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There is some sort of Whatsapp transport for XMPP[1]. Dunno how well it works in practice.

[1] https://git.theta.eu.org/eta/whatsxmpp

I use the PinePhone as my daily driver. Telegram Desktop actually works rather well, so does Matrix with Fractal, but I don't think WhatsApp can really work without an official blessing from FB.

It should work in anbox though right? Just a matter of whether anbox runs smoothly?

http://anbox.io/

Good to hear re Telegram, thanks. Gah, I'm tempted again. I actually got as far as checkout before, but then tax and shipping was added last minute and it suddenly seemed not such a great idea on a whim, and to warrant more thought/reading reviews on which size RAM model to get.

Maybe 2021 will be the year of (my) Linux phone.. :)

I'm in the same boat with WhatsApp -- though I got a pinephone anyway, because an open, battery powered arm64 computer with USB-C and displayport out is awesome enough to justify it personally.

A couple months ago I went through the hoops of getting anbox set up and working (which I confess involved a lot of mucking around with containers and package versions) and it was .. better than I expected?

WhatsApp and several apps besides installed and opened up fine, and first impressions were that it was surprisingly smooth, given how positively ... anemic the Pine's SoC is. Not pleasant, but definitely usable.

Unfortunately at the time, a bug in the software keyboard and wayland meant that all keyboard input was mangled, so I could never get as far as actually setting up whatsapp and actually testing it.

I remember seeing a month or so ago that Purism apparently fixed the bug in their software keyboard, so now it should work? I've been out of the country though, and haven't tested it yet.

There's still some small keyboard issues left to fix I think but the main thing is I don't think notifications will be possible (especially if they rely on Google Play services).

There is a WhatsApp app on KaiOS (the FirefoxOS successor) which I think must be a PWA so I wonder if that could be repurposed to run on the PinePhone.

Ahhh yeah, I hadn't considered that. Hmmm.

The KaiOS app looks interesting. It seems like they just repurposed the regular web version of WhatsApp, based on its limitations (no voice/video calling). It's a shame they can't just use local storage and let you use that by itself in a browser (without an android/ios device), but, oh well.

An involved solution can be to set a Matrix bridge up for most services, including WhatsApp.

The downside are:

1. You have to host your Matrix server, so not everybody will be happy about it, or able to do so;

2. This relies on reverse-engineering the whatsApp web API, and is against WhatsApp TOS, you might get banned

3. You need another device with WhatsApp installed (an old android phone or a VM works fine).

Personally, this is the main reason why I refuse to use any of these proprietary apps, and I make this clear to my friends.

On the upside, if you go that route, you can go the extra mile and bridge facebook messenger, discord, telegram, and others to your Matrix account, and control everything on the go from a single app. I'm planning to work on push notifications for the Linux phone platform :)

4. Text only

Advantage of anbox approach is that it is the WhatsApp app, so audio/video calls (in theory) work too.

Matrix and bridges is cool though, I would like to set that up, it just unfortunately doesn't cover every use.

Sounds pretty promising, thanks! Can you expand slightly on the SoC being 'anaemic'? Slow in general, or just to start up?

The PinePhone is not 'fast'. It is however not 'slow' per se either. It's fine for running most apps, but things like Firefox take a while to launch.

Still, the fact I can just drop any Linux aarch64 binary on it and run it without restrictions makes it very much worth it.

How's the battery life?

To be honest, for a daily driver, this is my wish list:

    - At least 20 hours charge
    - Browser
    - Email client
    - MP3 over bluetooth
    - Phone audio
    - Camera (video and audio)
    - SMS
    - Some form of IM that others can use (Matrix client would be nice)
    - Tethering (via 4G)
    - Native (gui) apps (Firefox OS was ok, but native would have been good)

Any issues with the above? Because that's really 99% of my daily usage.

Here's my experience:

> At least 20 hours charge

I think I get about 3 days on complete standby (with no sim card)

> Browser

Has had a usable browser for at least half a year.

> Phone audio

Works

> Camera

Its supposed to work on Manjaro at least.

> IM

Someone posted Matrix and Telegram work in a sibling thread

> Native apps

Pretty much everything is native afaik, excluding PWA/electron/emulation

Can't say about the rest, since I didn't really test it much with a SIM card :/

One thing I'll say though, it has(had?) problems with wakeup, ie. if it goes to sleep an alarm or timer wont wake it up.

> I think I get about 3 days on complete standby (with no sim card)

I'm more interested in "realistic usage." Like you I haven't really tested it with a SIM card. Though just from a minute or two with the keyboard I found it impractical for carrying on a conversation over SMS so I don't think I could do a real test of the battery life anyway.

The on-screen keyboard is not actually the main problem, the main problem is just that the thing is very laggy compared to my flagship. I hit the wrong button and then the entire UI locks up and it can take a minute just to get back to the screen I wanted to be on. vs. on my flagship I can jump to the browser, do a search, jump back to messenger, send a message, jump to maps, look at something, and everything happens with typical subsecond responsiveness.

This is my biggest gripe with it at the moment as well, it's horribly unresponsive. I think a UI specifically for mobile will have to be made before it's really useful :/

Ok, thanks to the both of you. I think I'll have to wait it out a bit longer, but I'm excited that it's showing so much progress. Feels at least better than the OpenMoko days.

Some people say it’s already good enough: https://forums.puri.sm/t/librem-5-dogwood-vs-pinephone-pmos-....

For messaging, I think there will be a matrix client that works for it. And since bridge bots will soon be e2e encrypted, it should work nicely.