Switching between Android and SFOS

General
#1

I happened to push “device owner” and see “android” as an option. Out of curiosity I clicked it and was suprised to see my phone restart in Android.

Are there 2 partitions on my phone, 1 android, 1 SFOS? I set my OP6T up like that when I was trying Drodian because it was not daily driver ready when I tried it.

I have been using my Xperia 10iii as a daily since the 2nd day I got it with no major issues so I am not sure when I would use the android partition.

Now that I know it is there maybe I will install google maps on that side since I can’t seem to find a navigation/map app that even comes close. I live in Thailand and everything I have tried has been lacking.

Anyway, I didn’t know that was there and thought I would get someone smarter than me to explain it.

Thanks in advance!

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#2

What exactly do you mean with “push device owner”?

#3

Screenshot_20221228_002
Screenshot_20221228_0021080×2520 233 KB

Screenshot_20221228_001
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push, tap, hit, enter, sumit…whichever term you prefer =)

#4

Thanks for showing the screenshots. But what is shown here is the list of configured Sailfish users you can switch to, not some kind of dual-boot option.
The username is Android in your case, but it’s just an instance of the Sailfish GUI (aka shell) with its own settings.

#5

Or maybe the phone has two users configured - one with Android support disabled, and one (‘Android’) with Android support enabled, perhaps in hope of keeping Android apps from bleeding data from SFOS apps?

#6

Device owner-me, has android support.

Even though.it is not dual boot, as long as the user data from 1 user is nit availabke to the 2nd user I can still accomolish the same goal of keeping nothing google on my daily driver and put google maps on the 2nd user.

#7

Thanks so much for clearing that up for me!

I am sure I set that up, albeit by accident, when I set up the phone and just do not remember doing it.

I had never seen that option show up until I accidentaly hit the device onwer button/icon.

Sounds somewhat like the work profile I set up on Android on my old phone to use 2 instances of several apps.

Do you know if I put google maps on 1 profile will it be able to spy on the other profile or just the one it is installed on?

Or am I being paranoid and SFOS sandboxing negates my concerns?

#8

My understanding is that Android apps have no chance to look outside their lxc container, so your SFOS apps and data are safe in this regard.
But it’s a good question if the SFOS users share the same container for their Android profiles, or if each user gets his own container. In the latter case the Android profiles would be sufficiently separated from each other.

#9

Android support is only available for the main user (at least as far as i know)

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#10

Although my knowledge is blurry and incomplete, I know there is a transfer of data between SFOS and the Android App Support. E.g. contacts, that are copied (and updated at every A2S start?) in

/home/.android/data/data/com.android.providers.contacts/databases/contacts2.db

Or some media data copied in:

/home/.android/data/data/com.android.providers.media/databases/external.db

Perhaps other data are exported, but I didn’t explore more.

This is not “spying”, but a way of offering Android “As the true one” for a full experience or something.
For people needing to “really” use their phones with android, contacts and such data are needed in order not to feel in an empty shell, being able to communicate, share images, media, etc.

I personally didn’t find (or didn’t spend enough time to find) clear informations about exactly what is shared and how it is done.

Indeed, if one feels unconfident with Goo/pple logic and want to avoid uncontrolled traffic between SFOS and A2S (Android App Support), they can use a secondary user.

From what I could see, there is no transfer between secondary (or more) user and A2S as there is with “Default User”.

Data loss used to happen, though, but this hasn’t been reported since a long time.
More infos here: https://forum.sailfishos.org/t/switching-between-android-and-sfos/13948

However, I personally use the second user solution every day and enjoy it!

#11

That appears to be correct. Couldn’t install fdroid on the 2nd user. Andrdoid app support and developer tools don’t show in the settings menu. Defeats my thoughts on installing google maps on the 2nd user. Oh well. Not a deal killer by any means.

#12

Thank you everyone! I have learned a little more about SFOS!

#13

Why not doing it the other way round: Android on default user and all the rest in secondary user?

I believe A2S can be used in secondary user if started in default user. Or?
Because e.g. Firefox appears in “open with” in secondary user.
Not sure though…