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Google is building its own DeX: First look at Android's Desktop Mode

(www.androidauthority.com)
442 points logic_node | 4 comments | 13 May 25 14:30 UTC | HN request time: 0.662s | source
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enragedcacti ◴[13 May 25 14:58 UTC] No.43973693[source]▶
Taking better advantage of a display is nice but imo the really exciting part of desktop mode is the planned integration with Google's Linux Terminal app (i.e. 1st party linux VM support). I have a Samsung DeX device and while you can get a basic dev environment working easily it can be really cumbersome to make it comfortable to use and integrate with your normal tablet workflow. Being able to install full-fat linux apps and run them in a window would be a complete game changer.

source for planned integration: https://issuetracker.google.com/issues/392521081?utm_source=...

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1. assassinator42 ◴[13 May 25 19:18 UTC] No.43976570[source]▶
Rumor is Samsung won't support Google's Linux Terminal (at least for their existing phones) since their Knox conflicts with the Android Virtualization Framework :-(.

Honestly I'd like to see Windows 11 running under this as well, but that seems incredibly unlikely.

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2. wiktor-k ◴[13 May 25 20:25 UTC] No.43977315[source]▶
It's interesting to hear because Samsung had a Linux feature previously: https://developer.samsung.com/sdp/blog/en/2017/10/18/samsung...
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3. pmontra ◴[13 May 25 22:26 UTC] No.43978445[source]▶
They had Linux on DeX in 2018, killed in 2019. It was a partnership with Canonical

https://9to5google.com/2018/11/09/samsung-linux-on-dex-andro...

It was the Ubuntu 16.04 desktop running in a LXD container. It crashed when the tablet went in out of memory, so I had to be careful with what I was running.

4. caleb-allen ◴[15 May 25 14:45 UTC] No.43995622[source]▶
Maybe it's possible anyways? Qualcomm was able to integrate their own hypervisor on top of AVF

Linux Plumbers Conference 2025 | Adding Third-Party Hypervisor to Android Virtualization Framework

https://lpc.events/event/17/contributions/1447/attachments/1... https://youtu.be/hLdUCrlheKg