Vitaliy Alexeyev

synshell · Compatibility · syndroid

Android apps

Android apps on the synshell desktop — a LineageOS container (Waydroid images) with its own runtime, a daemon, a management window and a CLI.

READMEAUR package: syndroid-binAUR package: syndroid-git
Apps

Features

  • Own container runtime — syndroidd starts Android /init in its own namespaces and cgroup (no LXC, no Waydroid tools); system and vendor images are mounted through loop + overlay, and nothing is left mounted on the host after a stop.
  • Images — download the latest LineageOS from the Waydroid OTA channel, with or without GApps; check for updates; import OTA .zip or .img files. Downloads continue in the background with a progress notification, retry on failure and resume.
  • Several Androids — each image variant is a separate instance with its own apps and data; switch, reset data or remove an instance.
  • Apps in the desktop — installed Android apps appear in the synshell app menu; open, stop, clear data, uninstall, install an APK. Each app in its own window or the whole Android in one window.
  • Integration — Android notifications go to the desktop notifications (clicks go back), shared folders (Downloads, Pictures, Music, Videos, Documents), network through a bridge with NAT, gamepads (USB/Bluetooth and the on-screen one) and, on phones with a sensor source, the device sensors.
  • Freeze — freeze Android to free the CPU and unfreeze it in a moment.
  • Settings — start with the session, windows mode, network, screen density, Android properties, download retries and timeouts; logcat with a filter.
  • Phone and desktop — the window has a sidebar on wide screens and bottom navigation on a phone.
  • 14 languages — the UI follows the system or the language chosen in the app.
Images Settings Phone
Images Settings Phone

The screenshots show sample data.

Install

Arch Linux (AUR) — x86_64 and aarch64:

yay -S syndroid-bin      # prebuilt
yay -S syndroid-git      # built from source
sudo systemctl enable --now syndroid    # the daemon

Needs a kernel with Android binder (binderfs); networking uses dnsmasq and iptables (iptables-legacy if present). Images (about 1 GB) are downloaded from the window or with syndroid image fetch.

The whole desktop: yay -S synshell-bin. From source: cargo build --release -p syn-droid in the synshell repository.

Command line

syndroid                          # management window
syndroid status
syndroid start | stop | restart
syndroid freeze | unfreeze
syndroid show                     # the whole Android in one window
syndroid image fetch              # download the latest image set
syndroid image import system.zip vendor.zip
syndroid app list
syndroid app install app.apk
syndroid app launch org.lineageos.etar
syndroid shell getprop ro.build.version.release
syndroid logcat
syndroid --help                   # everything else

Part of synshell

syndroid is one of the applications of synshell — a Wayland desktop environment in Rust for computers and phones, built on the syngui UI framework.

License

GPL-3.0-only