So here I am. I took the plunge and made up my mind. I went went Ubuntu Touch (UT) for a few reasons:

• Easiest to install of the linux phone distros (way easier than sailfish IMO)
• A fairly active community
• Devs that seem to be paying attention and updating regularly

I did one other thing and ignored the warning about things still being fairly developmental and decided to use this as my daily work phone. On stable branch of course (I'm not that crazy). As of writing this I am currently on OTA 2. (Updated for OTA 3)

Here are the pros and cons I've found with the phone:
Pros:

• Battery life. I have never seen such phenomenal battery on a phone that isn't in super power saving mode or something comparable. I honestly feel like I'm making up these numbers but on average I get anywhere between 60-90 hours on battery usage. The most I ever saw out of the phone was 120 hours. Now granted I barely used the phone at all that week but still on average I get about 3 days out of the phone on regular usage.

• Usability: This is both a pro and a con. (I'll cover cons later) For a new user this is a bit of a leap from Android or Apple but once you get a feel for it the phone just flows. Want to switch between tabs on a browser? Quick swipe to the left and your there. Need to check the date or battery life? Swipe down and and as a added bonus you can run your finger across that bottom bar and it moves across all your setting options. Need to close stuff? Long swipe left and then it zooms you out to everything that running and you can pull down or up to close apps.

• Support: This is a free OS developed by people who clearly love Linux and didn't want to see this project die. To that I am truly in debt. The amount of love and attention taken into developing this is amazing. Tip the devs for me.

Ok here's what all the glass half-empty people want:
Cons:

• Apps (sorta): I say this is sort of a con mainly because it's a catch 22. Want great apps developed by developers for free? You got it. Want to make web apps for the platform so you can make app icons for websites? You can do that too. Want android apps? Anbox (not on my phone atm). Want to run XYZ Android app flawlessly on the phone? That's where the real challenge comes in. Anbox emulates that app you want to work and if you know anything about emulation there is no 100 percent guarantee that XYZ app will or will not run flawlessly. Now that's not to say things won't get better in the future but for now it's not there. But it's getting better. My money is on snap packages but we will see.

• Openstore: I only see this one as a issue due to the fact that it slightly fails in my eyes. I can see the app I want to download but I don't really see reviews. To me reviews are good feedback to let me know what apps are working and which don't. I also like the idea of donating to devs for apps. Kind of like Firefox add-ons used to do before quantum (I can't find the button at least). That or if one wanted a paid app require a minimum donation in order to download? (Or a link to their website to pay to download) Honestly this may just be thoughts in the wind but still an idea nonetheless.

• Usability (cons): (Updated to reflect OTA 3 upgrade) The screen rotation lock no longer shows up in the notification bar, but can still be found in system settings. Most other issues I had with the previous version have been fixed. I have had a few random crashes but nothing that hinders my daily usage. Also signal is a thing now, but no push notifications. One can hope this will change in the future.

So that's my experience so far. Any feedback is appreciated and thanks devs for all your hard work!

I've been doing a lot of thinking on this topic as I know that many are against the idea of emulating android apps in UT as sailfish does. But what if the apps themselves can be ported over? Kinda like how a console game gets ported to PC or some other method?

Under Canonical this was a real issue that they were trying to find a solution to and seems to be a ongoing issue in the Linux/Android world as a whole. There was however a "solution" at the time and looks like the code is still out there.
Would continuing work on something like this be worthwhile?

Sources:
http://www.channelfutures.com/open-source/ubuntu-devs-work-porting-android-apps-ubuntu-linux
https://code.launchpad.net/ndr

Really just depends on what you consider convergence. I'd love to see programs via appimage, flatpak, or even snap that could just be installed on one platform or another. The problem is all these platforms are different and the software developed on them are different as well with different goals. The closest I've found to a convergence system that works is Chrome OS and Android.

Essentially you would want software that is scale-able regardless the platform. Have a program that you can install on the phone, then turn around and be able to install on the desktop and it scale up. The closest I've seen to something like this is the maui framework under Nitrux.

This way the program being used is the same regardless the platform and makes everything feel seamless. I've also seen Chrome OS essentially do this with Android applications being run on their desktop OS. The only real difference in running an application on Android and Chrome OS (aside from the underbelly making things work on desktop) is you have a minimize, maximize and close slapped onto the application. It would be amazing for eample to see the open store ported to desktop and all applications just work.

Hardware to me is kinda the beauty of Linux. 2 or more gigs of ram minimum and for most people you are set. Usage for a wide majority of people anymore consists of paying bills online, word processing, and surfing the web or multimedia.

As for OS itself the closest I've seen to convergence is Android x86. Unity8 I could see doing the same as long as it's essentially scale-able. As of current it's not really like that. The phone OS and Desktop OS for nearly every major system out there is difference in appearance.

For me either make it all function and/or look as close to the same on all platforms and slap on a minimize, maximize, and close for the desktop and I'm set.

Sorry for the delayed reply. Through command prompt before I installed Android Studio with just the universal package it didn't see the phone. Not sure why but it just stayed at waiting on device.

Ubports was until I wiped it to proceed to install the other OS.
Still have Ubports bootloader.
Oneplus One that originally had Cyanogenmod on it.
Windows 10 beta 0.1.12 installer ubports.
Tried .1.09 still hung at same spot.
I do have the adb universal files installed.
Also have Android Studio installed.
I do have the phone in fastboot. power+up. Doesn't see it.
If I have to I'll switch to the linux side to do this. Will just need instructions for Ubuntu 18.04.

@advocatux thanks for that however the big problem that's hanging my phone right now (one plus one) is the fasboot mode. I can't even get the ubports loader to see it atm. The installer hangs at reboot into bootloader.

Hey all,

It's been a quite a while since I first installed UT on my phone, but now there is a specific set of apps I need for work that I can't get on UT afaik. I'm not gonna list them off here as it would give away where I work, but I just know they are android specific and I need them to work flawlessly for my job. The problem I'm running into is how do I reflash Android (Lineage OS in this case) on a phone that has nothing but UT on it?

Any help appreciated!

@einstein212 thanks for the heads up! I just got the update and it fixed loads of bugs for me. Turns out I had the updates set to wifi only. I think I did that a while back to prevent things from downloading when I didn't want them to. Makes me feel silly now for doing it seeing how much smoother I've found OTA 3 to be.

@grisen define MMS. If you are talking pictures I can send and receive pictures. Pictures I receive like normal, sending them I just use the "share" option in galleries then share to the default messaging app. From there I just type the name I want to send and done. I haven't tried video or audio but I would imagine it's a similar function. Honestly I don't know why they don't just hotlink the messaging options for attachments to other apps like galleries if you can share them via that method. Now I may be missing something here that's just how I do it.

So here I am. I took the plunge and made up my mind. I went went Ubuntu Touch (UT) for a few reasons:

• Easiest to install of the linux phone distros (way easier than sailfish IMO)
• A fairly active community
• Devs that seem to be paying attention and updating regularly

I did one other thing and ignored the warning about things still being fairly developmental and decided to use this as my daily work phone. On stable branch of course (I'm not that crazy). As of writing this I am currently on OTA 2. (Updated for OTA 3)

Here are the pros and cons I've found with the phone:
Pros:

• Battery life. I have never seen such phenomenal battery on a phone that isn't in super power saving mode or something comparable. I honestly feel like I'm making up these numbers but on average I get anywhere between 60-90 hours on battery usage. The most I ever saw out of the phone was 120 hours. Now granted I barely used the phone at all that week but still on average I get about 3 days out of the phone on regular usage.

• Usability: This is both a pro and a con. (I'll cover cons later) For a new user this is a bit of a leap from Android or Apple but once you get a feel for it the phone just flows. Want to switch between tabs on a browser? Quick swipe to the left and your there. Need to check the date or battery life? Swipe down and and as a added bonus you can run your finger across that bottom bar and it moves across all your setting options. Need to close stuff? Long swipe left and then it zooms you out to everything that running and you can pull down or up to close apps.

• Support: This is a free OS developed by people who clearly love Linux and didn't want to see this project die. To that I am truly in debt. The amount of love and attention taken into developing this is amazing. Tip the devs for me.

Ok here's what all the glass half-empty people want:
Cons:

• Apps (sorta): I say this is sort of a con mainly because it's a catch 22. Want great apps developed by developers for free? You got it. Want to make web apps for the platform so you can make app icons for websites? You can do that too. Want android apps? Anbox (not on my phone atm). Want to run XYZ Android app flawlessly on the phone? That's where the real challenge comes in. Anbox emulates that app you want to work and if you know anything about emulation there is no 100 percent guarantee that XYZ app will or will not run flawlessly. Now that's not to say things won't get better in the future but for now it's not there. But it's getting better. My money is on snap packages but we will see.

• Openstore: I only see this one as a issue due to the fact that it slightly fails in my eyes. I can see the app I want to download but I don't really see reviews. To me reviews are good feedback to let me know what apps are working and which don't. I also like the idea of donating to devs for apps. Kind of like Firefox add-ons used to do before quantum (I can't find the button at least). That or if one wanted a paid app require a minimum donation in order to download? (Or a link to their website to pay to download) Honestly this may just be thoughts in the wind but still an idea nonetheless.

• Usability (cons): (Updated to reflect OTA 3 upgrade) The screen rotation lock no longer shows up in the notification bar, but can still be found in system settings. Most other issues I had with the previous version have been fixed. I have had a few random crashes but nothing that hinders my daily usage. Also signal is a thing now, but no push notifications. One can hope this will change in the future.

So that's my experience so far. Any feedback is appreciated and thanks devs for all your hard work!

So is this something off in the horizon as far as potential development? I have seen anbox as well as other projects that have tried to take on the goal. I just noticed that NDR (unlike Anbox) was something that allowed to import the frameworks then build the rest of the app from there giving devs a base to build from so that they don't have to totally rewrite all the code.

It would be nice if an android app could be easily ported to UT as I see the biggest issue for devs is not wanting to support the platform due to such a small market. By giving them an easy way to port android apps over this would solve several long term issues. Even if there is a way to convert android apps into snaps (not sure if that's a thing or not). Any kind of porting or conversion process is better than nothing.

I'm talking normal SMS messages. Do they have to have telegram to send texts to or not?