS and move it under a team doing a mobile OS.
| jeroenhd wrote:
| Auto-hide the task bar at the bottom, and you've basically got
| the Gnome UI. Works just fine. It's the permanent screen
| reservation of the double task bar that really eats up the
| usable desk space.
|
| Samsung's task bar (when you enable the DeX integration on a
| tablet) also supports this and it makes for a fine user
| experience.
| Miraste wrote:
| Inexplicably, Samsung removed the ability to hide the taskbar
| with One UI 8 last year.
| OldMatey wrote:
| My Huawei P20 Pro did this in 2018. It was fabulous, turned the
| OS into a mini-computer with a taskbar, desktop, icons, browser
| etc. It was still the best phone Ive ever owned (and I used to
| work at Google). It was no wonder Google killed with GSM. It was
| light years ahead even back then and they really hate
| competition.
| jokoon wrote:
| with win11, it's an opportunity to take the desktop market
| paul_h wrote:
| Exciting .. I'm typing on that HP Dragonfly now :) Google - put
| me in the testing group pls - Paul H
| zb3 wrote:
| The good part about this is they've invested in bringing
| extensions support to Chrome.. of course only those "desktop"
| builds, but the code is there and for now you can use this on
| normal Android - if you compile it for yourself or download the
| Chromium APK.
|
| I wonder whether they'll keep pretending that extensions are not
| supported on Android, perhaps even intentionally breaking support
| on mobile.. or maybe they'll stop this madness and just support
| extensions officially..
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