Start with installing gimp package in your Libertine Container.
Screenshot is GIMP running in Libertine Container using the Color 48 theme to make icons usable on a mobile device - https://bitbucket.org/paynekj/paynekj-gimp-scripts/raw/2e8e87faf5eaaf6036e0d8b68ff9f6f37a3f0421/themes/Color-48.7z

In order to install this theme I had to extract the 7z archive on my computer and upload the folder to the phone. Then I had to go into home/phablet/cache/libertine-container/xenial/rootfs/usr/share/gimp/2.0/themes rename the "Default" theme folder as "Old Default" - and then paste in the Color 48 theme folder renamed as "Default" (because trying to change the theme from Gimp's gui would just crash it)

Also to get the GTK menus to be sized to be useable on phone it is important to: create a file named .Xdefaults in a text editor (tedit is a good Ubuntu Touch native one for this) with a single line Xft.dpi: 280 - or whatever other dpi value which you prefer. Save this to the home directory of your chroot environment - usually .local/share/libertine-container/user-data/xenial/ in your normal home directory.

You also still need to use an external bluetooth keyboard for GIMP on the phone in order to have the gui respond.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Given that Dekko2 was recently updated for the 2.x version from using the Oxide engine to the QtWebEngine - to the best of my knowledge no critical UT native apps are using Oxide anymore. Is there a timeline to remove Oxide support from UT (from my understanding, a step that will be necessary at some point in order to free up space in the UT image for future enhancements) - and is there a way to check whether our webapps will be effected by this? Am I correct in believing that any webapp made using Webapp Creators "Ogra container" will not work once Oxide support is removed - so that these webapps will have to be updated once the change is made? And is this change expected to be made in OTA-12, OTA-13 or later?

Best regards,
Steve Berson

• What improvements and fixes for the Morph Browser are marked as "definitely will happen" for OTA-6? Biggest requests I have myself is to be able to sign into sites like Dropbox, and be able to upload files to various services via the browser itself.
• Any chance that camera zoom for the OnePlus One will get fixed in OTA-6 - or is this just a serious brickwall of an issue that will likely take much longer, if ever, to fix?
• Would UBports consider hosting crowd sourcing drives for specific native apps? E.g. on the Telegram channel there were two of us that were willing to put up $80 to help fund coding for a native Wire app - and I would be willing to donate $200 myself towards a native Lyft app. Seems to me if there was a place hosted on the UBports site where people could donate towards funding specific apps they desired - with any funds held in escrow by UBports itself - then greater funds could be raised, and the donors would have the confidence that their money would not be sent without a functional app getting delivered, and the coders would have the confidence that they would get all pledged monies as soon as they delivered the functional app.
• Has the UBports team received the Purism Librem 5 developer boards yet - and based on specs known so far, does it seem realistic that it will end up being a fully convergence capable device?

Best regards,
Steve Berson

The following desktop apps are working ok in OTA12 via Libertine in my tests (meaning that they launch and can, with some work arounds and patience with the clunkiness of their guis when used on mobile devices, generally made to function), and all offer some amount of functionality that is not necessarily already found with UT native apps.
For apps that much more suited for desktop, like AbiWord and GIMP, I would suggest using them with an external keyboard/mouse/trackpad and/or external display.

abiword - word processor
file-roller - archive manager
evince - pdf viewer
firefox - web browser
gimp - image editor
gthumb - image gallery & editor
gedit - text editor
medit - text editor
gtick - metronome for musicians
youtube-dl - command line YouTube video downloader - run in Terminal app
hardinfo - system information & benchmark tester
xournal - note taking via touch, stylus or text; pdf annotator
mypaint - illustration - note it is somewhat laggy and crash prone though
easytag - id3 tag editor for audio files
p7zip-full - command line archive manager for 7zip files
p7zip-rar' - command line archive manager for rar files
mpv - media player - open files into it from the File Manager app

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Some screen shots

There is a functional native Signal client (Axolotl) now in the Open Store, and there is a beta for TELEports available that allows the UT device to initiate an encrypted "secret chat" for Telegram, and there is a clunky but functional webapp available for Wire - so there is in fact a number of ways to send and receive encrypted messages from a UT device currently.

Also - if one needs to have end to end encrypted notes, the Standard Notes UT webapp allows to access these online with an option for them to be password protected.

But it would be great if encrypting our home folders was made much easier to do in the future - hopefully a developer will take on this task at some point.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

@MarkG_108 - yeah - uNav is a bit clunky in usage in my experience - but I think offline maps for Pure Maps should end up happening within a month or two - I've been really encouraged by how well it works, and it was just ported to Ubuntu Touch a couple weeks ago.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

I will note that for those that like a slightly cleaner look for their lock screen, that you can disable the circle thingy that displays usage stats by going into Settings and then Security & Privacy and unchecking Stats on welcome screen.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

@Aury88 said in New badge for Yumi?:

here some iterations..!

...my screen is filling with friendship...
Here the link to the svg:
https://mega.nz/#!UN0SDA7J!njORZM45c7EuA5DotnT8eW3KKdTD36mN9HL_iYIsmEo

I really like the bottom logo on this one a lot, far superior to the others in my opinion.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

@dobey said in New Launcher, edge channel.:

@TotalSonic said in New Launcher, edge channel.:

I think the ultimate plan (or at least one possible one) is to allow people to place widgets and launchers on the wallpaper background as if it was a "home" (same as if it was a non-vanilla-Gnome-3 desktop) - but that this will take time to code and the need to streamline the code and image size to what can be easily maintained makes the first step of getting rid of Scopes one that will have to happen in order to make any forward progress from there.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

It has been an idea that a few people have mentioned. There is currently no plan to do it (nor do I think should there be, as it's not a convergent feature).

I don't see why allowing icons and widgets on a "home" background (whether mobile, tablet, or desktop) would be consodered "not a convergent feature" when that feature is an integral part of most OS's in all 3 form factors. I do agree that coding that feature to be truly convergent would likely be difficult, and as such should not be a priority for the UBports team.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

This is really a very minor quibble - but while we got really nice updates (with a unified design style) to the splash screens to most of the core apps in OTA-13, it seems Morph, Camera and File Manager apps still are using old splash images. Are there plans to have new ones for these 3 core apps in OTA-14?

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Are there any plans to bring category based search to the search bar in the App Drawer? Seems this, along with the ability to initiate an internet search directly from the App Drawer search bar, would be a welcome feature improvement that might make sense to prioritize for OTA-15.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

@Giiba - sure that works, but if you place an html file into a subfolder inside your Documents folder and try to open it via its local url it doesn't (just tested this). ALSO - again, that is not a direct gui based method of opening the file - what I am asking for is a gui based method with an "Open" command within Morph's options, which allows for browsing in the file manager prior to clicking it to have it open, rather than having to know and type the local file's url.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

First big thing I can think of is the ability to directly open a local html file - the lack of this seems like a strange omission to me.
Support for web based video/audio chat would also be high on my list.
Ability to load a Widevine plugin would be nice too, for support of DRM protected major video streaming sites like Netflix and Hulu.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Regarding Firefox - we would need Mozilla to build a mobile version for UT, or to have someone code a fork for one - otherwise you can already install desktop Firefox on UT devices via a Libertine container - some info on that here - https://forums.ubports.com/topic/3774/where-is-firefox/15?_=1603043940011 - but the performance and interface on it will be slower and more clunky relative to the native Morph browser.

Regarding "built in mail app" - there is already a very good UT native email client being maintained available for install in the Open Store - https://open-store.io/app/dekko2.dekkoproject
Dekko2 is coded and maintained by a team that is separate from the UT core developers - so it is not by default included in the OS. Also - many people do not use email clients these days, or prefer to use web based clients - so the app is not included with the UT OS image by default, in order to keep the image smaller, and with less things that might not get used by all users.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

At only 1gB of RAM, and being a 7 year old phone that only received Android 4.1 originally, this phone unfortunately would be a poor candidate for porting.
You can try for yourself though - instructions on how to do this are at
http://docs.halium.org/en/latest/porting/first-steps.html
and
http://docs.ubports.com/en/latest/porting/Intro.html

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Ubuntu Touch is not compatible at all with any of the Palm Pre phones.
It is very possible UT could be made to work with the Xperia XA - but it would require some porting first. Info on how to do this is at http://docs.halium.org/en/latest/porting/first-steps.html
http://docs.ubports.com/en/latest/porting/Intro.html
http://docs.ubports.com/en/latest/porting/halium_9/Halium_9_GSI_porting.html

Best regards,
Steve Berson

@Giiba - Google.com/maps finds my location in Morph with no problem in under a minute on Meizu Pro-5 post OTA-13 RC - just tested it now - you just need to give it permission to access your location when that dialog box pops up (a decision that you have an option for Morph to remember).

I unpublished yesterday the Ogra based Google Maps webapp (which uses Oxide) that I had posted 2 years ago. Between recent updates to uNav, Pure Maps, and OSM Scout Server, as well as the ability for Morph based webapps to find location, at this point I don't think it is actually necessary - and the Ogra webapp did not work on PinePhone or PineTab.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Seems any Ogra based webapp in the Open Store is marked as "Web App+" - think it would make sense to have a notice made that all of these apps marked as such will be unpublished automatically in a month or two, and then only allowed to re-publish if they are updated to QTwebengine.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Going to un-publish the two Ogra based webapps I have in the Open Store right now, as a tiny part in furthering this effort, which makes total sense to me.

Edit: One thing I've noticed - it seems that the "Delete" button does not always appear on the page for an unpublished app, so that it is not always possible to completely delete an app off of the Open Store.

Best regards,
Steve Berson