Android and openSUSE: Who is connecting and how are you connecting?

English Hardware
21

Yes, indeed.

I have been looking that over, as well.

I am also going to look into setting up a CalDAV server (probably using radicale, at least for first test) so I can have the Calendar synchronized with kOrganizer through the local network.

My goal is to collect all the connectivity options, test them, and list their pros and cons. In the end, I hope to have a few easy-to-follow guides with the options – especially emphasizing FOSS options (so, yes, checking FDroid and so forth) – that will help anyone new to this.

I am sure that if I have a comprehensive guide, it will be found by many on the internet, and since I am using openSUSE as the example OS, it might also encourage more newcomers to try our favourite OS out.

22

Why just caldav? A nextcloud instance can do calendaring, files, contacts. DavDroid+Nextcloud-client on the phone. Done

23

Sorry Gerry, apparently I cannot “mount the SD card as a local mount”, since that “Card” directory is anyway mounted through an mtp: protocol, it isn’t a “device” and even “mount --bind” gives “permission denied” errors.
I still have full read/write access though, i.e. I can create new directories and files on it and those are “retained” by the SD card when detached from the phone.
Please remember that things might be slightly different on stock Android 5.1.1.

I’ll add to the thread if I find something more useful, maybe once 42.2 is finally released.

24

Okay, that is exactly as I expected. Yes, the mtp: protocol cannot be mounted. But, for simply copying one or two files back and forth, or creating directories, or deleting them, or even just accessing a file to get information from it or possibly edit it, mtp: protocol is just fine. So, it is very usefull as it is.

For more functionality, such as rsync or Unison, something like DroidNAS would be the ticket, and there are more solutions.

Please remember that things might be slightly different on stock Android 5.1.1.

Of course. And, I think we should be collecting anything that might be different about setting up the various versions, if we want to provide a guide that is “comprehensive”.

I'll add to the thread if  I find something more useful, maybe once 42.2 is finally released.

Looking forward to your next input. Thanks.

25

Thanks for that, I will test that as well.:slight_smile:

As I said, I want to do as much exploring and testing as I can using various methods of getting the job done.

The unit I picked up – a Moto E – was on sale cheap from the retailer, so if I wind up blowing it up, it will not cost me a lot. That ease of mind allows a lot of experimenting, tinkering, and exploring. :wink:

My first tack is to run through everything I can without having to root the phone. This will allow me to provide solutions and suggestions to those who do not want to risk their warranty by rooting their phone or tablet, yet would like as much connectivity as they can get.

After I have done that, I plan to restore the phone to factory, then root it. I then will start exploring all over again, this time concentrating on applications that require root privileges.

A firewall might be such an application. Yes, there are some no-root firewalls out there that work using a fake VPN, and I am testing them out. So far, though, I have found they are not able to work on an LTE device because they only work with IPv4. At least one of the devs says he is trying to come up with a solution to the IPv6 problem, but has not achieved that, to date.

I still have a few more to test, though, to see if someone else did solve the problem.

This was not by design, but my discovery that I purchased the LTE version of the Moto E turns out to be a bonus, with respect to some things working differently on the device, since I can test some situations that do not exist on the other versions.

And I am also super-pleased at getting the input from my fellow openSUSE forum members.

It is a great help!

26

… actually, in afterthought, there may be situations where the CalDAV server (using radicale or any other server that supports CalDAV) on the home (or business) PC might make more sense: If a person (or a small business) wants to sync multiple devices to the calendar(s).

For example, if I wanted all my employees to stay synchronized with the business calendar. Or, if I have a couple of smartphones and a tablet or two, plus a couple of laptops, they could all sync to the calendar on the server.:wink:

27

I have a rooted Galaxy Nexus running Dirty Unicorns (Android 6 custom ROM) and I just installed Tumbleweed KDE.
However, it doesn’t work out of the box and the required mtp packages don’t appear to be installed.
Can someone else grab the latest tumbleweed iso and verify?
Are the 3 packages mentioned earlier all that is needed?
These days they should really be installed by default.

Perhaps you could edit the original post with the required packages for Android support.

28

Nextcloud/Owncloud can do exactly that. I had a customer ( bankrupt :)) where the employees all shared a general calendar, each had their own, some groups a shared one too. Nextcloud/Owncloud doesn’t care how many devices are used. For example: we use a family calendar ( rw access to all family members ) which we access from phones, tablets, laptops through DavDroid, Korganizer, web interface.

29

I have an “old” Moto Droid Ultra, and I run an app on the phone called AirDroid(I also run the app on my Kindle Fire). I just use it for transferring files, books, photos, etc. I’ve yet to encounter a problem with the app.

30

Reporting back on this quest: I have installed and have been testing NoRoot Data Firewall https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.jianjia.firewall and it appears to be doing its job admirably. As far as I have been able to tell, nothing is skirting around it using IPv6, so I guess IPv6 is successfully implemented. If I find out otherwise, I will post the information back here.

At this point in time, I recommend it.:good::good::good:

It is described as follows, first:

The app is developed **in my spare time.**
**All the features are free** and there **are no ads in it.**
If you like it and want to support the author, you can buy the donation package of Firewall Donation

… which featured highly in my choice of testing this one.

The rest of the info is as follows:

FEATURES:

  • NO ROOT REQUIRED mobile and Wifi data firewall.
  • Control the access permission for each app to access internet with mobile network and WIFI network.
  • Support to only blocking background data and let foreground data go.
  • Record, analyze and sort the data usage for each app.
  • Show the history data by hour, day or month in bar chart.
  • Notify when one app has new internet connection.
  • Set temp permission for just 1 hour.
  • Support mobile network only mode which disable firewall automatically in wifi network.
  • Analyze the accessed websites for each app.
  • Domain filter.
  • Domain resolution.
  • IP filter
  • No image mode.
  • Night mode.
  • Set DNS server address.
  • Startup automatically.
  • Capture data packets, which means you can sniffer the internet data on your device with no-root needed.
  • Support profile
  • Network throttle

ATTENTION:

    1. This app is based on VPN interface, which is the only way to implement the firewall on noroot devices. It works as the proxy between the common apps and the servers. The app doesn’t steal you data or send even one bit of its own.
    1. The app needs the permission to read/write sdcard for two features: 1). Backup/Restore the firewall rules to/from the sdcard. 2. Store the captured package pcap file in the sdcard. It doesn’t steel your data on the sdcard.

If you still think it’s not secure, please DO NOT install it.

31

I link myself into this thread. Read all pages but still I’m confused. I try to switch from Apple Platform to Linux. I learned, that my loved iPhone too is to be abandoned because there is no way of using it appropriate any more with Linux in terms of syncing…

So no matter how sad I become, I will consider using an Android Smartphone. Now I want to find out how flawless Linux works with Android. My needs are simple:

I want to connect LOCALLY via USB. I will not use any Cloud Service and I refuse to set up my own cloud just to sync my Phone.
With syncing I mean Calendar and Contacts - but really syncing, i.e. I add Meeting X on the Smartphone and change Appointment Y on the PC and after I synced, both PC and Phone reflect the changes. Same with Contacts.
And of course I’d like to retrieve photos and movies I make from the Phone; and I would like to use the Smartphone as MP3-Player like my iPhone does it, thus getting MP3s from the Linux PC to the Phone.

From what I read here, it seems to be an issue of which Android-Phone you chose?! Reading this thread actually confused me more than it helped me - which ist of course partially because I am used to a Mac where this is handled centrally by iTunes and the built in Apps like Calendar and Contacts sync without glitches. On Linux, as far as I understand this, there is no “standard Contacts App” so maybe I totally miss the point anyway?

However, for contacts for example kaddressbook is installed by default on my openSuSE Leap 42.2 - my hope is now that there is a kind of “hub”-Application that connects the Phone to the Desktop App (kaddressbook in this case) and handles the synchronisation. Same for korganizer als Calendar-Application.

Probably this is considered a noob question, that’s because it is - long before I can deal with firewalls on the smartphone (wasn’t necessary on the iPhone) or virtual VPN considerations, I’d like to be able to perform the basic tasks. And from the starting post in thist thread I derived that my question would fit in here.

tia. w.

32

wa_ha’s post above is over a year old, but this thread still looks like the forum’s likeliest clearing house for Android / openSUSE connectivity information, so I’ll add my two cents here:

I use LineageOS, the successor to CyanogenMod, and TWRP recovery. The current LineageOS version uses Android Oreo 8.1. I unlocked the bootloader to install LineageOS, but didn’t root the phone.

  • File transfers have never been an issue, either with Android loaded or through TWRP in recovery mode. I connect the USB cable, tell Android that I want to transfer files, rather than use the cable only for charging. Easy.

  • Tethering was much tougher, but not through any fault of openSUSE. On two separate smartphones, I experienced the issues described at: https://forums.opensuse.org/showthread.php/531369-Can-t-tether-to-Android-smartphone-internet-via-USB-or-hotspot : I connected the phone, switched on tethering, watched the linux desktop offer “thumbs up” messages … only to find myself unable to ping, traceroute, connect online in anyway.

I fixed the problem on both phones by following most of the steps at: https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/how-enable-tethering-android-6-0-marshmallow-update-1524792 , although I downloaded the Android platform tools from https://developer.android.com/studio/releases/platform-tools , rather than use Windows tools or drivers. I believe that I had to enable both Android debugging and “ADB over network” in Android developer options to get the ADB Shell to work, and invoked ADB Shell from a root terminal.

The listed ADB shell command settings put global tether_dun_required 0 fixed the problem in both Android phones.

I used to USB tether with ease in Linux Mint, but am now convinced that this was only because I was using an older version of Android. I hadn’t tried to tether for a long time, and was caught flat-footed by an unfortunate change in Android default settings.

33

The correct link to the article: https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/how-enable-tethering-android-6-0-marshmallow-update-1524792

34

an old thread but to share my experience
I have 2 cheap android devices both mediatek devices running kitkat 4.4.2 an mt6592 octacore arm7 phone and an mt8121 quadcore arm7 tablet both are rooted with supersu via TWRP and are talking to LEAP (currently 15 but worked since 42.0) and each other with kdeconnect
I also like receiving notifications (calls sms etc) on my desktop
I’ve connected bot devices via MTP and had no issues but I prefer kdeconnect
the main reason for rooting is blocking google ads with adaway
https://f-droid.org/en/packages/org.adaway/
and blocking android apps from phoning home with AFWall+
https://f-droid.org/en/packages/dev.ukanth.ufirewall/
I’ve tried CM13.1 (android 6.1) on both devices but found it more restrictive then android 4.4 and moved back to good old kitkat