Android x86 version

S

s85

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Hello!
I've been using Pleco a lot on Android now. It works great and is compatible with a vast array of devices, including quite cheap ones.
I've been exploring x86 builds of Android recently to be used on my netbook with a touchscreen.
So the big question is:
Will it be possible to build Pleco for x86 architecture of Android? As far as I understand, this should not require much time, just recompilation of the app.
Thank you in advance.
Pleco is definitely the best application for studying foreign languages.
 
Involves new versions of some licensed libraries and quite a bit of coding too (since we have so much cross-platform native code), so it's not on our immediate radar I'm afraid. Possible in the future if X86 Android becomes more popular though.
 
@mikelove:

Has anything changed on this front now that android-x86 has matured enough and compatibility has improved? With roms such as Bliss android has become quite a usable system for an intel hardware and wanting to be able to run Pleco was my primary motivation to get android running on my notebook.

Would love to hear updates on this topic.
 
Sadly no, we see no indications that things will be improving on the licensed library front anytime soon; to the extent that we're doing any lobbying with licensors for new processor architectures it's asking for good ARM64 support on Android, since Google Play will be starting to require that for all app updates as of next summer.
 

@s85:​

for the time being you can use android emulator with a armv7/8 or arm64 image — if you are on X86 it will be slower than X86 images that run natively, but it will work (in android studio on X86 machines the arm images are under a separate "not recommended" group)

moreover, nowadays when ARM laptops are becoming more common you can run under a native arm64 image on apple silicon m1/m2 or if you lean to windows on any of the windows arm devices
 
I know this is an old thread, but I'm here just to make a small public announcement. I have managed to make Pleco work on Ubuntu 23.10 Mantic using Waydroid.

I had stayed away from Waydroid before because I thought it had the same limitation as Anbox, namely that it only runs x86 Android apps, which Pleco isn't.

In fact, after installing Waydroid you can use a script to install libhoudini, a translation layer ripped off WSA, and it works. Only problem I faced is that windows of Android apps don't seem to float and initially take the whole screen. I managed to resize them (them as in all of them at once) to my liking using a couple simple terminal commands for width and height and restarting. Otherwise all seem to function as expected.

I don't know if I'm allowed to post links here, in any case the documentation page of the Waydroid project has all the guides separated by distribution. In order to learn how to install libhoudini (or the other translation layer for ARM apps, libndk, which seems to work better with AMD processors) you can visit the guide for installation on Arch and find the link to casualsnek github page there with the script you need and how to run it.

Also don't bother with installing Google Play Store if all you want is to run Pleco. You'll need the apk anyway cause google's store will still recognise your device as Android x86.

Edit: Even though Google Play Store will not let you install ARM apps, it will let you update them once they're installed, and it doesn't seem to break them.

Edit 2: Google Play Store will actually recognise your Waydroid instance as an ARM-capable device if follow the steps to validate your 'device' with Google AFTER installing libndk or libhoudini No longer sure of this as other apps are now appearing as incompatible. Maybe it was a fluke that I managed to install Pleco from the GPS on my 2nd Linux computer
 
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Also sorry to bump an old thread. (This seemed the best one for the sake of continuity.)

I think I read recently that Google is enforcing 64-bit ARM for all apps, or at least those listed in the Play Store.

At time of writing I'm on EndeavourOS (an Arch Linux derivative) with an AMD Ryzen CPU and an NVidia GPU, and have looked into other current options (including Genymotion and Waydroid), but for me the easiest way to have Pleco on the desktop was to install Android Studio and ignore everything except the virtual device manager.

BTW, once the virtual device is opened, it seems safe to close the Device Manager and Android Studio windows.

The virtual devices include ARM emulation even if you have an x86 CPU, and most of them include Google Play support.

As for the virtual device selection within Android Studio, first I'll mention that no matter the pixel dimensions, the virtual device will be scaled to fit within your display's frame (I have an LG wide monitor that is only 1080p tall).

The two current tablet options have too wide of a border margin for my taste. Among the phones, there's really just a choice between a 9:20 aspect ratio and something closer to a square (1:1) aspect ratio (the ones with "Fold" in the device name).

RE: the choice of API to go with the virtual device, just pick a recent stable one that lights up the "Finish" button.

On Linux, in the menu that appears to the right side of the virtual device, you can click the three-dots icon and then Settings, where you can enable a window-border -- which could be handy if you use a window manager that allows window-shading (rolling a window up into just its titlebar).

There are other Android emulation options for Windows and Mac that include ARM support (e.g., Bluestacks), but Android Studio is also an option for those two platforms.
 
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