Portal v2.7.0

Portal v2.7.0

Portal has a new engine. Debian now runs under tawcroot instead of PRoot, which makes starting the desktop, opening apps and anything that touches a lot of files several times faster. The APK is also 20% smaller, and Steam, the clipboard and the on-screen keyboard got a round of fixes.

New engine: tawcroot

• Portal now runs Debian under tawcroot, a rootless engine that handles Linux file paths and permissions inside each app's own process. PRoot did the same job from a separate process, so every file operation took a round trip between the two. Measured on a OnePlus Pad 3:
  • The desktop is ready in about 2.7 s after Portal starts, down from about 4.7 s.
  • Opening Plasma's edit mode (long press on the panel) takes 1.5 s instead of 3.5 s.
  • File-heavy work is much faster: listing /usr/lib recursively takes 0.8 s instead of 6 s, searching /usr/share 1 s instead of 4 s, unpacking an archive 5 s instead of 26 s, and Python imports about 3 times faster.
• Everything that worked under PRoot works under tawcroot: sudo and APT, Flatpak apps with their real sandbox and GPU, Discover, Firefox, Chromium and Electron apps with their sandboxes on, Steam and Proton, the camera and microphone, and the optional apps.
• Existing installs switch to tawcroot on their next start; nothing needs reinstalling. File ownership carries over between the two engines.
• Devices whose kernel can't run tawcroot (roughly Android 7 and older) fall back to PRoot automatically.
• Steam games built for x86-64 Linux now start from scripts too: tawcroot hands x86-64 programs to Box64 the way Linux does with binfmt_misc.
• Unity games such as Kerbal Space Program boot to their menu instead of exiting or crashing during start.

Smaller app

• The APK is down from 22.4 MiB to 18.0 MiB, and Portal takes about 32 MB less space once installed. The KWin, Mesa (Turnip) and Xwayland builds Portal ships are now stored compressed and unpacked only when they change.
• The unused second "candidate" Xwayland build was removed; every install uses Portal's own patched Xwayland.

Steam and games

• While Steam runs, the game handle at the top of the screen can be dragged anywhere, and it stays where you put it, also after rotating the tablet.
• The game panel was redesigned: settings are grouped like a settings list, with Portal's own switches and sliders.
• Starting a Windows game with no ARM64 Proton installed now opens Steam's install dialog for Proton 11.0 (ARM64), instead of only telling you to install it.
• Source and other games built for the Steam Linux Runtime (sniper, soldier) no longer refuse to start because they don't find their runtime.
• Ubisoft games through Proton no longer fail with "Corrupted installation (CODE 011)". Ubisoft Connect's overlay is kept off for them, because its hooks can't run on ARM64 yet.
• Steam's tray menu closes when you tap somewhere else, as do other X11 menus.
• Steam Settings no longer crashes when it opens.

Keyboard and clipboard

• The Android keyboard comes up in Firefox and other GTK apps on Wayland again when you tap a text field.
• On a fresh install, typing works from the first session even if the input method was still being installed when the desktop started.
• Text you copy on Android while Portal stays on screen (for example from a notification's Copy button, or another device's shared clipboard) now reaches Linux right away.
• Switching back to Portal no longer empties the Linux clipboard when Android briefly refuses to share the clipboard.
• Copying in Linux no longer sometimes sends the previous text back to Android, and copies reach Android in the order you made them.

Apps

• On installs with no KWallet yet, including every fresh install, Claude, ChatGPT, VS Code, Chromium and KDE apps no longer stop on KWallet's setup wizard: Portal creates the default wallet and opens it at login, as a desktop Linux login does. A wallet you already set up is left as it is.
• VLC no longer aborts at startup.
• Discover, admin prompts (pkexec, System Settings' admin pages) and other system services that start on demand work again on devices using the PRoot fallback.

Privacy and size

• Android backup no longer includes Portal's data.
• Portal's release build drops its debug and verbose log messages.

Performance comparison (PRoot vs tawcroot, panel long press to edit mode):

panel-edit-mode-proot-vs-tawcroot.mp4

Files:

• Portal-2.7.0.apk: the app (install this one)
• Portal-2.7.0-debug.apk: debuggable build, for troubleshooting only
• Portal-2.7.0.aab: Play Store bundle, not for direct install