Google has added a Terminal application to the Android platform's codebase, allowing users to run a terminal emulator with access to a full Linux environment executed in a virtual machine. The virtual machine's functionality is being developed as part of the Ferrochrome project and is meant to run a guest system with Debian GNU/Linux 12.
Virtualization uses the framework AVF (Android Virtualization Framework) added in Android 13, implemented on the basis of the KVM hypervisor and the crosvm toolkit. A similar configuration had been previously used by Google in experiments to run Chromium OS on Android and in functionalities for running Linux on Chrome OS. Unlike the experiment with Chromium OS, the new application is currently limited to access the Linux system through a command line interface, despite the AVF framework's capability to launch operating systems with a graphical user interface.
To activate the Terminal application in Android builds from the AOSP repository, you must enable the ‘Linux terminal’ option in the ‘Settings > System > Developer’ section. Once activated, the Terminal program appears in the application list, which launches the virtual machine with Debian and connects to it via a WebView component through a local IP address. Setting up the virtual machine is not yet automated and requires manually downloading the system image with Debian and creating the configuration.
One of the change requests mentions plans to add the LinuxInstaller application to automate the downloading of Debian and starting the virtual machine. The plan also includes adding a menu in the Terminal application for operations like copying, stopping the virtual machine, and settings that allow modifying the disk image size, setting up network port forwarding, and using the ‘Recovery’ feature. Additionally, testing of the new subsystem is mentioned for devices codenamed 'tangorpro' and 'komodo', referring to the Pixel Tablet and Pixel 9 Pro XL tablets. No information has been reported yet regarding support for launching graphical Linux applications. an IP addressGoogle has added a Terminal application to the Android platform's codebase, allowing users to run a terminal emulator with access to a full Linux environment executed in a virtual machine.
Source: opennet.ru
