ⓘ Fairphone

Getting desktop-class Linux to run on mobile hardware is notoriously difficult, but developer Nick on X has managed to pull it off on the modular Fairphone 6 (Notebookcheck review), giving us our first look at Fedora 44 running on an Android device.

In a hands-on video, the phone is shown running a touch-friendly GNOME interface running smoothly, without any noticeable lag. Scrolling through the Settings pane displays options for Wi-Fi, network, multitasking, appearance and even sections for mouse & touchpad, keyboard, color management, printers etc. just like you would see on a desktop. Presumably, the options found in some of those submenus are not yet entirely functional. Swiping down from the top bar smoothly pulls up the calendar widget alongside the quick-settings shade, where toggles for Wi-Fi, Night Light, Dark Style, Tiling, and display brightness are all fully interactive. Heading into the system's "About" page verifies the build as Fedora Linux 44 (Forty Four) under the host name fedora, with the system accurately detecting 7.1 GB of RAM and 251.5GB of internal storage.

Because it is an early port, there are still a few issues. As shown at the end of the video, tapping the Trash icon on the bottom dock brings up an error message saying "Failed to launch 'Trash': Failed to find default application for content type 'inode/directory', which simply shows that default file manager shortcuts aren't properly linked yet.

A follow-up demo shows the camera app opening smoothly and switching seamlessly between the main, ultra-wide, and front lenses without a single crash.

The Fairphone 6+ recently made its global debut alongside an official launch in the US. It retains almost the same hardware and design as the standard Fairphone 6, differing only under the hood with an upgraded Snapdragon 7s Gen 4 processor and 12GB of RAM compared to the regular Fairphone 6 which features a Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 and 8GB RAM configuration.

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