Termux Tutorials on Ivon's Blog

How to use Termux X11 - The X server on Android phone

infoivonblog.nkfjt@aleeas.com (Ivon Huang) — Fri, 17 Apr 2026 13:00:00 +0800

Termux X11 is an app that can run X servers on Android phones. What does this mean? It means it can be used to execute Linux programs that rely on the X11 display, such as Firefox, Chromium, GIMP, Blender, Visual Studio Code, and more. Although Android is based on the Linux kernel, its graphics protocol differs from that used by most Linux distributions. Most Linux program toolkits are designed for X11 or Wayland, so Android cannot run Linux programs. Termux X11 provides an X server that runs on Android, allowing Termux’s Linux programs to display a graphical interface within it.

In addition, you can also achieve 3D hardware acceleration through the experimental VirGL server (virglrenderer) in Termux.

Termux X11 can be used with mouse and keyboard, or with touching gestures. Just setting the appropriate desktop resolution so you could interact with the desktop environment using your phone’s keyboard.

1. Install Termux X11
#

Termux X11 was inspired by Sparkle, and was initially implemented using XWayland, but was later replaced by XCB.

Currently, Termux X11 requires devices running Android 8 or later.

Install Termux
Download latest Termux-x11 APK from Github Releases. Download the Termux X11 APK.
Install the Termux-x11 apk.
Launch Termux, instal x11-repo. Then install termux-x11-nightly

pkg update

pkg upgrade

pkg install x11-repo

pkg install termux-x11-nightly

2. Usage 1: Run X11 apps in Termux
#

Personally, I recommended you to use Termux X11 with proot-distro because Termux has fewer package than proot-distros.

Open Termux X11 APP and you will see this
Go back to Termux. Install XFCE4 and GIMP

pkg install xfce gimp

Launch XFCE4 with dbus-launch

termux-x11 :0 -xstartup "dbus-launch --exit-with-session xfce4-session"

If you encounter Make sure an X server isn't already running(EE) error, close Termux, then “Force stop” and “Clear cache” Termux and Termux X11 App in Android system settings.

Now you should see XFCE4 runnning in Termux X11.
You could change Touchscreen input mode in Termux X11 preferences in notification bar.
If the font is too big, open System settings → Appearance → check Cutsom DPI. You can also set display resolution in Preferences of Termux X11 APP.
Press CTRL+C in Termux to stop XFCE4.

3. Usage 2: Run X11 apps in Proot-distro
#

Install a proot-distro. For example Debian proot or Arch Linux proot.
Open Termux X11 app. Then go back to Termux.
Log in to the installed Proot-distro using the regular account user. When logging in to proot here, you must add the --shared-tmp parameter, which means mounting the Termux $TMPDIR directory to the proot /tmp directory.

proot-distro login --user user debian --shared-tmp

Launch desktop environment. For example, XFCE4

termux-x11 :0 -xstartup "dbus-launch --exit-with-session xfce4-session"

While in Termux X11, you can activate phone keyboard by pressing back button. I suggest you to install Hacker’s Keyboard for using desktop shortcuts.

Running postmarketOS on Android Termux proot without flashing a custom rom

infoivonblog.nkfjt@aleeas.com (Ivon Huang) — Sat, 16 Nov 2024 21:00:00 +0800

閱讀中文版

Running postmarketOS and Phosh on Android phone without rooting or flashing a custom ROM.

I’ve taken the unofficial and weird approach of running postmarketOS on Termux Proot, so that we can run mobile Linux on Android.

A video demonstration. Phosh + postmarketOS runs on Sony Xperia 10 V Android 14.

1. Motivation
#

Why do I do this? To explore the possibilities of running mobile Linux on an Android phone. And we needed a desktop environment designed for touchscreens.

It’s my personal wish to run mobile Linux on my Sony Xperia 5 & 10 series, but not many people have ported postmarketOS for them, and I didn’t succeed myself. So I’m just using Termux to taste the sweetness of the mobile Linux OS. I would like to share this highly experimental method of running postmarketOS on Android with you.

postmarketOS is a GNU/Linux system designed for out-of-season mobile phones. Based on Alpine Linux, it has full Linux functionality and is able to run Linux pc applications, and it has become one of the most popular distro choice among PinePhone users. However, postmarketOS is not available for all Android phones, see postmarketOS pmbootstrap installation instruction. In order to port a postmarketOS to an Android phone, you need to pacth the Linux kernel a lot, and since many drivers are not compatible between Android and Linux, it is more difficult to create a postmarketOS ROM than to port LineageOS. Even if you finally get it up and running, there will be lots of missing proprietary drivers, which makes the system unpleasant to use.

Moreover, the entry barrier for installing postmarketOS is very high, and for many mobile phone users, they can’t even unlock the bootloader, so it’s impossible to flash a custom ROM. This makes Termux a good option to consider, as it allows you to run Linux containers on your Android without rooting, and display the Linux container X server screen with Termux X11. The first question we have to ask is whether pmbootstrap can be run on Termux. According to this Github issue, chroot is hard to run on Android without rooting. So we use a slower proot instead.

Termux provides rootfs for Alpine Linux, and postmarketOS is originally based on Alpine Linux, so if you do a little trick to convert Alpine Linux to postmarketOS, you can get those packages designed for mobile Linux. Why don’t we use Alpine Linux directly, because some packages of postmarketOS are not being upstreamed, some packages are not found in Alpine Linux’s repsitory.

Finally, let’s talk about Phosh, a desktop environment developed by Purism, a free software company, designed for Linux phones. Its Wayland compositor, Phoc, is based on wlroots. In the PinePhone community, Phosh is one of the best rated interfaces. According to my personal experience of using PinePhone, I think Phosh is the most stable interface although the interface is very simple, and Phosh is very resource-saving. The animation of Phosh is still very smooth even running on the underpowered PinePhone which equipped with Allwinner A64 processor. I think Phosh is very useful for users who want to interact with Linux system in Termux X11. Because most Android phones don’t have keyboard and mouse, so if you run XFCE, KDE Plasma, GNOME and other traditional Linux desktops in Termux X11, it would be very awkward. So that , the touchscreen-optimized Phosh would be an excellent choice.

How to run Windows programs on Android with Box86 + Wine in Termux Proot

infoivonblog.nkfjt@aleeas.com (Ivon Huang) — Thu, 25 Apr 2024 18:00:00 +0800

🇹🇼 中文版

We can run Windows programs (.exe) with Box86 and Wine in Termux proot on Android. No root required.

Wine is a translation layer for running x86/x64 Windows programs on Linux. However, most of Android devices run on ARM architecture so Wine will not work in ARM platform.

Fortunately, a new program named Box86 can transalte x86 instructions into ARM instructions. And there is Box64 for transalting x64 instrcutions.

Therefore, you can run x86 appplications on ARM devices! And Box86 is faster than QEMU emualtion.

By combining Box86 and Wine, now we could run Windows programs in Termux proot.

1. Install Termux Proot
#

Install proot Debian and setup Termux X11.

2. Install Box86 & Box64
#

Log into proot Debian as normal user.

proot-distro login debian --user user shared-tmp

Enable armhf support

dpkg --add-architecture armhf

Add ryanfortner’s repo and install Box86

sudo apt install gpg

sudo wget https://ryanfortner.github.io/box86-debs/box86.list -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/box86.list

wget -qO- https://ryanfortner.github.io/box86-debs/KEY.gpg | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /etc/apt/trusted.gpg.d/box86-debs-archive-keyring.gpg

sudo apt update

sudo apt install box86-android

Add ryanfortner’s repo and install Box64

sudo wget https://ryanfortner.github.io/box64-debs/box64.list -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/box64.list

wget -qO- https://ryanfortner.github.io/box64-debs/KEY.gpg | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /etc/apt/trusted.gpg.d/box64-debs-archive-keyring.gpg

sudo apt update

sudo apt install box64-android

3. Install Wine and Wine64
#

Wine is for running x86 (32bit) programs;whereas Wine64 is for x64 programs.

Since we are on ARM64 platform, we cannot install pacakges (i386:wine) from foreign architecture while using APT. Here we will install Wine by downloading binaries and moving them to the proper path.

Install Wine’s dependencies

sudo apt install nano cabextract libfreetype6 libfreetype6:armhf libfontconfig libfontconfig:armhf libxext6 libxext6:armhf libxinerama-dev libxinerama-dev:armhf libxxf86vm1 libxxf86vm1:armhf libxrender1 libxrender1:armhf libxcomposite1 libxcomposite1:armhf libxrandr2 libxrandr2:armhf libxi6 libxi6:armhf libxcursor1 libxcursor1:armhf libvulkan -dev libvulkan-dev:armhf zenity

Download Wine and Wine64 from Kron4ek’s Wine-Builds. The latest version is Wine 9.7.

cd ~/

wget https://github.com/Kron4ek/Wine-Builds/releases/download/9.7/wine-9.7-amd64.tar.xz

wget https://github.com/Kron4ek/Wine-Builds/releases/download/9.7/wine-9.7-x86.tar.xz

Unzip the file and delete redundant files

tar xvf wine-9.7-amd64.tar.xz

tar xvf wine-9.7-x86.tar.xz

rm wine-9.7-amd64.tar.xz wine-9.7-x86.tar.xz

mv wine-9.7-amd64 wine64

mv wine-9.7-x86 wine

Create a symbolic link and point /usr/local/bin/wine to $HOME/wine/bin/wine.

echo '#!/bin/bash
export WINEPREFIX=~/.wine32
box86 '"$HOME/wine/bin/wine "'"$@"' > /usr/local/bin/wine

chmod +x /usr/local/bin/wine

echo '#!/bin/bash
export WINEPREFIX=~/.wine64
box64 '"$HOME/wine64/bin/wine64 "'"$@"' > /usr/local/bin/wine64

chmod +x /usr/local/bin/wine64

Add the PATH of Box86 and Box64 to ~/.bashrc

echo 'export DISPLAY=:0
export BOX86_PATH=~/wine/bin/
export BOX86_LD_LIBRARY_PATH=~/wine/lib/wine/i386-unix/:/lib/i386-linux-gnu/:/lib/aarch64-linux-gnu/:/lib/arm-linux-gnueabihf/:/usr/lib /aarch64-linux-gnu/:/usr/lib/arm-linux-gnueabihf/:/usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/
export BOX64_PATH=~/wine64/bin/
export BOX64_LD_LIBRARY_PATH=~/wine64/lib/i386-unix/:~/wine64/lib/wine/x86_64-unix/:/lib/i386-linux-gnu/:/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu:/lib/aarch64 -linux-gnu/:/lib/arm-linux-gnueabihf/:/usr/lib/aarch64-linux-gnu/:/usr/lib/arm-linux-gnueabihf/:/usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu /:/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu' >> ~/.bashrc

source ~/.bashrc

Install Winetricks

cd ~/

wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Winetricks/winetricks/master/src/winetricks

chmod +x winetricks

mv winetricks /usr/local/bin/

echo '#!/bin/bash
export BOX86_NOBANNER=1 WINE=wine WINEPREFIX=~/.wine32 WINESERVER=~/wine/bin/wineserver
wine '"/usr/local/bin/winetricks "'"$@"' > /usr/local/bin/winetricks32

chmod +x /usr/local/bin/winetricks32

echo '#!/bin/bash
export BOX64_NOBANNER=1 WINE=wine64 WINEPREFIX=~/.wine64 WINESERVER=~/wine64/bin/wineserver
wine64 '"/usr/local/bin/winetricks "'"$@"' > /usr/local/bin/winetricks64

chmod +x /usr/local/bin/winetricks64

Create a shortcut to the Wine file manager on the Linux desktop, so that you can directly click the exe to start:

cd ~/Desktop

echo '[Desktop Entry]
Name=Wine32 Explorer
Exec=bash -c "wine explorer"
icon=wine
Type=Application' > ~/Desktop/Wine32_Explorer.desktop

chmod +x ~/Desktop/Wine32_Explorer.desktop

cp ~/Desktop/Wine32_Explorer.desktop /usr/share/applications/

cd ~/Desktop

echo '[Desktop Entry]
Name=Wine64 Explorer
Exec=bash -c "wine64 explorer"
icon=wine
Type=Application' > ~/Desktop/Wine64_Explorer.desktop

chmod +x ~/Desktop/Wine64_Explorer.desktop

cp ~/Desktop/Wine64_Explorer.desktop /usr/share/applications/

4. Install DXVK
#

DXVK is a Vulkan-based translation layer for Direct3D 9/10/11. This may improve performance of some Windows games.

How to install proot Ubuntu in Termux on Android phone (Desktop + Audio + One-click starter)

infoivonblog.nkfjt@aleeas.com (Ivon Huang) — Sun, 12 Nov 2023 23:30:00 +0800

🇹🇼 中文版

This article introduces how to install Ubuntu with desktop environment on Android mobile phones without Root permissions.

Ubuntu + KDE Plasma on Android

We will use the proot-distro provided by Termux to manually create the Ubuntu desktop environment. After everything is ready, we will setup a one-click startup script at the end of the article.

If you don’t want to manually configure Ubuntu, please use the community scripts to install it automatically.

1. Prerequisites
#

Your phone needs at least 6GB of RAM to run the Ubuntu desktop environment.

The processor is recommended to be Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 or above.

Storage space must be at least 10GB.

My device: Sony Xperia 10 V, Android 13

Install Termux
Install Termux X11
Set up GPU hardware acceleration virglrenderer

2. Install Ubuntu minimal file system
#

The minimal file system here refers to the rootfs provided by the maintainer of proot-distro. The rootfs they maintain does not have an LTS version and is always the latest version of Ubuntu of the year.

Open Termux and install Proot-distro and PulseAudio

pkg update
termux-setup-storage
pkg install proot-distro pulseaudio vim

Install root Ubuntu

proot-distro install ubuntu

Log in to Ubuntu. The --user parameter indicates logging in as root. --shared-tmp mounts the Termux tmp directory into proot so that X server resources can be shared later.

proot-distro login ubuntu --user root --shared-tmp

After logging in, install sudo, vim, and PPA tools. It may ask for your time zone during installation, enter a number to answer.

apt update
apt install sudo vim software-properties-common

Because Android does not support Systemd, please enter the following commands to disable Ubuntu’s Snap

cat <<EOF | sudo tee /etc/apt/preferences.d/nosnap.pref
# To prevent repository packages from triggering the installation of Snap,
# this file forbids snapd from being installed by APT.
# For more information: https://linuxmint-user-guide.readthedocs.io/en/latest/snap.html
Package: snapd
Pin: release a=*
Pin-Priority: -10
EOF

Then install Firefox through Mozilla’s ppa:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:mozillateam/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install firefox-esr

To exit the proot, enter exit to log out.

3. Change mirrors
#

This is an optional step. Changing mirrors can speed up package downloads.

For a list of global mirrors, please see Official Archive Mirrors for Ubuntu

For example, use the following command to replace all the ports.ubuntu.com URLs in /etc/apt/sources.list with the URL of the NCHC, Taiwan:

sudo sed -i 's/ports.ubuntu.com/free.nchc.org.tw/g' /etc/apt/sources.list

Update the package list again

apt update

4. Create a regular user
#

Usually we do not use the root acount operating system. For this purpose, we need to create a regular user account and add the sudo command to temporarily increase the permissions when the system needs to be changed (such as executing the apt command).

Change root password

passwd

Added wheel and video groups

groupadd storage
groupadd wheel
groupadd video

Add a new regular account “user” and change the password.

useradd -m -g users -G wheel,audio,video,storage -s /bin/bash user
passwd user

Add user to the sudo group. Execute the visudo command, find root ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL, and add the following content to the next line:

user ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL

Switch to the regular user

su user
cd

5. Install desktop environment
#

If you konw how to use the text-only interface, you don’t need to install the desktop environment.

virglrenderer: Termux GPU hardware acceleration tutorial

infoivonblog.nkfjt@aleeas.com (Ivon Huang) — Fri, 10 Nov 2023 06:00:00 +0800

🇹🇼 中文版

This article is about how to enable GPU hardware acceleration in Termux proot-distro by installing and running virgl server in Termux.

By enabling VirGL in proot, we will be able to play 4K60p videos and run 3D Linux games or Windows games (via Box86 + Wine) in proot.

SuperTuxKart, Glxgears

No root permission is required.

Testing device: Sony Xperia 5 II. Android 12. Snapdragon 865 (Adreno 650). RAM 8GB.

If you are confused, watch this video demonstration first (with subtitles) to see how virglrenderer improve the graphical performance of Termux X11.

1. Install Termux and Termux X11
#

Install Termux from F-droid

And setup Termux X11

2. Install proot-distro
#

Install a proot-distro with desktop environment.

I use Debian.

3. Install virglrenderer
#

Choose one method to install virglrenderer.

Method 1: Install virglrenderer-Android
#

virglrenderer-android uses Android GL/ES. It should work on most Android devices.

Install virglrenderer-android

pkg install virglrenderer-android

You can start virgl server by executing this command

virgl_test_server_android &

Method 2: Install virglrenderer with Zink
#

Zink is the OpenGL on Vulkan translation layer. The performance might be better than virglrenderer-android. It only works on Qualcomm devices.

Install virglrenderer with zink

pkg install tur-repo
pkg update -y && pkg upgrade -y
pkg install mesa-zink virglrenderer-mesa-zink vulkan-loader-android

You can start virgl server by executing this command. While using GALLIUM_DRIVER variable in proot, replace virpipe with zink.

MESA_LOADER_DRIVER_OVERRIDE=zink GALLIUM_DRIVER=zink ZINK_DESCRIPTORS=lazy virgl_test_server --use-egl-surfaceless &

4. How to run applications with virgl
#

4.1. In proot
#

Start virgl server in Termux.
Launch Termux X11 app, keep it opening in the background. Go back to Termux, start Termux X11

export DISPLAY=:0
termux-x11 :0 &

Swipe from left edge, clcik New Session to open a new terminal. Log into proot-distro as user and mount Termux’s /tmp to proot.

proot-distro login debian --user user --shared-tmp

Then start XFCE session

export DISPLAY=:0
dbus-launch --exit-with-session startxfce4 &

Open terminal emulator in XFCE desktop. Run applications with two parameters: GALLIUM_DRIVER=virpipe MESA_GL_VERSION_OVERRIDE=4.0 to use virgl. Note some applications may crash when MESA_GL_VERSION_OVERRIDE=4.0 is used.\

You may replace GALLIUM_DRIVER=virpipe with GALLIUM_DRIVER=virgl.

For instance, to run Minetest with virgl：

GALLIUM_DRIVER=virpipe MESA_GL_VERSION_OVERRIDE=4.0 minetest

The FPS of glxgears is higher when virgl enabled.

After enabling virgl, Minetest FPS grows from 10 FPS up to 20 FPS.

VLC with virgl is capable of playing 4K60p videos.

SueprTuxKart becomes playable after enabling vrigl.

The FPS of WebGL Aquarium doubled after enabling virgl. (You need to force enable WebGL in about:config)

[Root] Install Ubuntu in chroot on Android without Linux Deploy

infoivonblog.nkfjt@aleeas.com (Ivon Huang) — Sat, 04 Nov 2023 14:00:00 +0800

🇹🇼 中文版

The steps described in this article require root permissions. If your phone is not rooted, please useproot Ubuntu instead (note: proot is slower than chroot).

On a GNU/Linux PC, we can use the chroot to create an isolated Linux environment. This was the earliest container concept before cgroups. Switching into it via the chroot command is like entering another system. Android is based on the Linux kernel, and after some modifications, it can use chroot.

Termux, a temrminal emulator, could be an good Linux Deploy alternative. Although Linux Deploy has an intuitive interface, it is a bit old, especially the version of rootfs, and the default downloading script is not well written and easy to get disconnect. Also some settings are not very satisfactory.

So let’s abandon Linux Deploy and use Termux to manually create a chroot environment!

In this article, I will tell you how to manually install Ubuntu chroot environment on Android phone without using Linux Deploy. And I will provide you an one-click Ubuntu starting script in the end.

Ubuntu 22.04 LTS in chroot running on Android 13, Sony Xperia 10 V.

Ubuntu + KDE Plasma on Android

1. Hardware requirements
#

If you want to run a desktop environment in chroot:

Processor: Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 or above

RAM: 6GB

Minimum storage space: 10GB

2. Install Busybox, Termux, Termux X11
#

Use Magisk to flash the Busybox module (Skip this step if you are using Magisk, KernelSU or APatch)
Install Termux
Install Termux X11
Install virglrenderer to enable hardware acceleration

3. Download Ubuntu rootfs
#

Please install Termux first.

Open Termux, install tsu and pulseaudio

pkg update

pkg install tsu pulseaudio

Enter Androud shell

su

Create a directory at /data/local/tmp for chroot envrionment

mkdir /data/local/tmp/chrootubuntu

cd /data/local/tmp/chrootubuntu

Download latest Ubuntu rootfs from Ubuntu releases

busybox wget https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/ubuntu-base/releases/noble/release/ubuntu-base-24.04.2-base-arm64.tar.gz

Unzip the archive. And create a mountpoint for sdcard (internal storage)

tar xpvf ubuntu-base-*-base-arm64.tar.gz --numeric-owner

mkdir sdcard

mkdir dev/shm

Create a startup script.

cd ../

vi startu.sh

Type these:

#!/bin/sh

# The path of Ubuntu rootfs
UBUNTUPATH="/data/local/tmp/chrootubuntu"

# Fix setuid issue
busybox mount -o remount,dev,suid /data

busybox mount --bind /dev $UBUNTUPATH/dev
busybox mount --bind /sys $UBUNTUPATH/sys
busybox mount --bind /proc $UBUNTUPATH/proc
busybox mount -t devpts devpts $UBUNTUPATH/dev/pts

# /dev/shm for Electron apps
busybox mount -t tmpfs -o size=256M tmpfs $UBUNTUPATH/dev/shm

# Mount sdcard
busybox mount --bind /sdcard $UBUNTUPATH/sdcard

# chroot into Ubuntu
busybox chroot $UBUNTUPATH /bin/su - root

# Umount everything after exiting the shell. Because the graphical environment will be installed later, they are commented. If you do not want to install a graphics environment, uncomment the following commands.
#busybox umount $UBUNTUPATH/dev/shm
#busybox umount $UBUNTUPATH/dev/pts
#busybox umount $UBUNTUPATH/dev
#busybox umount $UBUNTUPATH/proc
#busybox umount $UBUNTUPATH/sys
#busybox umount $UBUNTUPATH/sdcard

Make the script executable

chmod +x startu.sh

Start the script. Then you should see the prompt becomes root@localhost. To logout, type exit.

sh startu.sh

Before updating packages, execute the following commands to solve apt cannot resolve host errors

echo "nameserver 8.8.8.8" > /etc/resolv.conf

echo "127.0.0.1 localhost" > /etc/hosts

Then fix Download is performed unsandboxed as root warning:

groupadd -g 3003 aid_inet

groupadd -g 3004 aid_net_raw

groupadd -g 1003 aid_graphics

usermod -g 3003 -G 3003,3004 -a _apt

usermod -G 3003 -a root

Now you can update packages:

apt update

apt upgrade

Install common tools

apt install vim net-tools sudo git

4. Create a regular user and setup language
#

Setup the timezone. For example, Asia/Taipei

ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/Asia/Taipei /etc/localtime

Add a new user named user

groupadd storage
groupadd wheel
useradd -m -g users -G wheel,audio,video,storage,aid_inet -s /bin/bash user
passwd user

Execute: vim /etc/sudoers. Add user to sudoers

user ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL

Switch to user

su user
cd ~

Install locales packages and generate locales for your language.

sudo apt install locales
sudo locale-gen en_US.UTF-8

5. Install a desktop enviromment
#

5.1. XFCE4
#

Install XFCE4 (Xubuntu) desktop environment.

sudo apt install xubuntu-desktop

Then setup default terminal emulator (Enter the number of xfce4-terminal)

sudo update-alternatives --config x-terminal-emulator

The command to start XFCE4 is startxfce4. We will discuss this later.

How to install Arch Linux ARM on Android phone (Termux Proot-distro)

infoivonblog.nkfjt@aleeas.com (Ivon Huang) — Tue, 25 Jul 2023 17:30:00 +0800

🇹🇼 中文版

Proot-distro of Termux allows you to install Linux distributions on your Android phone. No root required. Proot-distros are containers, which are limited but still possible to run some dekstop appliations in it.

In this article, I will guide you to install Proot Arch Linux ARM with a Desktop Environment from scratch (kind of) in Termux.

You would have to install the whole system from command lines.

1. Prerequisites
#

Make sure your device has 10GB+ storage and 4GB+ RAM.

My Device: Xiaomi Poco F1, Lineage OS 20 (Android 13)

Install Termux
Install Termux X11
Install virglrenderer

2. Install Proot Arch Linux base system
#

Scroll down the top menu, press ACQUIRE WAKELOCK to keep Termux running in the background.

Install proot-distro, pulseaudio, vim

pkg update
pkg install proot-distro pulseaudio vim

Install Proot Arch Linux (base system)

proot-distro install archlinux

proot-distro login archlinux --user root --shared-tmp

3. Switch mirrors and update system pacakges
#

(Optional) Go to mirror list to pick a fastest mirror in your country. Then edit /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist with vi. Replace every link before $repo to the mirror link.
Update system

pacman -Syu

4. Add a normal user
#

Change password of root

passwd

Add a new useruser. Then add him to group wheel and change his password.

pacman -S sudo vim
useradd -m -g users -G wheel,audio,video,storage -s /bin/bash user
passwd user

Add user user to sudoers. Edit/etc/sudoerswith vi, add following lines beneath"root ALL=(ALL) ALL":

user ALL=(ALL) ALL

Make sure you login to Arch as a normal user. Never login as root.

su user
cd

5. Install a Desktop Environment and common tools
#

Install Firefox, Noto Fonts, SSH and other common tools

sudo pacman -S vim firefox networkmanager xorg xorg-server pulseaudio noto-fonts git openssh fakeroot base-devel

Install yay - the AUR helper:

sudo pacman -S --needed git base-devel && git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/yay.git && cd yay && makepkg -si

Edit /etc/makepkg.conf with vim. Uncomment MAKEFLAGS="-j2". Change -j2 to -j + (2 x phone processor cores). This could speed up AUR compiling time.
Install XFCE4 Desktop environment

sudo pacman -S xfce4 xfce4-goodies lightdm

6. Timezone & hostname & locales
#

Setup timezone

sudo ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/America/New_York /etc/localtime

Edit /etc/hostname and /etc/hosts to rename your machine.
Edit /etc/locale.gen, uncomment your language, for example en_US.UTF-8
Generating locales

sudo locale-gen
echo "LANG=en_US.UTF-8" >> /etc/locale.conf

7. Start desktop enviornment manually
#

Congrats! Now you have installed Arch Linux on your Android phone! Read below to learn how to desktop enviornment manully.

Relaunch Termux
Launch Termux X11 app, keep it opening in the background. Go back to Termux and type the following commands to run Termux X11.

A simple Termux tutorial for beginners

infoivonblog.nkfjt@aleeas.com (Ivon Huang) — Sun, 23 Jul 2023 00:00:00 +0800

🇹🇼 中文版

Termux is an open-source terminal emulator for Android devices. It has its own package manager so you can download and run commandline tools in Termux.

Termux is a good tool for learning shell scripting and programming (Python, C/C++, Java, NodeJS…) on your Android phone.

It is also capable of running Linux containers (Ubuntu, Fedora, Arch..) on your phone without root permissions.

Please note:

Termux CANNOT ROOT YOUR PHONE! If you want to modify system settings, you must root your phone first (e.g. unlocking bootloader and flashing Magisk).
Double-check before installing suspicious packages or running random scripts on the Internet! It may be harmful to your device.
Termux is not for hacking.

In this article I will tell you how to install and setupt Termux properly.

1. Download Termux APK
#

Do not install Termux from Google Play store. The maintainers of Termux stated that Termux on Google Play is no longer maintained. It is outdated and contains lots of bugs.

Please download Termux apk from F-Droid or Github.

2. Things to do after installing Termux
#

Launch Termux APP, the terminal will pop out.
Scroll down the notification bar you shall see two options. Exit will kill the app and Acquire wakelock will keep Termux running in the background.
Go back to Termux. Swipe from left edge. Pressing Keyboard will open phone keyboard and New session will open a new terminal.
OK. Now it is time to type some commands. First let’s upgrade the packages, type this and press enter (you could long press in Termux to paste commands)

pkg update

It should start downloading and installing updates. During the installation, it may ask “Do you want to install XX package?” then please type y to continue.
If the downloading speed is too slow, consider changing Termux mirrors. Type this:

termux-change-repo

A dialogue will pop up. Now press up arrows on the screen to move the selection. Move to Single mirror and press enter.
Select any mirrors at you wish. For example Mirrors in Asia.
Termux wil try to refresh packages list. Type y to continue.
Finally, give Termux permissions to access your files in internal storage (DCIM, Downloads, Documents…).

termux-setup-storage

Last but not least, Termux may crash when running in the background on Android 12+ devices. If so, learn how to disable Phantom Processes Killing.

3. How to install packages in Termux
#

To install packages (software) in Termux, type pkg install <package-name>. Note it does not require sudo to install packages.

Type pkg help for usages.

For example, to install Python in Termux, type:

pkg install python3

To remove Python pakcage:

pkg remove python3

To upgrade all packages:

pkg update
pkg upgrade

To search specific package on Termux repository:

How to install proot Debian in Termux on Android phone (XFCE desktop + Audio + One-click starter)

infoivonblog.nkfjt@aleeas.com (Ivon Huang) — Sat, 15 Jul 2023 19:00:00 +0800

🇹🇼 中文版

In this article I will tell you how to install proot Debian manually.

Step by step, I will install proot Debian from minimum rootfs provided by Temux maintainers and setup a XFCE desktop with audio. Root permission is not required. After setting up the system, I will tell you how to start dekstop environment in one-click, without typing commands in terminal.

The reason that I choose Debian over Ubuntu is Snaps. On Ubuntu 20.04 or higher, more and more packages will be redirected to install snap packages when running apt install commands, while snapd does not work on Termux proot. I would use a snap-free distro rather than disabling snapd on Ubuntu.

Note: If you don’t want to install everything step by step, use automated scripts made by Termux community instead.

1. Prerequisites
#

RAM >= 6GB

Storage > 10GB

My Device: Xiaomi Poco F1, Lineage OS 20 (Android 13)

Install Termux from F-Droid.
Then setup Termux X11.
Setup virglrenderer

2. Download Debian rootfs
#

Install proot-distro and pulseaudio

pkg update
termux-setup-storage
pkg install proot-distro pulseaudio vim

Edit .profile with VIM:

vim ~/.profile

Download Debian rootfs using proot-distro

proot-distro install debian

Log into Debian proot. --user will make you directly login to the specific user (only root available in the fresh installation). --shared-tmp will mount Termux’s tmp directory in proot.

proot-distro login debian --user root --shared-tmp

Install sudo, vim, Firefox in proot

apt update
apt install sudo vim firefox-esr

3. Change Debian mirrors
#

(Optional) This would make APT downlaoading faster.

See SourcesList - Debian Wiki

Find mirrors on Debian mirrors

Edit sources.list

vim /etc/apt/sources.list

Replace each line with new links（note currently the codename is bookworm)

deb http://opensource.nchc.org.tw/debian/ bookworm main contrib non-free
deb-src http://opensource.nchc.org.tw/debian/ bookworm main contrib non-free
deb http://opensource.nchc.org.tw/debian/ bookworm-updates main
deb-src http://opensource.nchc.org.tw/debian/ bookworm-updates main
deb http://security.debian.org/debian-security bookworm/updates main contrib non-free
deb http://opensource.nchc.org.tw/debian bookworm-backports main

Refresh packages list

apt update

4. Add a regular user
#

It is recommended to create a regular user for your security. Don’t do everything in root.

Change root password

passwd

Add group “wheel” and “video”

groupadd storage
groupadd wheel
groupadd video

Add new regular user named “user” and change his password

useradd -m -g users -G wheel,audio,video,storage -s /bin/bash user
passwd user

We need to add regular users to sudoers. Type visudo then find something like root ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL. Add this in the next line of it.

user ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL

Switch to user

su user
cd

5. Install desktop environment
#

GNOME (package name:gnome) may not work in proot. And KDE (kde-full) is too heavy for smartphone.

Therefore, I choose XFCE4, a lightweight desktop environment.

Install XFCE4 desktop environment. Type “0” when apt asking for the keyboard layout.

Running Alpaca.cpp (LLaMA) on Android phone using Termux

infoivonblog.nkfjt@aleeas.com (Ivon Huang) — Fri, 07 Apr 2023 14:00:00 +0800

中文版

Running LLaMA, a ChapGPT-like large language model released by Meta on Android phone locally.

I use antimatter15/alpaca.cpp, which is forked from ggerganov/llama.cpp.

Alpaca is the fine-tuned version of LLaMA which was released by Stanford University. The alpaca.cpp could run on CPU only mode.

1. Environment
#

Device：Xiaomi Pocophone F1
Android 13
SoC：Qualcomm Snapdragon 845
RAM: 6GB

2. Compile alpaca.cpp
#

Please install Termux first. Then choose one methods from below to compile Alpaca.cpp on your device.

Alpaca requires at leasts 4GB of RAM to run. If your device has RAM >= 8GB, you could run Alpaca directly in Termux or proot-distro (proot is slower). Devices with RAM < 8GB are not enough to run Alpaca 7B because there are always processes running in the background on Android OS. Termux may crash immediately on these devices.

Or you could root your phone and setup a chroot environment. Then mount a swapfile to get more RAM on your device.

2.1. Compile Alpaca.app in Termux
#

Install these packages

pkg install clang wget git cmake

Download Android NDK

wget https://github.com/lzhiyong/termux-ndk/releases/download/ndk-r23/android-ndk-r23c-aarch64.zip
unzip android-ndk-r23c-aarch64.zip
export NDK=~/android-ndk-r23c-aarch64

Complile Alpaca.cpp and download the model

git clone https://github.com/rupeshs/alpaca.cpp.git
cd alpaca.cpp
mkdir build-android
cd build-android
cmake -DCMAKE_TOOLCHAIN_FILE=$NDK/build/cmake/android.toolchain.cmake -DANDROID_ABI=arm64-v8a -DANDROID_PLATFORM=android-23 -DCMAKE_C_FLAGS=-march=armv8.4a+dotprod ..
make -j8
wget https://huggingface.co/Sosaka/Alpaca-native-4bit-ggml/resolve/main/ggml-alpaca-7b-q4.bin

Run it

./chat

2.2. In Chroot
#

Install Chroot Ubuntu and log in to Ubuntu.
If your devices has RAM lower than 8GB, it is recommened to mount a SWAP file.

dd if=/dev/zero of=/swapfile bs=1M count=8192 status=progress
chmod 0600 /swapfile
mkswap /swapfile
swapon /swapfile

Install dependencies, compile the program, and download the model.

apt install build-essential wget
git clone https://github.com/antimatter15/alpaca.cpp
cd alpaca.cpp
make chat
wget https://huggingface.co/Sosaka/Alpaca-native-4bit-ggml/resolve/main/ggml-alpaca-7b-q4.bin

Run it.

./chat

2.3. In Proot
#

Install Proot Debian and log in to Debian.

proot-distro login debian --shared-tmp

Install dependencies, compile the program, and download the model.

apt install build-essential wget
git clone https://github.com/antimatter15/alpaca.cpp
cd alpaca.cpp
make chat
wget https://huggingface.co/Sosaka/Alpaca-native-4bit-ggml/resolve/main/ggml-alpaca-7b-q4.bin

Run it.

./chat

3. Usage
#

Now you can start chattig with Alpaca.
It will takes Alpaca 30 seconds to start answering your questions.
What can you do with Termux? Well, this looks like the answers from Termux official website :)

Termux: Installing Anaconda on Android (aarch64) devices

infoivonblog.nkfjt@aleeas.com (Ivon Huang) — Tue, 21 Feb 2023 13:00:00 +0800

🇹🇼 中文版

This tutorial is for those who want to install Anaconda on Android phone.

The benefit of Anaconda is that you could have multiple Python versions installed on the same device. And you can switch to different environments quickly.

An example of OpenCV program running on Termux on Android phone.

Because most Android devices are 64bit (aarch64), the Anaconda and Miniconda installers from official website will not work on Termux, therefore we have to use miniforge. The commands are almost as same as original Anaconda.

1. Setup Termux and Proot Linux
#

Install Termux
Though Termux does provide python packages, however the installer only works in Linux environment. Thus, we must setup a Proot Debian. You can skip installing desktop environment parts if you just want to run Python scripts.

2. Install miniforge3
#

Log into Proot Debian as root.

proot-distro login debian

Install dependencies of miniforge3

apt update
apt install wget python3 python3-pip vim

When executing python commands you would notice that it would use Python from Termux instead of Proot, so you have to execute follwoing commands to specify the path of Python installation

alias python=/usr/bin/python3
alias python3=/usr/bin/python3
alias pip=/usr/bin/pip
alias pip3=/usr/bin/pip

Download installer from miniforge repository

wget https://github.com/conda-forge/miniforge/releases/latest/download/Miniforge3-Linux-aarch64.sh
bash Miniforge3-Linux-aarch64.sh

Press Enter. Press Q. Then type yes to confirm the license.
By default miniforge will be installed to /root/miniforge3
Type yes to initialize conda environment.
Relogin to Proot Debian.

exit
proot-distro login debian

You will see the prompt become (base)，that means you are in conda environments. Type conda deactivate to exit.
If you want to disable auto activatation of conda environment, type conda config --set auto_activate_base false to disable it.

3. Usage of conda commands
#

When you are in conda environment, you can install Pyhton packages with conda install or pip install.

You can also create multiple virtual enviornments with different Python installed.

For example, you can create a environment with old Pyhton 3.6:

conda create --name test1 python=3.6

Then activate the enviornment.

conda activate test1

Now you can install Python packages which only work on old Pyhton versions.

4. An example of OpenCV program
#

Let’s detect the faces of two girls from Girls’ Last Tour from the image below. We will use codes from lbpcascade_animeface

Create conda environment

conda create --name facedetection python=3.10.9
conda activate facedetection

Install required packages

conda install -c conda-forge opencv
wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nagadomi/lbpcascade_animeface/master/lbpcascade_animeface.xml

Create a python script

vim detectface.py

The script will detect faces from input.jpg and create a output.jpg

import cv2
def detectFace(filename):
 cascade = cv2.CascadeClassifier("./lbpcascade_animeface.xml")
 image = cv2.imread(filename, cv2.IMREAD_COLOR)
 gray = cv2.cvtColor(image, cv2.COLOR_BGR2GRAY)
 gray = cv2.equalizeHist(gray)
 color = (0, 0, 255)
 faces = cascade.detectMultiScale(gray,
 scaleFactor = 1.1,
 minNeighbors = 5,
 minSize = (24, 24))
 for (x, y, w, h) in faces:
 cv2.rectangle(image, (x, y), (x + w, y + h), (0, 0, 255), 20)
 cv2.waitKey(0)
 cv2.imwrite("output.jpg", image)

detectFace('input.jpg')

You may wonder how to move pictures into Proot Debian? Don’t forget that internal storage is mounted at /sdcard , so just type:

mv /sdcard/Downloads/input.jpg ~/

Run the script

python detectface.py

Move the output.jpg back to sdcard

mv output.jpg /sdcard/Downloads/

The result.

References
#

How to run Stable Diffusion on Termux on Android phone

infoivonblog.nkfjt@aleeas.com (Ivon Huang) — Sat, 18 Feb 2023 20:00:00 +0800

🇹🇼 中文版

Stable Diffusion is an open-source deep-learning model. It can generate (paint) images conditioned on text descriptions.

I tried to run Stable Diffusion on my Android phone and it worked. No root required.

But why…? Because why not. A developer, Raoul Straczowski, on Github ran Stable Diffusion on his Raspberry Pi 4 and it could generate images up to 400x400 pixels. I think it should work on flagship Android phones, too. Therefore I tried many ways and it finally worked. The result is not bad.

1. Environment
#

Device: Sony Xperia 5 II (Android 13)
CPU: Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 (Adreno 650)
RAM: 8GB
Storage: 30GB+
High speed network for downloading large files.

2. Setup Linux environment
#

Install Termux
Install proot Debian. We only need rootfs, there is no need to add a new user and install desktop environment.
Log into Proot Debian

proot-distro login debian --shared-tmp

Install Git, Vim, Python, Pip

apt update
apt install git git-lfs vim python3 python3-pip

Install Anaconda if you need it.

3. Install Stable Diffusion
#

There are many versions of Stable Diffusion. I follow Raoul Straczowski’s instructions and choose Stable Diffusion v1.5 made by runwayml. It could run headlessly in terminal.

Clone runwayml’s repository and download all models (around 30GB)

git clone https://huggingface.co/runwayml/stable-diffusion-v1-5
cd stable-diffusion-v1-5
git lfs pull

Then install python dependences

pip install --upgrade diffusers transformers accelerate ftfy xformers

4. Creating a script for generating images
#

Because my phone only has 8GB RAM, the maximum image size that it could generate is 320x320 pixels. Beyond that Termux will crash immediately.

Disable background process in Developer Settings. I also enable “Stay awake while charging”.
Termux will crash when generating large images due to the limitation of Android OS, so we have to increase the value of max_phantom_processes. Please refer to Fix Singal 9 error to install ADB tools on PC, and execute following commands to set value of max_phantom_processes to 2147483647.

adb shell "/system/bin/device_config set_sync_disabled_for_tests persistent; /system/bin/device_config put activity_manager max_phantom_processes 2147483647"

Create a Python script.

cd ~
vim app.py

Type these

from diffusers import StableDiffusionPipeline, EulerDiscreteScheduler

# Use local models
model_id = "./stable-diffusion-v1-5"

# Use Euler sampling
scheduler = EulerDiscreteScheduler.from_pretrained(model_id, subfolder="scheduler")

# Enable low memory usage, set image size to 320x320 and steps to 50.
pipe = StableDiffusionPipeline.from_pretrained(model_id, scheduler=scheduler, low_cpu_mem_usage=True, height=320, width=320, num_inference_steps=50)

# Bypass NSFW filter
pipe.safety_checker = lambda images, clip_input: (images, False)

# Prompts
prompt = "A victorian woman stands on grass field."

# Start generating the image. Use CPU only
image = pipe(prompt).images[0]

# Save the image
image.save("result.png")

Let’s go!

python app.py

Wait for 20 minutes
We can see Stable Diffusion consumes almost all memory while computing
To view the generated image, move it to the internal storage

mv result.png /sdcard

Here is the result. Not bad, huh?

5. Running Stable Diffusion with Adreno GPU
#

We can run Stable Diffusion with Adreno GPU to accelerate the generation of images.

How to play Minecraft Java Edition on Android using Termux proot

infoivonblog.nkfjt@aleeas.com (Ivon Huang) — Sun, 22 Jan 2023 21:30:00 +0800

🇹🇼 中文版

Playing Minecraft Java Edition in Termux Proot on Android. No root required.

But why? We already have “Pojav Launcher”… because why not? The advantage is, with proot Linux, it is technically possbile to run any PC Minecraft clients, from MulticMC to HMCL, on Android and install any modpacks as your wish.

Currently everything is very experimental, the FPS of Minecraft is not good, the device will heat quickly and the shader will not working.

Before starting, you need mouses and keyboard for controlling players since Minecraft Java Edition does not support touching controls. Also, 6GB RAM phone is the minimumm requriement for running Minecraft Java Edition on Android.

1. Install Termux and Proot-distro
#

First install Termux from F-Droid

Second, setup Termux X11

Third, install a proot-distro, such as Debian

Fourth, enable GPU acceleration in Termux

2. Install Prism Minecraft Launcher
#

Prism Launcher is a third-party launcher for Minecraft, which is the fork of PolyMC (which is the fork of MultiMC). It can run multiple Minecraft instances so it will be easier to manage mods for different Minecraft versions.

Prism Launcher is avaiable in Pi-Apps. Pi-Apps is a helper script for installing apps on Raspberry Pi.

Start virgl server. Log into Proot-distro. Start Termux X11. Start desktop environment.
Install Pi-Apps in proot.

wget -qO- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Botspot/pi-apps/master/install | bash

Press Enter to continue.
Install Prism Launcher

~/pi-apps/manage install 'Minecraft Java Prism Launcher'

The script will install Prism Launcher and OpenJDK for you. However you may see “OpenJDK is not found”
If OpenJDK is missing or downloading failed, install OpenJDK17 (for Minecraft 1.17+):

sudo apt install openjdk-17-jdk

Check Java version: java -version

3. Launch Minecraft 1.19.3
#

For the detailed instrcution of setting up Prism Launcher, see official wiki.

Launch Prism Launcher with the following parameters:

GALLIUM_DRIVER=virpipe MESA_GL_VERSION_OVERRIDE=4.0 prismlauncher

Click Accounts at top-right. Log into your Microsoft account.
Create a new instance for Minecraft 1.19.3. (Optionally) Install fabric and Sodium mod to improve graphics performance.
Start the game. Go to Settings → Controls and turn off Mouse raw input.
Press F3 in game to see if the virgl driver is in use.

4. Launch Minecraft versions older than 1.12.2
#

Older Minecraft versions (<= 1.12.2) require old openJDK versions.

Go to Adoptium to download openJDK 8 binares for aarch64 Linux.
After downloading, extract the archive and move it to system path:

tar -zxv OpenJDK8U-jdk_aarch64_linux_hotspot_8u352b08.tar.gz
sudo mv jdk8u352-b08 /usr/lib/jvm

Launch Prism Launcher with the following parameters. Do not add MESA_GL_VERSION_OVERRIDE=4.0.

GALLIUM_DRIVER=virpipe prismlauncher

Create a Minecraft 1.12.2 instance. (Optionally) Install Forge and Optifine for better performance.
Right-click and edit the instance, set the Java 8 path:
Launch the game. Press F3 to see if virgl driver is working.

5. Import and export game data
#

The game data of Prism Launcher is located at ~/.local/share/PrismLauncher/.

Fix [Process completed (signal 9) - press Enter] for Termux on Android 12+ devices

infoivonblog.nkfjt@aleeas.com (Ivon Huang) — Sun, 25 Sep 2022 21:20:46 +0800

🇹🇼 中文版

After installing Ubuntu proot-distro in Termux, you open Real VNC Viewer to connect to the vncserver, however it says: The connection closed unexpectedly. Then you go back to Termux, see a message [Process completed (signal 9) - press Enter] and Termux is forced to quit.

That means the Termux processes are killed by Android OS. This will occur on Android 12+ devices. Fortunately this could be solved by executing some commands.

In this article, I will discuss the causes and solutions for Termux proceesses killing.

1. The causes of signal 9 error
#

According to agnostic-apollo’s article Phantom, Cached And Empty Processes, on Android 12 a new mechanism was added for Android system to monitor forked processes by the apps. They were named “Phantom processes”. And DEFAULT_MAX_PHANTOM_PROCESSES (default=32, all apps combined, not per app) defines how many processes are allowed to run before got killed by the system.

They were named “Phantom” because they were designed to give android devs nightmares when then saw them (allegedly of course).

Such feature could prevent apps from using excessive CPU powers. However it is harmful to Termux commands. While running services in the background, Termux is likely to be killed by system by anytime. That is why vncserver got terminated when you try to connect to the vncserver.

After that, Google added a new flag settings_enable_monitor_phantom_procs for disabling Phantom Processes Killing, though it was enabled by default on all Android devices.

The Phantom Processes Killing could be dsiabled by executing ADB commands. These commands are provided by agnostic-apollo.

2. How to solve signal 9 error
#

Use these commands at your own risks! Disabling Phantom Processes Killing may cause bootloop or make some apps in background lost control.

It is assumed that Google Services Framework is installed on your phone. We will disable its auto config syncing to prevent GMS from overriding the configs.

Here is a video for your reference

2.1. For non-rooted devices
#

For Android 14+ devices: Open Settings → Developer Options → Disable child process restrictions. Reboot. Then you are good to go.

If you are on Android 14 below, keep reading.

Note: These steps require a PC. If you don’t have a PC, try running ADB in Termux instead. See this Reddit post

Download Platform tools for Windows at Android Developers. Extract the archive.
Open terminal in platform_tools directory. (SHIFT + Right click → Open Windows Terminal or Powershell)
Open System Settings on Android, go to “About phone”, click five times on “build number”. Search “Developer options” and enable ADB debugging there.
Connect the phone to PC. Execute this command and agree ADB debugging on Android phone.

./adb devices

Execute commands according to your Android version. Then reboot.

# For Android 12L & Android 13+
./adb shell "settings put global settings_enable_monitor_phantom_procs false"

# For Android 12：
./adb shell "/system/bin/device_config set_sync_disabled_for_tests persistent; /system/bin/device_config put activity_manager max_phantom_processes 2147483647"

2.2. For rooted devices
#

Open Termux, switch to su and grant root permission.

su

Execute commands according to your Android version. Then reboot.

# For Android 12L & Android 13+
su -c "settings put global settings_enable_monitor_phantom_procs false"

# For Android 12：
su -c "/system/bin/device_config set_sync_disabled_for_tests persistent; /system/bin/device_config put activity_manager max_phantom_processes 2147483647"

Run Windows exe on Android through Proot Exagear on Termux

infoivonblog.nkfjt@aleeas.com (Ivon Huang) — Fri, 16 Sep 2022 15:40:46 +0800

🇹🇼 中文版

It is possible to run 32bit Windows exe on Android. Exagear allows you to run x86 programs on ARM platform.

Exagear, released by the Russian company ElTechs a few years ago, can translate X86 into ARM instructions, and when used with Wine, it can execute Windows programs on Android phones without root. (Wine is the software that allows Linux computers to execute Windows exe)

Although Exagear was later bought by Huawei (related discussion on Zhihu), a Russian developer on Github released the Termux Proot version of Exagear.

First you need to install Termux. Then install a i686 32bit proot rootfs with Exagear included. And run 32bit Windows exe using Wine(x86).

You could run 32bit Windows exe in proot.

Even Google Chrome (32bit) works! Though it is slow.

Also you could run some 2D old games, for example Fate/Stay Night. And there is no GPU acceleration.

Follow below steps to install proot-exagear to your system.

Please note that currently Exagear executables on the Internet are somewhat illegal because it was closed-source software and it has been bought by Huawei in 2019. If you are aware of this, you should try Box86 on Proot instead.

Install Proot Exagear
#

Device: Sony Xperia 5 II, 8GB RAM, Android 11.
Termux version: 0.118.0

Install Termux and Real VNC VIewer
Install tar and git:

pkg update
pkg install tar git

The proot-exagear is developed by Zhymabek Roman. Let’s clone it:

git clone https://github.com/ZhymabekRoman/Exagear-For-Termux ~/ExaTermux
cd ~/ExaTermux
git submodule init
git submodule update

Download Debian 10 rootfs from Termux Proot and extract it. (The lastest Debian 11 rootfs provided by the developer of Proot-Exagear does not work for me )

wget https://github.com/termux/proot-distro/releases/download/v1.1-debian-rootfs/debian-buster-i386-2020.12.05.tar.gz

mkdir exagear-fs/ && tar -C exagear-fs/ --warning=no-unknown-keyword --delay-directory-restore --preserve-permissions --strip=0 -xvf debian-buster-i386-2020.12.05.tar.gz --exclude='dev'||: && cd exagear-fs/ && mv debian-buster-i386-2020.12.05/* ./ && rm -rfv debian-buster-i386-2020.12.05/ && cd ../

chmod +x start-exagear.sh
./start-exagear.sh login --old --shared-tmp

Update packages

apt update
apt upgrade

If E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1) occurs, run:

cd /var/lib/dpkg/
mv info info.bk
mkdir info
apt update && apt install -f
cd info
mv ./* ../info.bk
cd ..
rm -rf info
mv info.bk info
cd

Install XFCE4, TigerVNC, sudo. Be patient, it is slow.

apt install sudo vim fonts-noto-cjk xfce* tigervnc*

Add a new user and setup password:

addgroup wheel users
useradd -m -g users -G wheel -s /bin/bash ivon
passwd ivon

Run visudo, add following lines under"root ALL=(ALL) ALL":

ivon ALL=(ALL) ALL

Install Wine and WineTricks

wget -nc https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/winehq.key
apt-key add winehq.key
echo "deb https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/debian/ buster main" >> /etc/apt/sources.list
apt update
apt install winehq-staging winetricks zenity

Finaly, setup PulseAudio. Add following lines to your ~/.bashrc:

export PULSE_SERVER=127.0.0.1

Slide from left, start a new Termux session. Add following lines to the first line of start-exagear.sh:

pulseaudio --start --exit-idle-time=-1
pacmd load-module module-native-protocol-tcp auth-ip-acl=127.0.0.1 auth-anonymous=1

Add this to /data/data/com.termux/files/usr/etc/pulse/default.pa:

load-module module-native-protocol-tcp auth-ip-acl=127.0.0.1 auth-anonymous=1

Restart Termux and login to Debian. Run VNC server, setup 6 characters password:

vncserver

Click application menu on top left. Run winetricks --gui. Wait for Wine to finish install.

[Root] Box86 + Wine in 64bit chroot on Android

infoivonblog.nkfjt@aleeas.com (Ivon Huang) — Wed, 15 Jun 2022 06:01:30 +0800

🇹🇼 中文版

Note: You need root permission to do this. For non-rooted devices please use Box86 in Termux Proot instead.

Note2: Not all programs can be run with Box64 + Wine. Please test running your Windows program with Wine on a x86 Linux PC first to confirm that it can run normally before running it with Box64. If you encounter any problems, please report them to the developer of Box64 first.

Some apps only work in 32bit wine. The best way is to run box86+wine in armhf Termux Proot. However it is possible to compile box86 in 64bit proot when multi-arch enabled (use raspberry pi 4 64’s compile options) but it will not work (bad address, I/O error) Only Box64 + Wine64 works (well there are still many bugs)

After following some tutorials, I tried again in 64bit chroot (Use Linux Deploy). Both Box86 and Box64 works. You may need different wineprefix for each of them, for example export WINEPREFIX=~/.wine64. This will create a new driectory for box64.

So you can run 32bit and 64bit app at the same time.

Here’s the guide of compiling box86 in 64 bit chroot:

Enable multi-arch support in Ubuntu:

dpkg --add-architecture armhf

Edit source list:

sudo vim /etc/apt/sources.list

Add these:

deb [arch=arm64,armhf] http://ports.ubuntu.com/ focal main restricted
deb [arch=arm64,armhf] http://ports.ubuntu.com/ focal-updates main restricted
deb [arch=arm64,armhf] http://ports.ubuntu.com/ focal universe
deb [arch=arm64,armhf] http://ports.ubuntu.com/ focal-updates universe
deb [arch=arm64,armhf] http://ports.ubuntu.com/ focal multiverse
deb [arch=arm64,armhf] http://ports.ubuntu.com/ focal-updates multiverse
deb [arch=arm64,armhf] http://ports.ubuntu.com/ focal-backports main restricted universe multiverse

Install following packages:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install git build-essential cmake wget gcc-arm-linux-gnueabihf zenity:armhf libasound*:armhf libstdc++6:armhf mesa*:armhf

Compile Box86 and download wine:

git clone https://github.com/ptitSeb/box86
cd box86
mkdir build; cd build; cmake .. -DRPI4ARM64=1 -DARM_DYNAREC=ON -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=RelWithDebInfo
make -j$(nproc)
sudo make install
cd
rm -rf box86
mkdir wine
cd wine
wget https://www.playonlinux.com/wine/binaries/phoenicis/upstream-linux-x86/PlayOnLinux-wine-7.0-rc5-upstream-linux-x86.tar.gz
tar -xvf *.tar.gz
cd

Run an exe (in proot it will end up with “bad address”):

export BOX86_PATH=~/wine/bin/
export BOX86_LD_LIBRARY_PATH=~/wine/lib/wine/i386-unix/:/lib/i386-linux-gnu:/lib/aarch64-linux-gnu/
box86 wine *.exe

References

box86 and box64 wine(run x86 and x64 exe on arm64 debian/ubuntu by box86 and box64)

Termux Tutorials on Ivon's Blog

How to use Termux X11 - The X server on Android phone

1. Install Termux X11 #

2. Usage 1: Run X11 apps in Termux #

3. Usage 2: Run X11 apps in Proot-distro #

Running postmarketOS on Android Termux proot without flashing a custom rom

1. Motivation #

How to run Windows programs on Android with Box86 + Wine in Termux Proot

1. Install Termux Proot #

2. Install Box86 & Box64 #

3. Install Wine and Wine64 #

4. Install DXVK #

How to install proot Ubuntu in Termux on Android phone (Desktop + Audio + One-click starter)

1. Prerequisites #

2. Install Ubuntu minimal file system #

3. Change mirrors #

4. Create a regular user #

5. Install desktop environment #

virglrenderer: Termux GPU hardware acceleration tutorial

1. Install Termux and Termux X11 #

2. Install proot-distro #

3. Install virglrenderer #

Method 1: Install virglrenderer-Android #

Method 2: Install virglrenderer with Zink #

4. How to run applications with virgl #

4.1. In proot #

[Root] Install Ubuntu in chroot on Android without Linux Deploy

1. Hardware requirements #

2. Install Busybox, Termux, Termux X11 #

3. Download Ubuntu rootfs #

4. Create a regular user and setup language #

5. Install a desktop enviromment #

5.1. XFCE4 #

How to install Arch Linux ARM on Android phone (Termux Proot-distro)

1. Prerequisites #

2. Install Proot Arch Linux base system #

3. Switch mirrors and update system pacakges #

4. Add a normal user #

5. Install a Desktop Environment and common tools #

6. Timezone & hostname & locales #

7. Start desktop enviornment manually #

A simple Termux tutorial for beginners

1. Download Termux APK #

2. Things to do after installing Termux #

3. How to install packages in Termux #

How to install proot Debian in Termux on Android phone (XFCE desktop + Audio + One-click starter)

1. Prerequisites #

2. Download Debian rootfs #

3. Change Debian mirrors #

4. Add a regular user #

5. Install desktop environment #

Running Alpaca.cpp (LLaMA) on Android phone using Termux

1. Environment #

2. Compile alpaca.cpp #

2.1. Compile Alpaca.app in Termux #

2.2. In Chroot #

2.3. In Proot #

3. Usage #

Termux: Installing Anaconda on Android (aarch64) devices

1. Setup Termux and Proot Linux #

2. Install miniforge3 #

3. Usage of conda commands #

4. An example of OpenCV program #

References #

How to run Stable Diffusion on Termux on Android phone

1. Environment #

2. Setup Linux environment #

3. Install Stable Diffusion #

4. Creating a script for generating images #

5. Running Stable Diffusion with Adreno GPU #

How to play Minecraft Java Edition on Android using Termux proot

1. Install Termux and Proot-distro #

2. Install Prism Minecraft Launcher #

3. Launch Minecraft 1.19.3 #

4. Launch Minecraft versions older than 1.12.2 #

5. Import and export game data #

Fix [Process completed (signal 9) - press Enter] for Termux on Android 12+ devices

1. The causes of signal 9 error #

2. How to solve signal 9 error #

2.1. For non-rooted devices #

1. Install Termux X11
#

2. Usage 1: Run X11 apps in Termux
#

3. Usage 2: Run X11 apps in Proot-distro
#

1. Motivation
#

1. Install Termux Proot
#

2. Install Box86 & Box64
#

3. Install Wine and Wine64
#

4. Install DXVK
#

1. Prerequisites
#

2. Install Ubuntu minimal file system
#

3. Change mirrors
#

4. Create a regular user
#

5. Install desktop environment
#

1. Install Termux and Termux X11
#

2. Install proot-distro
#

3. Install virglrenderer
#

Method 1: Install virglrenderer-Android
#

Method 2: Install virglrenderer with Zink
#

4. How to run applications with virgl
#

4.1. In proot
#

1. Hardware requirements
#

2. Install Busybox, Termux, Termux X11
#

3. Download Ubuntu rootfs
#

4. Create a regular user and setup language
#

5. Install a desktop enviromment
#

5.1. XFCE4
#

1. Prerequisites
#

2. Install Proot Arch Linux base system
#

3. Switch mirrors and update system pacakges
#

4. Add a normal user
#

5. Install a Desktop Environment and common tools
#

6. Timezone & hostname & locales
#

7. Start desktop enviornment manually
#

1. Download Termux APK
#

2. Things to do after installing Termux
#

3. How to install packages in Termux
#

1. Prerequisites
#

2. Download Debian rootfs
#

3. Change Debian mirrors
#

4. Add a regular user
#

5. Install desktop environment
#

1. Environment
#

2. Compile alpaca.cpp
#

2.1. Compile Alpaca.app in Termux
#

2.2. In Chroot
#

2.3. In Proot
#

3. Usage
#

1. Setup Termux and Proot Linux
#

2. Install miniforge3
#

3. Usage of conda commands
#

4. An example of OpenCV program
#

References
#

1. Environment
#

2. Setup Linux environment
#

3. Install Stable Diffusion
#

4. Creating a script for generating images
#

5. Running Stable Diffusion with Adreno GPU
#

1. Install Termux and Proot-distro
#

2. Install Prism Minecraft Launcher
#

3. Launch Minecraft 1.19.3
#

4. Launch Minecraft versions older than 1.12.2
#

5. Import and export game data
#

1. The causes of signal 9 error
#

2. How to solve signal 9 error
#

2.1. For non-rooted devices
#

2.2. For rooted devices
#

Install Proot Exagear
#