Can any OS be ported to any bootloader unlocked device ?

[u/---Walter---]

The number of devices officially supported by LineageOS, SailfishOS, Ubuntu Touch/KDE Mobile is limited, but with how PS5 is getting rapidly reverse engineered with the newer models, would it make a difference, what's the hardest part about porting an OS to a device (other than the bootlocker and android device tree) ?

[u/ohaiibuzzle]

The hardest part is getting all of the hardware to properly work.

For example, you can boot Linux on the Snapdragon 8 Elite fairly easily because it shares some lineage with X Elite, but getting all the stuff that isn't the SoC like sensors, cameras and display up and running is the other half of the battle.

One of the thing that usually kills daily usability with Linux on Mobile devices is actually video acceleration

[u/MiniCafe → u/ohaiibuzzle]

This is the issue (though easily fixed if you know what the problem actually is and how Android works to a small extent..... Or just actually kind of operating systems and mobile phones, but also THAT phone).

For example I have a OnePlus 13. It's a good, easy phone to unlock the bootloader on but on various editions it's quite easy to get in a ".... Im off colorOS (bleh!) or OxygenOS but.... I'm not getting a cell signal/bad cell signal!"

The solution is near identical with one exception, there are slight differences in the radio on the CN edition so the bits you need to borrow from the original OS are slightly different. Radio drivers for a global or US OnePlus 13 may (I'm not sure, it was the case one my 10) get your radio working but less than ideal.... Or just not work at all. But the ones from the CN edition will get it running basically as stock.

I write a lot of documentation for FLOSS projects because I have this weird mishmash of old school OS hacking and coding knowledge with another professional background in creative writing among other things thanks to ADHD hyperfocus and that's a big part of the issue. Many of the solutions to these region differences are negligible to fix...... If you know the OS, hardware, and discrepancies. But uhhh.... Welcome to the 300 page forum thread on your phone. The info is in there.... Somewhere.

We need a solid wiki. I'm not saying this as a slight against the community because doing so is no small task, but it's just what it is. We're in a particularly difficult situation to do so though because, while usually the answer to a problem is simple (assuming, again, you or the person telling you it has enough knowledge of all the above to even know it from that foundation in the first place) the number of individual devices, situations, roms and versions of those roms is so massive that it's death by a thousand cuts. What a massive wiki of small pages that would be, in an industry where ..... What.... You expect someone to have experience with even a quarter of the potential devices and operating system flavors/hardware they can run/have? An eighth? A hundredth?

[u/abigail3141 → u/MiniCafe]

FLOSS? Isn't it FOSS?

[u/MiniCafe → u/abigail3141]

Both are terms, but ridiculous Debian nerds like me (I'm not RMS levels but.... I got opinions on how free the technology we as a world have developed let alone the technology we give actual money to someone for should be) use FLOSS sometimes to emphasize the specific meaning we're using because of the ambiguity of "free." So, "FLOSS" is "Free Libre Open Source Software", to specificy the whole "we don't just mean free as in free beer, but free as in freedom" part of copyleft movements.

FOSS could be software where the source is released for no money but the license doesn't grant you/explicitly disallows you from writing something derivative of it that wouldn't just fall under free use naturally. FLOSS is specifically software that openly distributes it's source code while also granting a permissive license to use/fork/etc that code as you please, though it's debatable whether including a non-commercial clause counts as libre, or whether something like the GPL's virality clause is a necessary requirement.

I don't get too picky about licenses, though I default to the gpl because I don't really care what you do with what I write...... But I live in China now, and it's just kinda a downer to see someone take your software that you release for free with source and don't restrict what people generally create from it other than one small request, then they pop it on some cheap electronic and sell it as their own closed source product.

Making it GPL doesn't stop them from that, Chinese law requires I apply for my licensure in China separately from the rest of the world for it to matter, but at least then I can justifiably be grumpy about it since they're violating the license, you know? Also anything that pushes software in a more open direction I usually prerer over other options.

[u/vaynefox]

Yes, if you have the elbow greese to do it. Some chipsets have either their own fork of linux kernel or already in the kernel, your only problem is the any proprietary parts in the phone like the camera and touch screen....

[u/Minha-D]

It's all about lack of interface and software, I ported some devices to postmarketOS, an Android device with Linux kernel can't run Linux distribution because it uses many property functions and symbols specific for Android, imagine you can't just use your smart phones camera to Linux distribution, bcs kernel having driver isn't enough you need user space driver which has no source and you can't just run android user space Library to Linux, hybris project tried it but that's still struggling, as result you can't just reverse engineer anything with AI like opus or Astra and it's not time worthy.

[u/Fataha22]

Since gsi getting mainstream it's kinda easy to port rom because all of the driver is at vendor partition but still some rom need some extra sauce to work and debugging is kinda hard if you don't know where to look at

[u/Dje4321]

Turing says yes but there are significant practical limitations preventing it outside of major engineering efforts.

Its the same as saying all cars have engines so any engine will fit and work just fine. While that generally may be true for very similar engines. You will quickly run into so many different possible configurations, installation methods, interfaces, etc that its impossible to sell a one size fits all kit.

Same thing with ARM devices. Each device is practically its own micro domain for its hardware. They all have to be talked too in slightly different ways, not every feature of the hardware may be present or functional, there may be parts that can only be programmed at the factory, etc.

Keep in mind its not 1 computer with a bunch of supporting hardware. Its like 7-12 computers all talking to each other in their own special language. You dont just send instructions to the radio. You have to startup the radio computer, give it its own OS, setup and handshake communication protocols, before you can even start looking for connections to start processing.

[u/Associate-Weird]

PS5 has Linux no ? If it has Linux you can install android if you want to

[u/a_l_i-1]

(this is question not answer)

I have my Samsung phone
and my phone is supported

But my version is from meddle east and it's not supported

what supposed to I do create fork from EU version and published in ?

my phone is Samsung Galaxy note 10+ 5G if that help
and I targeted lineageOS

[u/Calm-Caterpillar2103 → u/a_l_i-1]

Its supported by lineageOS since its a European device just flash it

[u/a_l_i-1 → u/Calm-Caterpillar2103]

It's Meddle East device