I tried Waydroid on Arch and its amazing. It runs Android apps flawlessly. And with a touchscreen device, I feel like I have an Android tablet running inside my Linux machine.
But I still don’t know what to use it for…
What apps do you use with Waydroid? What use cases do you have for it?
The only way I can know the monthly rent amount, is through an Android app.
That’s actually horrid. My router is android only and I thought that was bad.
That should be an ADA violation
If I was in the US.
Reminds me that my daughter wanted to play Toca Life World on her PC. So I guess I would use it for that. As soon as I have the energy to do it.
Don’t search tasks for a tool. Search a tool for your tasks.
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Well yes, but also no.
Whenever you search for a solution to your problem, it stems from the realization that something is a problem. But sometimes, you have a thing which has been done for a longtime, it was a problem with no solution and you’ve had to accept that. How would you determine one day that things can be done differently and better without constantly reevaluating everything? It’s not realistic.
In my view, it is a perfectly reasonable question to ask “what problem does waydroid solve?” To figure out if you have that issue and you didn’t know of this solution.
Sorry, just my 2 cents.
Also, Learning is Fun, so here I have a new toy, let’s have fun seeing what I can learn to do with it, then - as you say - that might solve a problem or improve a thing I hadn’t thought of before.
Too right.
Someone needs to make a start on the “periodic table of emulators” It might as well be OP.
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You misread that. They did type “Waydroid”.
If you just woke up, good morning.
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That would show the edit icon.
Just own it mate. You said something silly. So what? No biggie.
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Minecraft Bedrock.
This is the way 😉 although the Minecraft launcher is pretty good these days running under Waydroid is considerably less hacky as it’s not having to thunk between android and Linux userspace.
I’ve found the official launcher to be terrible, laggy, unstable, and poorly designed even on windows. I don’t think it can even launch bedrock anyway, I need to use the unofficial *nix launcher and the android APK to play on a realm.
Sorry I was referring to: https://mcpelauncher.readthedocs.io/en/latest/
Ah, that’s exactly what I’m talking about!
Using the Apple Music client
To make my system less secure lol
It is true that Waydroid isn’t super secure. that being said, it is still just a mostly stock android (unless you download gapps). Root is not exposed to the container so unless an exploit is found it is reasonably secure. There are measures waydroid can take to make it more secure. but as it stands it’s “not bad”
Android relies on SELinux for its app sandbox. On Fedora the Waydroid package has some SELinux rules, but not sure if they are as good.
Daniel Micay answered under a Waydroid issue and at least on Android I fully trust his knowledge.
I dont know about exposed root, but Waydroid uses LXC containers and not rootless Podman/Docker.
The best solution would either be:
- only run it on Fedora (no Problem for me)
- harden the SELinux policy when needed
- switch to a rootless container
- or on other Distros, use a VM where you can fully control the environment
as far as I know the SELinux container is configured, whether or not the distro uses it isn’t up to waydroid but the packaging and host configuration. If there are issues with the SELinux implementation they need to be brought up.
Waydroid also supports apparmor for some protections when SELinux is not available. OFC it’s not as good as selinux (and currently it’s set in warning mode so it doesn’t actually offer protections out of box, please we need people testing this) https://github.com/waydroid/waydroid/pull/906
If you want to use a VM, and anyone who needs a highish level of security should. Bliss OS is a much better option. Though it doesnt offer “native integration” with the host.
Side point, is it possible to install the google play store on waydroid? Aurora keeps crashing.
I go with APKUpdater now.
Yep,
waydroid init -s GAPPS. But it will complain when first trying to sign in with Google so you’ll have to authorize the device.
Android does have lots of games, and some apps that aren’t as easy to use, or as good as in native linux. For example, some painting apps (krita is powerful, but can also overwhelm someone), video editors like capcut or lumafusion, audio apps. For most of everything else, there is a web browser on linux that can do the job better probably, and native apps. But overall, I’d say that Android apps aren’t really that useful on linux, because they’re mostly geared towards apps that you use on the go, while you usually sitting on a chair at home or work when you’re using linux. To be honest, most native apps now have been replaced by a web browser, so either native linux or native android apps are only useful for high end professional usages (e.g. blender, video editing, etc) rather than everyday use.
aren’t a lot of games aarch64 only? do they even support x86? I’ve attempted in the past to use waydroid for a game, but no way to install it on an x86 machine. Does waydroid support some kind of box64 layer?
There is an unofficial script that ads arm emulation. Note before anyone asks, it will not become officially supported by waydroid.
Only the ones that are written in compiling language. The ones written in java/cotlin can. Also, in x86 tablets there are special chips that have arm emulation in hardware for these compiled apps. But plain x86 desktop cpus don’t have that. So it depends what app can work and what can’t.
2FA app, in my case aegis, and a few games
There aren’t any 2FA apps for desktop?
Yeah. You’d have to pry keepassxc from my cold dead hands st this point. Passwords + TOTP, cross platform, just a datafile.
Yes there are for example by gnome authenticate
*Gnome Authenticator
Yes there are for example by gnome authenticate
Not aegis, which is what I’m used to
Was straight up asking myself this the other day and still couldn’t come up with a good answer. I keep reading for 2fa or my passwords but that’s not really a reason IMO. Why not just have a copy of your totp seeds (any good android totp manager should let you export) and then use a desktop manager like keepassxc, the same with your passwords. The only reason i can personally think of are games but even then which games are worth keeping on your desktop that don’t already have a port? Another application that might be worth emulating could be like Shazam but not sure how good the desktop alternatives are
I keep reading for 2fa or my passwords but that’s not really a reason IMO. Why not just have a copy of your totp seeds (any good android totp manager should let you export) and then use a desktop manager like keepassxc, the same with your passwords.
Well, you know, some people use more than one computer. Having WayDroid + 2FA codes on one laptop, and filling in the codes on a browser on the other laptop does not defeat the idea of strictly using two different devices for 2FA.
I would say use a cross-platform password manager that supports it in that case. Bitwarden, 1Password and Enpass all have Linux versions and support TOTP, and in the case of Enpass, it has local wifi sync so none of it goes to them. I get that moving 2FA codes to that can be time-consuming, though.
No i get people use more than one computer but I don’t understand your point though about using wayDroid specifically vs a desktop totp manager? You can achieve the same by just having your totp seeds on one computer and manually filling the generated code on the other. Only difference is no android application needed just a standalone desktop totp manager
No i get people use more than one computer but I don’t understand your point though about using wayDroid specifically vs a desktop totp manager? You can achieve the same by just having your totp seeds on one computer and manually filling it in on the other. Only difference is no android application needed just a standalone desktop totp manager
Right, I see your point. Now, I don’t see myself clicking on a touchscreen laptop with KeePassXC to get TOTP codes. Seems easier to use Aegis app in WayDroid.
Ahh didn’t think about laptops with touchscreens just assumed touchpads or mice. That’s fair honestly never knew that was a popular way to navigate would assume people just get tablets for that but you make a solid point.
I went through the same process of thought.
I’m using Aegis and it exports an encrypted .json backup automatically whenever I change or add something, so I can sync that backup somewhere off the phone and the desktop app OTPClient can open it directly from the backup dir.
For playing games (or for any other native app) you can use scrcpy to see the actual Android screen on your desktop and use mouse and keyboard with it, sort of like vnc.
There are a few games that are unique to Android that I like playing this way, like Battleheart or Puzzle Retreat.
You already answered this in your question description :) With a touchscreen laptop and Linux and WayDroid you can have a Linux tablet. (Unfortunately (?) the choice of a DeGoogle ROM for Android tablets is minimal and you never know when the ROM developer will buy a new phone, change their life priorities and drop the ROM development) Compared to an Android phone you’d have a much larger screen. What do I use WayDroid for personally ? Just to test some programs, to see what’s new in F-Droid, and sometimes use LibreTube.
Why should one use libretube over freetube? What special features does it provide?
If you like LibreTube check out Grayjay. It similarly lets you privately browse and watch YT content, while also being able to subscribe and make playlists, but it’s killer feature is pooling all your subscriptions across different platforms into one feed. Ie having your Patreon, YouTube, Twitch, etc all in one app.
Used to use it for Apple Music but Cider 2 does what I want now, especially since Apple started locking down AM on rooted devices (of which Waydroid basically is) for no good reason.
Cider doesn’t support lossless, but then again neither does the version of android supported by waydroid currently
I was able to get lossless back then. It’s a matter of enabling
fake_wififor the app in Waydroid. You have to play a track for it to activate, but that’s also a bug I’ve experienced on my actual phone.I could enable it in the app, but Android versions below 10 resample everything down to 16 bit / 44.1 khz and Waydroid is stuck on Android 9 for now.
Now I guess I’d have to pass safety net or hide root and I can’t be bothered. I just plug my phone into the dac instead
Yeah I got a headphone dongle for my phone. Cider 2 is still nice though, 256kbps AAC (whether CBR or VBR) is fine for most people, and it seems to stay in that bitrate.
I use it to run the Sky App to stream football.
The only options are a windows app or an android app (since you can’t watch in the browser) and I couldn’t get the windows app to work with WINE.
The android app runs fairly well with waydroid, although it occasionally runs into some hiccups.
I wonder if Pokemon Go would work on waydroid…
