I have an ROG Phone II now, and I have UserLAnd installed. It's . . . definitely different. Haven't got the dock yet. If I can get a few more things installed and working, that'll be my next step.
I don't 100% understand the internals of the app, but it seems to piggyback heavily on the underlying Android subsystem. It uses its own filespace in Android to download a minimal amount of system files to support a command-line window on top of what looks like a dead X session (funky grey background, no functioning GUI). Got a $9 USB3->USB-C adapter/hub to hook up mouse and keyboard, and by Jove they work! So if I really want to get away from the Android keyboard and add mouse support, I can do that. Everything's still pretty tiny unless I use touch commands to zoom in. Can't pan with the mouse either, which is somewhat vexatious.
But the kicker was getting LXDE started. UserLAnd's own documentation actually tells you how to start up LXDE, and I'm okay with using it since that's my preferred desktop environment anyway. For reference:
Main UserLAnd Repository. Contribute to CypherpunkArmory/UserLAnd development by creating an account on GitHub.
github.com
LXDE installed properly enough (hint: the keyboard support you want for American English is "31", don't make the mistake I did and install an Arabic keyboard), and I even installed nano via apt to put together a shell script to launch LXDE in case I would have to do this multiple times from command line. So my first concern was addressed: network support under UserLAnd just piggy-backs on whatever network support you have under Android. I'm using 802.11ac to my 6300v2 router. It's arguably the fastest and easiest-to-set-up wifi I've ever had under Linux. So ironic.
XSDL wanted me to use port 4713, so I typed:
Code:
export DISPLAY=:0 PULSE_SERVER=tcp:127.0.0.1:4713
startlxde
and that's where hilarity ensued. I had the same basic problems from this thread:
I followed the instructions, but the app xsdl can't connect to userland. There are missing pieces, first of all, the "start" command can not be executed.
github.com
XSDL just doesn't work under Android 9 right now. Bummer. Anyway, next I get to figure out how to make Firefox work in LXDE. Getting some nice errors there.