Score:2

Tablet friendly, no keyboard/mouse Desktop Environments for x86-64

eg flag

I have a Higole Gole1 Pro, which is an awesome little device with a tiny touchscreen. I don't want to plug in a mouse or keyboard in order to easily travel with the PC. I've been switching between Ubuntu 22.04.1 and 22.10 to figure out which I like best for the software I'm trying to run. This software requires x86-64 architecture so unfortunately I can go ARM. I've tried with a Pinephone.

Phosh is my current goto for this setup, but are there any other desktop environments that are good on touchscreen only devices?

Despite my research suggesting Gnome and KDE being touch friendly, they don't have the virtual keyboard that locks on the screen like a mobile device would need. They only have floating virtual keyboards which is not ideal.

I would also like to try out Lomiri or Plasma, but I can find any instructions to get working on x86-64 Ubuntu.

Any suggestions for this setup?

Edit: Typo

nobody avatar
gh flag
My 1. Thought is windowmanager matchbox. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matchbox_(window_manager)
us flag
Did you try Unity? https://ubuntuunity.org/ It is supposed to be touch friendly. For virtual keyboard you can use Onboard. `sudo apt install onboard`.
guiverc avatar
cn flag
Your post confuses me somewhat; you've tagged your question about Ubuntu-Touch which is for phones/tablets and no longer a Ubuntu OS (supported by [UBPorts](https://ubports.com/)). You also mention loliri? but did you mean [Lomiri](https://lomiri.com/) which is a UBports product. I don't actually see a question for this Ubuntu Q&A site with many non-Ubuntu details provided, others very unclear. Possibly you should read https://askubuntu.com/help/on-topic
kschepps avatar
eg flag
Yes, Lomiri. Ubuntu-touch seemed relevant at the time
kschepps avatar
eg flag
Thank you, @ArchismanPanigrahi! I'll give Unity a shot. I'm not sure about onboard. I think I tried it, but it was difficulty to use because it was a floating keyboard, but maybe I was thinking of something else. I want the keyboard to push the windows up like the keyboard in Phosh.
us flag
@kschepps Check out the screenshot in my answer. This is most likely what you wanted.
Score:2
us flag

On Screen Keyboard

For on-screen-keyboard you can install Onboard.

sudo apt install onboard

You can Dock it to screen edge using Onboard preferences, so that it will not anymore be a floating keyboard. You can also configure to make onboard appear when you select a textbox.

(This is Ubuntu Unity 22.10, but onboard should work on other DEs too)

enter image description here


Desktop Environment

Unity is a desktop environment that was originally intended for desktop as well as mobile devices with a touch screen. You can try https://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/23138/how-to-accept-the-answer-on-stack-overflow using Ubuntu Unity. https://ubuntuunity.org

kschepps avatar
eg flag
Ubuntu Unity with Onboard for the win! It's not perfect, but at least I can run normal apps. I'm running 22.04.1 at the moment because 22.10 wasn't working for one of the apps I use.
us flag
@kschepps You can ask a new question about how to fix the app issue :) Hope you will like Unity. You can accept my answer if that works for you.https://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/23138/how-to-accept-the-answer-on-stack-overflow
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