-
Hi,
given the lack of VoLTE support on Volla phones, if I now buy a new phone for Ubuntu Touch, which one would have the highest chance to (eventually?) work with VoLTE?
Feels like it becomes increasingly more difficult to stay connected on a non-VoLTE phone nowadays.
Alternatively, has anybody tested how well Linphone works on Ubuntu Touch? Having a well-integrated SIP telephony solution may make the current situation more bearable: providers like sipgate.de even appear to allow one to receive calls for a mobile number just via their SIP network.
cheers,
Dave
-
I have a question please if UT switched to modemmanger instead of its telephony stack i guess its ofono could it fix the carrier problem and voLTE problem since modemmanager support (3g/4g/5g) and its more advanced than ofono
-
@jgalaxy said in Status of VoLTE (Voice over LTE 4G) implementation?:
I have a question please if UT switched to modemmanger instead of its telephony stack i guess its ofono could it fix the carrier problem and voLTE problem since modemmanager support (3g/4g/5g) and its more advanced than ofono
Maybe last Q&A video can give you some answer: https://youtu.be/Z5bl5hTiAGo?t=2460
-
Read section 2.1 of the sysmocom
systems for mobile communications GmbH
Ubuntu Touch VoLTE Investigation, Revision V1 July 22, 2021 and then read about the Purism Librem 5 phone which uses PureOs. A significant involvement of the device manufacturer is required to implement VoLTE. After that is accomplished a carrier has to be willing to activate the phone. Purism gets over the last hurdle with its AweSim. -
@jgalaxy
As far as I understand it, the problem is not ofono but that in order for VoLTE to work properly there a lot of IPC needed with the cellular module and that is proprietary so it's hard to figure out. -
I am also interested in the future of this. I have Visible Mobile (Verizon), and I can't get it to work. I'm guessing this is the reason
-
@inrk said in Status of VoLTE (Voice over LTE 4G) implementation?:
I'm guessing this is the reason
I'm going to assume* you're in the US? Then: yes, it is.
*if people don't tell us where they are, they are usually in the US.
-
@beyolf said in Status of VoLTE (Voice over LTE 4G) implementation?:
@jgalaxy
As far as I understand it, the problem is not ofono but that in order for VoLTE to work properly there a lot of IPC needed with the cellular module and that is proprietary so it's hard to figure out.It's more of a stack that does a SIP-ish type transaction. You need an additional 3GPP stack like Doubango to scoop up your voice signals, do call signalling, and deliver the other side's voice data to you.
Some of the solutions use firmware in the comm module to do this (The IoT modules doing VoLTE) or you need a stack. Shrug. Doubango compiles inside my Yocto build environment as a recipe now, but I need to clean up the mess I have to get there. I'm kind of wondering where UBPorts is on this score so I can either lend a hand or to straighten out the problems I have (All ships rise in the tide...)
-
Currently I am trying to figure out the proprietary part with the cellular module. Currently trying to make the cellular module register in the cellular network for VoLTE.
If you are interested in more info you can contact me on telegram.
-
In Feb 2023, Marius Gripsgard was about to give talk on "VoLTE for FOSS" at Fossdem 2023. I have no idea if he gave the talk there. There's other information on their website no video nothing. The news was also shared on ubports blog.
-
@beyolf Good morning to the hard-working Linux people. What is so difficult about the integration of VoLte for UT? Is it the fact that UT actually only runs piggybacked as a container on top of Hallium Android on some smartphone models? Do you have to rewrite the entire module from the cell phone? Then surely there can also be limitations with data processing and LTE? Why is there only information via Telegram, very cumbersome
Anyway, good luck! -
I dont really understand your post... The problem with VoLTE is the same for every OS which uses halium and vendor blobs and it is figuring out how to setup the proprietary vendor blobs. So the problem with VoLTE is not related to the OS it self but that the vendor blobs are not open and a lot of reverse engineering has to be done. To make the matter even more complicated different vendors implement VoLTE support in different way, meaning that there is no standard VoLTE setup for the different vendor blobs , which makes it harder and more things to reverse engineer. This was explained multiple times in the forum and in the Q&A sessions and also in the telegram groups.
Also why exactly are you pinging me?
-
@blueque said in Status of VoLTE (Voice over LTE 4G) implementation?:
In Feb 2023, Marius Gripsgard was about to give talk on "VoLTE for FOSS" at Fossdem 2023. I have no idea if he gave the talk there.
He did not. He was not at FOSDEM, I seem to remember that he was ill and could not make it.
-
beyolf I'm just interested in how the whole thing works out of curiosity as a hobby. I have no idea how all the Linux stuff is packaged in the end. I'm not pinging you anymore, take the "@" off.
Because you don't need to ping me anymore, I haven't watched these Uport videos for a long time.
-
I do not have problem that you ping me. i simply dont understand why you pinged me thats why I ask.
I will try to explain simply how it works. Vendors which manufacture android phones, put their proprietary drivers and i vendor partition on the Flash memory of the device. We call this proprietary drivers "vendor blobs". Halium based OS as UT , Droidian and etc, use Halium as abstraction layer between the OS and the vendor blobs. What developers which work on halium do is reverse engineer how Android setup the vendor blobs and implement that in the halium project, then third party OSes (as UT , Droidian) use halium in order to provide different functionalities as telephony,wifi,camera,flashlight and etc.
If you want to gain deeper understanding on how exactly that is done and how halium works i would suggest to read the documentation.
In terms of VoLTE the IMS implementation is not standartized so the different vendors implement IMS functionality in different way in the vendor blobs. What we are trying to do now is reverse engineer how exactly Android communicate with the different vendor IMS drivers in order to setup the IMS functionality."
For telephony UT and other halium based OSes use ofono. Ofono have few different ways to communicate with the vendor blobs in order to provide telephony. The most recent method for achieving this is through binder (Android IPC). So ofono uses binder calls in order to communicate with the vendor cellular module. So what we are working on is understanding what binder IPC calls does Android do in order to setup the IMS for the different vendor blobs and implement that IPC calls in ofono. Sailfish OS already made IMS ofono extension for qcom based devices but this extension is proprietary and not open source.
As you can see from the explanation above the problem with VoLTE is not OS specific, but the problem is that the VoLTE vendor implementation is not standartized and for the different vendors a lot of tracing has to be done in order to understand how exactly android setup VoLTE and replicate that setup procedure in ofono for the different vendors.
Hope that brings some clarity on the subject.
-
Yes, thanks, your explanation helps me a bit. So it is always a small partion where the drivers are located. Just like a PC manufacturer customizes its software, you do that. Vendor and so is clearly seen several times when flashing
-
Hi,
This will become a problem in Australia soon too (and might already be an issue for some carriers here). The largest provider here, Telstra, is planning to switch off their 3G network in June 2024.
I'm not sure what the status is of a crowdfunding effort, but I would also donate, at least a small amount for VoLTE support.
Merry Christmas / Happy holidays!
-
Maybe, Can refer to the implementation of Sailfish OS.
Write a plugin instead of ofono-vendor-qti-radio-plugin.
On qcom based devices use vendor.qti.hardware.radio.ims -
Hopefully all frequencies will also be supported. In Germany, LTE is supported from 700Megaherz to 3600Megaherz. 5G is already available, but I don't have the hardware to use it yet. If you don't always need special applications for devices, I don't think it's that difficult. With Waydroid you could get VoLte and VoWifi up and running with some devices. I'm just making assumptions here. With Xiaomi, for example, the whole modem and Bluetooth stuff somehow runs via a chip where the FM radio is also installed. Shailfish Os is Android again then you can also stay on Lineage Os.
-
Thank you for pointing this out but we are making tests with that plugin from about a month already. We don't want to use closed source plugin that's why we are just examining how the plugin works and trying to make a new open source one.
Ubuntu Touch fan
UT Focal port for miatoll contributor.
Device:
Redmi note 9 pro
