Welcome to the UBports community!

Ubuntu Touch by UBports

This channel is meant to complement our FAQ on our website at https://ubports.com/faq
Please bear in mind, that we are a small community maintaining a full OS. Most work is done by volunteers in their free time. We are not a multi billion $ company. 🤑
The following questions are answered in this channel:
1. Does Ubuntu Touch run on my device?
2. My device is not on the list, what can I do?
3. What is porting?
4. How do I port a device?
5. This "porting" thing is way above my head, can you port it for me pretty please?
6. Can I run android applications on Ubuntu Touch?
7. I am fine with bugs, how can I see anbox or waydroid in action?
8. Can I use apt on Ubuntu Touch?
9. The installer is buggy, where can I find the manual instructions?
10. Do you have list of UBports Telegram groups and channels?
11. What is convergence? Will all devices support convergence? Are you working on convergence?
12. I'm having issues with installing, what do I do? Heeelp!!!!!
13. Can I run WhatsApp on Ubuntu Touch?
14. My devices touch screen doesn't work after I unplug it from an external monitor!
15. Applications look huge in an external monitor!
16. Can't log into an open wifi hotspot because the welcome page is missing?
17. So many release channels in system update settings, where is the difference?
18. Is there a changelog for updates?
19. OTA xyz is out but I can't install it yet. What's wrong?
20. Why do we need Android in a specific version on our devices before installing? What is halium?
21. Openstore web shows an app but I can't install it with OpenStore app on my device. Why?
22. Can you add a bot in the group to fight spam and to answer questions?
23. What is the difference between UBports and Ubuntu Touch?
24. Is dual boot supported with Ubuntu Touch?
25. Is there a flashable zip I can download to install Ubuntu Touch with twrp or such?
26. Does the bootloader need to be unlocked when running Ubuntu Touch?
27. What is offline charging?
28. What do the version numbers of the channels mean?
29. How do I report a bug 🪲?
30. Is there a way to move the launcher (https://t.me/UTusage/28) to the right side of the device instead of the left side?
31. Is Ubuntu Touch fully open source?
32. Where can I get the source code?
33. What is this circle with dots on the lock screen about?
34. When will device ABC be ported for UT? When will device ABC be ported to focal?
35. Why does GPS not work or take very long to get a fix on UT?
36. Is device xyz good for me? Which device is the best for me?
37. Why is there no home screen with app shortcuts or an empty home screen?

1. Does Ubuntu Touch run on my device?
Only devices are listed on https://devices.ubuntu-touch.io can run Ubuntu Touch, if your device is not on the list see the next question

Before installing, make sure that the specs of your device match exactly the ones on the devices page.
Your device having slightly different hardware specs* (e.g. memory, NFC, other board, other camera, ...) compared to a ported device does not mean Ubuntu Touch will work on it. The firmware will be different. You risk ending up with a bricked = useless device. But creating a port should be much easier.

If you need help with installing ubuntu touch on any of these devices feel free to join us: https://t.me/welcomeplus

* For example the redmi note 9 pro and the xiaomi poco m2 pro are essentially the same device while the redmi note 9 is a completely different device installing the image of the redmi note 9 pro on the redmi note 9 will brick it

2. My device is not on that list! What can I do?
Your search did not return a hit on the list? Then you do have these options:
a) buy yourself a device that is on the list
b) develop a port for the device yourself
c) wait for the miracle that someone else develops a port for that device soon™

Many porters, like Tygerpro, started with zero experience! So don't worry, anyone can learn to develop port a device. However, it can take 5 months or more of full time work to get to the point where your device is supported by the UBports installer. "Developing a port is often called "Porting" for short.
Check the next few answers for further information about what porting is, how you do it and why we can't do it for you.

3. What is Porting?
Porting is the process of creating a version of Ubuntu Touch that works on your device. This has to be done for every device. You see, unlike your desktop computer, the hardware in your smartphone is not standardized, every one of them has their own quirks. Since Android is mostly open source, we can take the source code, modify it and keep just enough to allow Ubuntu Touch to work well on the device. This is how Halium came to be, the compatibility layer we use to make use of Android drivers and services.

4. How do I port?
First off you can check if there is a port in progress on https://forums.ubports.com/category/33/porting, if not then you you'll need to check a few requirements
- is there a way to unlock the bootloader?
- what version of Android does the phone ship with?
- if it is Android 7 can you find the kernel source tree, the vendor source tree and the device source tree?
- if it is Android 9/10 can you find the kernel source code?

Don't worry if it sounds difficult, we have our own documentation at https://docs.ubports.com/porting where you can read and learn what is needed to port, how you too can do it and where you can ask specific questions should anything be unclear.

It is even possible that when you do understand it better and feel like it could be worded better in our documentation, that you can improve the documentation itself! The documentation is open source: https://github.com/ubports/docs.ubports.com

5. This "porting" thing is way above my head, can you port it for me pretty please?
Sadly, we can't do that. If porting is not an option for you, then your only remaining option is to buy a device that can be found on the list from point 1.
Android Central has an article that explains why not every device can just run Ubuntu Touch.

In short, every device is unique. The work done on one device does not guarantee the same techniques will work for another. As soon as there are any hardware differences, different drivers or firmware may be in use that require different adaption.
For this reason the person who ports the device will need to own the device. The more variants they try to cover, the more time it will take them.

To illustrate it, think of a tailor. You can go to a tailor to ask them to make clothes for you, and they'll need to take your measurements so that the clothes fit you well. Asking us to port your device, is like asking a tailor to make clothes without taking your measurements.

6. Can I run Android applications on Ubuntu Touch?

No, you can't out of the box. Ubuntu Touch is not Android. It is similar to a MS Windows app not working on a Mac. The OS codebase is very different.

There are currently two approaches to make running Android applications on UT possible to some extend: @waydroid and @anbox

Waydroid works on newer UT devices, devices we call "Halium 9+ devices" currently all "Halium 9+ devices" originally shipped with android 8 or newer.

Is Waydroid the way?
Waydroid is a limited tool to ease a transition to Ubuntu Touch. While it looks very promising, to suggest that Waydroid is something that will continue to grow and be perfected within UT raises unfair expectations. It is still in development and with many bugs that have yet to be solved. A large part of the android apps will not work at all. And if they do work, don't expect them to run for more than 15 minutes a day without draining your battery completely. System notifications are another problem, not to mention breaking apparmor rules, which UT native apps must comply with. Finally, there is no guarantee that Google will not remove the ability to run APKs in a container overnight, after which all investments have been for nothing. They can already do that and do so with some apps.

Anbox was experimental and is basically abandoned. It has many unsolved problems such as very heavy memory and battery drain, doesn't ship with Google Play nor Google services, many applications don't work. Therefore Anbox is no longer supported. Although it may still run on some devices, you are on your own when using it.

7. I am fine with bugs, how can I see waydroid in action?

To set up Waydroid install waydroid helper from the openstore and click "install waydroid". Waydroid is still in development, so expect bugs. You can report issues and find help by joining t.me/waydroidonut. Also battery drain might be an issue depending on the apps you use.

8. Can I use apt on Ubuntu Touch?
yesn't [yes and no]. Ubuntu Touch is built with privacy, reliability and stability accross a wide range of devices in mind. It is crucial that the developers are able to quickly reproduce and fix bugs across devices to ensure no faulty update ever makes it to the stable channel on any device, ever. To achieve this the rootfs is read-only.

This allows UBports to provide image based updates. When you run an OTA update it replaces the read-only part of the operating system. Userdata is not a part of that, so you don't lose that or installed apps. But apt is not designed for a read-only rootfs, so as a result it will attempt to write to the read-only portion of the operating system. While you can remount your rootfs as read-write, because apt is writing into a normally read-only part of the system, an OTA update can partially overwrite the changes apt made. This can result in a broken system. So using apt essentially means you are running your own fork of Ubuntu Touch.

You can install apps from the OpenStore app. How to get updates is described in our usage channel.

there are other package managers that are made to work with a readonly rootfs, current working examples include snap and crackle

9. The installer is buggy, where can I find the manual instructions?
**WARNING** The manual method is very device specific, if you are not careful and download the wrong file, you can brick your device. Furthermore these instructions will not work on devices that are not listed here, those have to be ported. If you ignore this warning we will not offer support if anything goes wrong. We recommend using the installer whenever possible.

That said, if you still want to see how it would work manually, this github repository contains the manual instructions for the meizu pro 5.
But remember manual instructions are device specific those instructions are only for the Meizu Pro 5 and you will have to adapt them to suit your specific device. And we don't offer support for this method, unless of course you are in the process of porting and know what you are doing.