I am using Waydroid and Waydroid Freezr quite a lot. I just got aware that a hint on the Waydroid Freezr store page says:

"UT camera may not work when Waydroid is freezed".

I'll observe that on my device and come back then.
Maybe this is also a hint for others having this issue.

@Moem said in Camera stays black - possible to restart (via terminal)?:

@jojumaxx This sounds like the problem I've been having. Please check out my bug report. And if you feel it's the same problem please comment and add your experience!
https://gitlab.com/ubports/development/apps/lomiri-camera-app/-/issues/210

Sorry, I've only ever been able to fix it by rebooting. Usually it takes a cold boot.

Sorry for answering late. Yes, that sounds similar.
Yet I suspect that my camera always works once but not a second time.
But a normel reboot suffices for me, a cold reboot is not necessary in my case.
And I always have the same behaviour (complete black screen while switching between apps and closing the camera app is possible). I don't experience the other described scenarios.

I don't have a Gitlab account therefore I haven't commented on this, yet.

VP Quintus OTA-8

Every now and then the camera app does not come up and the screen stays black. I haven't figured out exactly yet, when that happens. To be able to use the camera again I have to reboot the phone.
That is not an OTA-8 thing, I had this also on OTA-7.

My question now is: Is there some command like

sudo systemctl restart camservice

or similar to restart the camera which avoids a reboot?

@ancientsounds in my experience the mediaplayer app only plays mp4 videos encoded in a special manner.
If you're lucky, they work, or they just don't. Maybe you were lucky until now.

I encode or re-encode my video files with Handbrake with standard settings. There was no file yet, the media player didn't play...

Maybe this helps...

I'm sorry, I haven't tried that yet due to the lack of according hardware (wireless receiver)...

@Taiga-Woods I experienced that today, too.
At the end I deleted and reinstalled OSM Scout Server (rebooted in between).
Everything worked again afterwards and the maps I had downloaded were still there.

But I'm also interested if there's another solution...

It seems, there are not many Quintus running Ubuntu Touch out there and since I have been asked about working features I thought I'd make an entry here for those who are interested.
Since there's no Quintus sub section, yet I write it here until it can be moved to its according place.

I took this list from the Ubuntu Touch device page.
I don't have the device for a very long time, so I will update things marked "untestet" ().
These are my personal observations on stable channel (OTA-8).

Actors:
:white_heavy_check_mark: Manual brightness
:white_heavy_check_mark: Torchlight
:white_heavy_check_mark: Vibration

Camera:
:white_heavy_check_mark: Flashlight
:white_heavy_check_mark: Photo
:white_heavy_check_mark: Video
:white_heavy_check_mark: Switching between cameras

Cellular:
:white_heavy_check_mark: Carrier info, signal strength
:white_heavy_check_mark: Data connection
:white_heavy_check_mark: Incoming, outgoing calls
MMS in, out
:white_heavy_check_mark: PIN unlock
:white_heavy_check_mark: SMS in, out
Change audio routings
Voice in calls
:white_heavy_check_mark: Volume control in calls

Endurance:
:white_heavy_check_mark: 24+ hours battery lifetime
7+ days stability

GPU:
:white_heavy_check_mark: Boot into UI
:white_heavy_check_mark: Hardware video playback

Misc:
AppArmor patches
:white_heavy_check_mark: Battery percentage
Offline charging
:white_heavy_check_mark: Online charging
Recovery image
Reset to factory defaults
RTC time
Shutdown / Reboot (see bottom)
Wireless External monitor
:white_heavy_check_mark: Waydroid

Network:
:white_heavy_check_mark: Bluetooth
:white_heavy_check_mark: Flight mode
Hotspot
NFC
:white_heavy_check_mark: WiFi

Sensors:
Automatic brightness
:cross_mark: Fingerprint reader
:white_heavy_check_mark: GPS
:white_heavy_check_mark: Proximity
:white_heavy_check_mark: Rotation
:white_heavy_check_mark: Touchscreen
:cross_mark: Double touch to wake

Sound:
Earphones (see bottom)
:white_heavy_check_mark: Loudspeaker
:white_heavy_check_mark: Microphone
Volume control (see bottom)

USB:
MTP access
ADB access

Reboot not always working. The screen turns off but it doesn't come back again. Hard reboot is necessary.

Bluetooth earphones work. The USB-C to 3.5mm adapter that came with the phone works, too. Another one I tested does not work. So this depends on hardware.

When listening to Music in the Music App, sometimes sound goes completely down on switching tracks. Same happens occasionally when switching position in the video app.

In some cases, but especially after the container has been frozen, Waydroid does not start again after having been closed/stopped. The only workaround working for me is running

systemctl restart waydroid-container

in the terminal (sometimes twice). Then Waydroid will start again.

Solved with OTA-7 / current Waydroid version

Re: Show/Hide apps doesn't work since OTA-5

I also do have the problem that all Waydroid apps appear in the launcher and can't be removed.

So I checked what the Waydroid Helper does to hide them to see if there's something wrong like a path to the files or something like that.
But the path is correct and what the helper does is simply setting the NoDisplay flag in the .desktop file to true or false.
This mechanism works, the flag is set to true or false just as selected.

So my conclusion is, that the launcher seems to ignore this setting and it therefore is not an issue of the Waydroid Helper.

I am on a Volla Phone 22 with OTA-6 (OTA-5 also had this issue)

Other Volla models do not seem to have this issue, it seems to be related to the Volla 22.

Maybe someone has a clue.

Removing or renaming the .desktop files caused issues and does not seem to be a solution.

@tuXut Thanks.
I once suggested, that the Pinephone (Pro) would have been a good start, since it's "open" hardware.

In my understanding most time is lost in running after the Android Compatibility Layer (Halium).
How much development could go into functionality, usability and features on the Pinephone?

Instead there is (AFAIK) one developer keeping UT on the Pinephone alive. I shortly revived my PP UT CE and want to leave that developer a big "THANK YOU - good job, keep it up" here.

That's sad. And again my question (no one answered yet): Why not the Pinephone? Why running after Android development which seems to go too quick to keep up?
The PPP could be THE UT device and compared to what we have now surely wouldn't be bad...

I get the feeling this going in a wrong direction.

I DO NOT criticize the state of Ubuntu Touch. I criticize HOW IT IS SOLD!

I studied computational linguistics and developed e.g. natural language processing models etc. Due to personal reasons I couldn't continue doing so. I say this to make clear, I have an understanding of how much work this is.

This said: Dear developers, I DO NOT criticize your work. I know this is often painful and hard and I highly appreciate it.

The only thing to be addressed here is preferences, but that's another thing.

I DO criticise, how the smartphones are sold and I'm talking about those who can be bought new with UT preinstalled.

Now the following scenario:
A random person (using Ubuntu on their PC at home) is looking for a new phone. Maybe something de-googled this time. The person finds out about Volla Quintus. Then the person finds out "hey, I could order it with UT preinstalled" and does so.

Go to the website. They state, that if you do use Linux, the phone is for you because everything will be familiar.
They say, that all basics work.

Now the phone arrives and half of the stuff doesn't work. Now anger and frustration begin, not to mention the money that thing costs.

If there was a real warning, like in the Pinephone Shop, you either don't buy or you know what you're dealing with.

THIS is my point!

So the UBPorts devices site changed a bit. It doesn't claim any more, that the experience is comparable to other OSes on the marked.

When I bought my original Volla Phone, that was true and it was my daily driver for a long time.
I bought the next promoted one, because I thought they wouldn't put it on the marked without improvements, but the experience was worse. And I felt scammed because these devices nevertheless cost a lot if money. And they put phone after phone on the market of which none really works.

So this is about Volla, too.

From now on, like Pinephone, I look at Ubuntu Touch like an enthusiast project.
I do not expect functioning devices when I order them. And potential buyers should be clearly warned.

I still believe in UT and love it. And I hope we will get to the point of working daily drivers again.

I wish I could contribute in cases of development, but due to personal reasons, I simply can't

So again, I DO NOT criticize developers or UT itself but how it is presented to potential buyers namely as working alternative which right now it is not.

This might cause people to loose money they maybe don't have in the believe they buy a working "Linux" phone.

Thanks for reading!

As a last step I tried switching channels now which also did not lead to success.

And as a very last step I did a factory reset after which the app worked again.
I don't know which data were responsible at the end, but all actions spared it. Only deleting ALL user data helped. Maybe someone else has a clue.

Though I have to set up everything again, I'm happy the music app is back. I'll cautiously set up Waydroid this time and check after every step if the Mmusic app still works. Maybe I'll be able to identify at least the action causing this issue.

I'll mark this as solved for now.

@domubpkm said in Music app stopped working:

@jojumaxx said in Music app stopped working:

Since flashing went wrong on my Vollas too many times, I don't want to do so

No particular problem to reflash Volla 22 UT for me using Ubuntu 20.04. Just make sure you have a good internet connection and a proven USB cable.

My Volla 22 ended up bricked once I flashed Droidian onto it.
I couldn't even enter fastboot mode, the screen stayed black no matter what I did.
The Volla support helped me to revive the phone in a way I couldn't follow and completely understand. But something was changed for sure.
Since then, the UBports Installer isn't even able to recognize or identify my phone at all.
Every try to flash it since then failed. Fortunately I had not a complete brick again but I don't want to risk that...

That's why I want to avoid flashing...

Is there maybe a log file somewhere to check?
Or how do I launch the app from the terminal? The exec command from the .desktop file doesn't work...
Maybe it would give me a hint

@lduboeuf

I meant
/opt/click.ubuntu.com/.click/users/phablet,
not
/home/phablet
which is missing...
Sorry if I expressed that wrong

I played around with Waydroid and my Bluetooth headset, maybe similar as described here.
And also in my case, the app stopped working. I shortly see the loading screen and then it disappears and that's it.

Deleting and reinstalling doesn't help.

In the post mentioned above the solution was to delete the entry "music.ubports" from /opt/click.ubuntu.com/.click/users/phablet and after a reboot it worked again.

Since I don't have a "phablet" folder like in the path mentioned but only a “@all" folder I don't dare to remove "music.ubports" from this folder.

Are there any proposals on how to make the music app work again? And how do I prevent this to happen again or in other words what caused this? Has it to do with Waydroid?

I'm on a Volla Phone 22 with UT 20.04 OTA-5

Thank you!

EDIT:
I deleted now the whole /opt/click.ubuntu.com/music.ubports folder which didn't solve the problem.
I then also deleted ~/.config/music.ubports which also didn't solve the problem.
Also I deleted music.ubports from /opt/click.ubuntu.com/.click/users/"@all"

What's left now? Switching channels forth and back and reflashing, right?
Since flashing went wrong on my Vollas too many times, I don't want to do so...

@kingu Look, if you sell something on the market, which at least Volla does, you have a responsibility for your customers.
I don't really see that when I look at 4 phones hardly usable nor flashable.
Looking at what the Gigaset "originals" cost or compared to a Pinephone, yes they are expensive and in my case, taking the original bills about 1700€ of phones I can't really use.

Is it wrong, questioning this?

Why do I have no plan? If you need to have a plan, this should be outlined, don't you think?

And what exactly makes me a bad user? If special skills are necessary, this should be outlined, too.

That's exactly, what this is about.

Search the net, there are enough reviews of normal people (bad users?) who tried. If everything was working, maybe the market share would be higher (or maybe they just have no plan).

@Timespansoul I am completely with you. When I was writing my post I did it while being angry, disappointed and clueless somehow.

If I offended someone, I really and honestly apologize. I didn't mean to lower the value of the work everybody puts in.

Ubtuntu Touch is a great project and I'm grateful it exists. Otherwise I wouldn't have been here for so long.

But nevertheless, basics need to work to use it. If a car has a broken engine, this should be addressed since driving is its main purpose and not e.g. the improvement of the entertainment system...
Keep in mind, this is subjective to me and that I don't know what the core developers are responsible for and for what others. I don't want to do someone wrong!