@nero355 The HTML5/WebApp feature for Clickable to create UT app is quite literally putting an application in its own browser window, the only difference is the lack of NodeJS on the backend.

After some playing with regular ReactJS I've been able to make some applications, hopefully webpack will play nice with any modules I like to use in my setup, though generally it always has done.

I doubt the overhead for Electron or Chromium is going to be much different to Morph if ran on the platform due to the fact Morph utilises Qt WebEngine which has Chromium at the core.

I'm not certain what the performance tweaks are and whether they could be applied to Electron.

Ubuntu Touch does support windowed mode so being able to spawn multiple windows (assuming its supported) could be useful in that mode.

Eitherway, I got the input I needed.

Thanks for your responses everyone.

@mrt10001 Instead I replaced the phone! With the Google Pixel 2 XL. Now I have both models to test and play with, though I can't test battery life with the Pixel 2 as its so bad. So far the 2 XL (used) is already looking good.

I'll feedback when I have a definitive answer and hopefully more answers regarding stability, I'll be using it at my work phone so I'll have to keep it charged and ready to go daily.

Hi all,

I've been tinkering and hacking around with my Google Pixel 2 XL.

After some messing around and doing unspeakable things with the OS I managed to get Electron and Chromium to run under Libertine with Xmir and little effort outside of making it use an existing X session i.e. setting DISPLAY=:0 or another screen number, this relies on another X application to be running under Xmir to use its session, in this case I used lxterminal and ended up with Electron & Chromium displaying ontop.

I also found that at some point Chromium added support for Wayland to its "Ozone" graphics and input abstraction layer.

I'm assuming this could allow it to work with Mir?
Though my understanding of Mir is practically 0 outside it being similar to Wayland, but I could be off the mark. Running Electron results in a broken pipe and SIGABRT.

Is it possible to package an application that can start its own Xmir session or how can I get Electron to play nice with Mir using Electrons upstream Wayland support?

Though this does introduce some significant overhead. Because... well, Chromium likes RAM.

Unless there's a better solution that allows NodeJS on the backend of an app presenting a HTML5 UI with communication via IPC or similar?

From poking around at Clickable, it appears to just run a command, would this allow running a shell script with a few commands, does it need to present a window etc.

I have so many questions, but the end result is the same. HTML5 applications backed with NodeJS, though I'm still looking at my options.

I suppose it's possible to use a HTML5 application and hoping webpack will work to create a full featured app.

I've found a possible solution for myself to install applications without needing to change the read only permissions on the rootfs of Ubuntu Touch.

The solution I'm using is copying the executables from the Libertine containers rootfs to "/home/phablet/.local/bin" which has allowed me to use git and htop without having to do anything to my installation.

The question remains, would this persist through updates or is .local cleared when updating OTA?

If not, this may be a good solution to get git, htop and similar working. Obviously this excludes anything that requires X11 support but allows terminal applications to run. Is there any obvious drawbacks?

Thanks for the feedback.
I may have just shelled out £60 on a Google Pixel 2 XL ;D
I'll be trying Crackle with that