What is Syncthing?

Syncthing is a continuous file synchronization program. It synchronizes files between two or more computers in real time, safely protected from prying eyes. Your data is your data alone and you deserve to choose where it is stored, whether it is shared with some third party, and how it's transmitted over the internet.

What does this have to do with Ubuntu Touch?

I have packaged Syncthing into a click. This is based off the work of @ZeroPointEnergy who I am not sure is still active in the community.

My attention was drawn to Syncthing because I was looking for a simple way to sync my ebooks between my tablet and my phone, and the Nexcloud sync app did not play well with my Nextcloud setup.

Cool! Where can I get it?

Syncthing companion snap

Want to use Syncthing as a lightweight backup solution and need to install in on a server? There is now a Syncthing snap packaged by yours truly.

I have questions.

Any suggestions or questions on its functioning on Ubuntu Touch can be posted in this thread. I will do my best to help where possible. Questions on Syncthing in general are better posted on their support forum.

Links:

• main site: www.syncthing.net
• documentation: docs.syncthing.net
• main project: github.com/syncthing/synhthing
• ubuntu touch 'port': gitlab.com/arubislander/syncthing-clickable
• snap package: snapstore.io/syncthing-arubislander
• snap package source: gitlab.com/arubislander/syncthing-snap

Ah...

It is difficult to find the right words to write.

I could write about your encouraging attitude and your clear-sightedness in envisioning a future goal, and dedication to seeing it achieved.

Or about your capacity for keeping people pursuing disparate short term aims onboard, and working together towards the common goal. Keeping all the frogs in the wheelbarrow, so to speak.

Or about your desire to give consideration to every voice in the Community and agonizing over how to do right by everyone.

I could go on, but you know you. Maybe you would see things differently, but this is what I have seen from you.

You have done really, really well by the project. Now go do really really, well by yourself. Hopefully this experience will help you find a way in future to do both, by you, and by whatever endeavor you passionately dedicate yourself to.

I look forward to seeing you shine!

@Mario-CH said in Ubuntu Touch Q&A 123 call for questions:

I imagine that many UT users (like me) will finally want to pay the long overdue next donation when ...

I couldn't help reacting to this. I understand you are saying this somewhat in jest, but it exposes a common misconception about donations (and one that I have also fallen for from time to time.)

Donations, by their very nature, should not be seen as reward to a project for work done, but as a way to support the work being done at the moment.
While donating doesn't guarantee your issue will be addressed, withholding your donation until some features that is important to you is implemented or fixed will definitely not make that happen any quicker.

@Inglebard said in Device compatibility/lifespan with UT:

why is it not always possible to update the kernel?

To start with your last question. It is not always possible to update the kernel because the proprietary drivers that make the hardware of the device work are compiled against a specific version of the kernel. If a newer version is used, then the drivers may stop working, and they cannot be fixed to work with the newer kernel because the source code for them is not available.

The changes needed to work with Ubuntu 20.04 could in principle be backported to older kernels by someone wanting the see these older devices keep running on later versions of Ubuntu Touch. But that is a huge amount of work in itself, and also just one step in getting some of these devices up to date.

I would like to know what makes a phone compatible with Ubuntu Touch?

The short answer is: Anyone willing to put in the work to make a port of Ubuntu Touch for that phone.

A longer answer would be: If the phone has at least 3 GB of RAM, runs on a relatively new Kernel with sources published, and there is a working Halium version available for the Android version it shipped with, that would make it a good candidate for porting.

I would also like to know how to determine if a device that is compatible with 16.04 or 20.04 will be compatible with 22.04 or 24.04, or even beyond (What is its lifespan)?

This depends on the changes that are introduced in the underlying Ubuntu version that is being targeted. For instance 20.04 no longer supported Upstart as the init system. Everything was moved to SystemD (this had happened earlier, but those versions were skipped as UT targets). This in turn meant that only kernels that could support all the SystemD features that were required in Ubuntu 20.04 to get Ubuntu Touch running, could be supported. Sometimes these features could be backported to older kernels (as is ongoing for the OnePlus One) but since different devices used different kernel versions, this work would most likely need to be re-done for each device for which support was desired.

It is not always clear before starting to work on it, what changes in the new version of Ubuntu will have what impact on Ubuntu Touch. And which changes will cause the most work to adapt to. That is why it is difficult to state beforehand how long any particular device will be able to be supported. You can assume though that once a device gets support for an new version of Ubuntu Touch, you will be able to receive security updates for that device for at least as long as the underlying version of Ubuntu is supported by Canonical. Feature updates might stop earlier due to the need to keep somewhat up to date with the current versions of Ubuntu to benefit the most from the latest improvements to the software components being used in the OS.

Last but not least, the commitment of the porter to the device determines to a very great extent how long and how good support will be for any given device.
Some ports are sponsored by, or done in collaboration with, device sellers, such as Hallo Welt with their Volla Phones, and Fairphone with the FP4. These have a better chance of seeing good support.

@ktatar156 Emotions have nothing to do with it. I was simply reacting to your stated requirements.
Of course you can install GApps on Waydroid and download your bank apps from the play store. I wasn't suggesting otherwise. The question is though, if they would run. Does your bank app run on Lineage, or on a rooted device? If that is the case it has a higher chance of also running on Waydroid.

About your question if UT will ever be a succes: Define success. The project will continue as long as there are people willing and capable of continuing it. That is both the strength and the weakness of OpenSource. It doesn't have to become a commercial succes, it doesn't have to become popular overnight. All it needs is a dedicated team of developers and a passionate community that both supports the team and whose members can in time become part of the team.
I would venture to say that since Canonical handed over stewardship of the project to UBports it has given a boost to community involvement in the project. By this metric the project is a bigger success than it ever was under Canonical.

Concerning the lack of flagship Open Source apps like Firefox. On the one hand I could say, bug the publishers of these apps and ask them to support Ubuntu Touch. Why should the burden of packaging and maintainance fall on this project alone? But publishers of Open Source are more likely to consider supporting UT if the software stack is more up to date. Well, there is great news on that front. The work to bring UT to 20.04 is in very advanced stage. And once it is released as stable sometime in the first half of this year, work will immediately continue with rebasing on 22.04, which should also be well advanced by the second half of this year. An up to date software stack opens up many possibilities for supporting additional packaging formats such flatpaks and/or snaps. This would not automagically make the software feel at home on UT (think confinement and application lifecycle) but it would be a start.

Are there any needs? Yes! There are knowledgeable developers who are balancing working on this project with their fulltime jobs and daily lives. Given enough donations and sponsors, the UBports foundation could employ all these developers fulltime and there would definitely be a boost in productivity. (Whether this would impact community involvent, if you wish to discuss this, slide into my dm's or let's start a new thread.)

As it is now, @Keneda already mentioned that coders are very welcome. Experience is a pre, but stick-to-itivness and eagerness to learn can make up for the lack of experience.
There is even a job posting for a developer by the company that makes the Volla phones (these are phones that come with the option of pre-installed UT).

I am struggling to even see the relevance of this comparison. How often do users boot their iPhones? How often do Purism expect it will be necessary to boot the Librem 5?

There is no need at all to go to war over anything, especially since there are options. If a pin, or the behaviour of the pin entry screen, is deemed insecure, then there is the option to specify a password for unlocking. This can be anything and will present a keyboard for entry and must also be confirmed with an ENTER. Seems like the exact behaviour you were looking for.

@escain said in Feedback FP3+ after 3 months:

What I really miss:

P0: Bluetooth support for calls. When driving, it's an absolute must. I also have "that" wonderful headset able to manage calls.

Bluetooth is hit or miss on Linux in general, depending on a combination of devices, driver versions, supported protocols, the phase of the moon and the orientation of the Earth's axis at the time of pairing and subsequent connecting...

Is this really being contemplated? Under what program can this endeavor be justified to management? The UTtouch market is vanishingly small in comparison to the Duopoly.

Not to rain on anyone's parade here, but I also do not see how this proposition could be made to work from a technical perspective.

One of the ways Google Fi helps the customer save money as I understand it, is by the seemless handover between mobile data and wifi. The reliability of this handover varies from device to device on UTouch.

Also, I doubt there are currently API's in place to allow third party applications to control the network connection in this way while simultaneously respecting Ubuntu Touch's application lifetime cycle scheme.

Not to speak of how problematic it might be in the perceptions of many patrons of Ubuntu Touch to grant access on such a low level to a component from a known data gathering entity.

@dissapointedbcn said in Back to 15.04:

The main problem is malfunction of desktop apps in the new libertine container. Any option is opened in a new window. Impossible to work with gimp or libreoffice, essentials for me.

See this post on how to fix that

@dissapointedbcn said in Back to 15.04:

Firefox crashes as soon as it starts.

I don't know what version of Firefox in present in 15.04, but if you want to install an older version of firefox that does not crash in 16.04, follow along with this blog post.

@DPITTI ,I have deleted your message, because, it contains harmful commands, that if executed could lead to an unbootable device.
Also, your answer was in German, even though you have been repeatedly told in the past to communicate in English on the forums, or at the very least provide a translation with your answer. But the main reason was because of the harmful commands.
Please do not suggest harmful commands to be executed that are known to potentially render the device unbootable. Consider this an official warning.

@Python, Are you looking to install a python environment for development purposes? Or just for running scripts? How to best proceed may differ depending on what it is you want to do.

@Charly said in Please add the x23 in the subforum for volla devices:

Where can I submit my bug reports.

Bug reports should ideally be reported to HalloWelt Systems, the makers of the Volla Phone. They would then coordinate with the UT devs to get them fixed.

@projix Nowhere was it claimed and implied that you were doing anything illegal. Neither were you told to 'get lost'. In fact I believe you could add valuable contributions to the knowledge pool of the community.

I was merely pointing you to a venue were you were more likely to be able to interact with other users with similar interests and your question might receive an answer quicker.

Should you have another query of this sort in the future, please do not hesitate to post it in the General category, or again, if you don't mind Telegram, in the channel I pointed to.

@projix Upon rereading my initial answer I can see how I may have been unclear.

I wasn't implying your usecase could not be discussed here on the forums. They are an open place and all things UT related can be discussed.

But you were specifically seeking support for your usecase, and that, unfortunately cannot be provided.

In addition, I was wrong to move your topic to Off-Topic. I have now moved it to General.

@projix said in UBPorts as server:

I managed to solve this by reading the startup scripts of my port, some crontab usage and merging the overlays with the actual file system and deleting them.

You are still welcome to the Break your UT telegram channel I pointed you to, and share how you managed to solve this there.

To anyone else reading this - if you want to do this try an open distribution, if at all supported on your device. My trouble is that UT is the only one that has a port with working WiFi, so I am stuck with it.

UT is open, as is evidenced by your ability to solve your issue all on your own. You would not have been able to do this with the product of the company you unfairly compare us to.

It is simply that as a small team of volunteers we have to limit the scope of our support, and are not in the position to do so for the usecase you are exploring.

@pd Please try some of the solutions suggested, and at the very least answer the question posed in the post just before yours.

@projix As you will understand, using the OS in this way (the OS is called Ubuntu Touch by the way. The community is UBports) cannot be supported on this forum.

But you are welcome to join the chat group Break your UT on Telegram to explore and discuss ways to maybe achieve your goal. You can point to this post, and also mention what device you are trying this on specifically, as different devices have different setups.

(this post will be moved to Off Topic because of the above. Thank you for understanding)

@eheintzmann oh, this is the Xiaomi section. I mistakenly assumed it was the Pixel 3a section. That devices used to have this same issue.

But we are all on the same side here, and we can agree that UT is much more aligned out of the box to the user's privacy than Android.

@Rinkeby said in lineage native VS lineage on Ubuntu:

There is a lot of liberties with "stock" android. Wherever its geopolitics or Google/Apple themselves. I am sure Lineage kills off most of it. But even them are limited in all the code and firmware at play.

Not to be polemical about it, but your link only shows that some vendors go ahead and add spyware to their devices, not that Google was involved in this is any way. What the link is talking about is in no way 'stock' Android, like one would find on say a Pixel. This is the 'stock' for that Chinese vendor, and one can expect that they will add their own software on top, as do all other Android vendors (just hopefully not all as privacy invasive as these.)

For instance I expect the Android that is shipped on for example the FairPhones and the OnePlus range to be more privacy respecting than the ones shipped on budget Chinese devices. What the latter do with their devices, that's on them.

Then there's the term 'firmware' in the article: as this link explains:

Firmware meaning, especially when speaking about devices with Android, has been incorrectly expanded in popular culture to encompass all the software on those devices. Android “firmware" now means the firmware plus the Android operating system on top of it.

So the 'firmware' that contains the spyware is most likely just extra sodtware included in the image flashed to the devices. Again, none of it Google's doing or Android's fault per se.