I salvaged a Microsoft Surface Go gen 1 from the scrap pile and installed Linux on it. Most stuff seems to work ok but I can’t get screen rotation working in Gnome. I know its not a sensor issue because it works under plasma-mobile, and if I run monitor-sensor I can see its detecting mottion even under Gnome.

I tried installing the older version of iio-sensor-proxy-git suggested here but that made no difference: https://github.com/linux-surface/linux-surface/issues/689

I also tried the screen rotate extension, however the AUR version made no difference and when I tried downloading it from the web it just said it was incompatible. I don’t think it would solve the problem anyway because Gnome realises its in tablet mode and has the option for auto-rotate, it just doesn’t do anything. I’ve also tried the Fedora live iso and its the same there.

Alternatively can anyone suggest a good on screen keyboard for KDE? I’ve tried maliit and plasma-keyboard but they’re missing keys like ctrl and tab etc which makes using the terminal horrible. Thats the main reason I’m even using Gnome because the on screen keyboard is great.

Edit: Turns out I just had to go back to the extension web page and enable it.

  • Infernal_pizza@lemmy.dbzer0.comOPEnglish
    2·
    12 hours ago

    Which model have you found? Mine is a first generation Surface Go so I didn’t think there was a previous model?

    I’ve honestly been quite impressed with it so far though, it seems to run Linux quite well! I didn’t even have to use the Surface kernel as everything worked fine with the standard kernel. The touchscreen worked fine straight away with no config needed. The gyroscope works as well for auto-rotate, although you may need to do a bit of config to get your DE to recognise it (there’s a GNOME extension to fix it). I even managed to get secure boot working with custom keys.

    I found it a bit tricky at first as it was difficult to find an on screen keyboard that had extra keys such as tab, eventually I switched from KDE to GNOME as their on screen keyboard was the best. You probably won’t have that problem if you’re getting the keyboard cover anyway, and tbh if you don’t need a good on screen keyboard KDE may be the better choice for a touch screen.

    I’m also quite impressed with Waydroid. There is a bit of a performance hit from it being virtualised rather than an actual Android tablet, but considering how weak the CPU is the performance is still pretty good. Its fairly noticeable if you compare the performance of a native web browser vs an Android browser running through Waydroid, but depending on what you’re doing it’s nice to be able to run Android apps since they’re more touch focused. It also doesn’t have perfect compatibility, I couldn’t get IronFox to work at all.

    The only bit that was a bit dodgy was the camera, you need to install libcamera for it to work and even then some programs don’t recognise that you have a camera, or if it does you just get a green screen. But I have no need for the camera so I don’t really care. Switching to the Surface kernel didn’t help either so I’ve stuck with the standard kernel.

    • wltr@discuss.tchncs.de
      2·
      9 hours ago

      Thanks for your feedback! The model I’ve found is named Surface 3, and it looks like it’s very similar to Go, just the names are different. However, that particular item was sold, so I need to hunt another item. I decided to explore all three models, the one I was considering, yours, and the next one too (Go 2). I’m looking for a keyboard only option, however I realised I may not really need any. Having a decently built tablet with Gnome looks good enough for me! I don’t care about the camera, it’s still worse than my iPhone, and I’m not going to have any video calls, that’s for sure. I thought of reading some books, plus writing a blog. It’s really challenging to write, as when I’m with my computer, I do work. When I’m on a phone, it’s not really comfortable to write long texts, and do any serious work. A Surface tablet with Linux, looks very good.

      Seriously, a couple of weeks ago, I wasn’t aware you can get a Linux tablet at all! Thanks to M$ for building such a shitty OS, most people selling this tablet as garbage. I thought of buying a used iPad Pro 12.9 (2015), I have a couple at home, and it’s fabulous (especially given the price, you can get one used for about $100). And iPad Pro is just miles ahead of this garbage. But! The real OS (Linux) makes it better than iOS. Windows is real OS too, but since it’s garbage, iOS is still a much better experience in most tablet scenarios.

      As of today, I think I’d get a cheap used Chinese Windows tablet with a crappy keyboard, just to test waters. Assuming a Surface is a better device in every department (support, built quality, keyboard quality), and the Linux on the go is something I’d find useful, I’d surely go with monitoring local used market for a decent item.

      So, yeah, thanks for drawing my attention towards this. I’m long dreaming of having a cheap and light Linux laptop with me. And a used Surface looks decent for that.

      Did I ask you about the battery life and whether it sleeps well? Theoretically, I could turn it on when I need it, not a big deal. The portability is my main issue, otherwise it’d stay at home most times. But if it sleeps good and is usable in a real tablet mode (meaning you forget about a battery, it’s just always charged when you pick it up), it’s just an ideal iPad replacement for me.

      • Infernal_pizza@lemmy.dbzer0.comOPEnglish
        2·
        8 hours ago

        No problem! What are you planning on using it for? I’ve had a look at the specs and it looks like the surface 3 is quite a lot weaker in single core performance, but multi-core seems about the same. It also only goes up to 4GB RAM, if you’re wanting to use Waydroid that probably won’t be enough as I struggle a little bit on 8GB (if I try to do split-screen in Waydroid it seems to run out of memory and one of the apps will crash). Despite that this one has enough power for what I use it for, although if I had paid for it I’d probably want a bit more power. It probably depends what price you can get one for.

        Battery is hard for me to comment on, as well as the lack of Windows 11 support the other reason it was on the scrap pile at work is because they were complaining they got less than 30 minutes battery life out of it. I suspect a lot of that was because they used it outside so it got too cold. I’ve been getting about 2-2.5 hours out of it since I got it home which isn’t that great for a tablet, but good enough for me especially since it was free! I don’t know to what extent the battery has degraded so it may be possible to get a unit that lasts much longer. I think the one I have was originally purchased in 2018 so it’s fairly good for a 7 year old battery! The battery life is probably the biggest risk of buying a used one.

        Having said that I’m not sure you’d ever get iPad levels of battery life from one, it’s more of a laptop that happens to be in a tablet form factor so even brand new its closer to a laptop in terms of battery life.

        Sleep seems to work ok, although for some reason it takes 2 or 3 button presses to wake up as the screen immediately turns off again after the first press.

        • wltr@discuss.tchncs.de
          2·
          6 hours ago

          Thanks for the conversation. I’m a bit hurrying, so I’d try to squeeze my entire point into the message, in order to not forget to reply later, if I’d to postpone. I think I’d link a blog post at some later point, if you’d ever be interested in a more detailed story.

          What I’m looking for is some kind of laptop/tablet mix for very light computing. Basically, I’d like to use some text editing for my blog (it’s not deployed yet, because there are a number of posts that I’d like to finish writing, they’re mostly in the draft state at the moment). I have very little time for it (work, kids, family, exhaustion), so I thought if I’d have some light laptop on me at some times, I’d use it instead of mindless iPhone scrolling. I don’t need Waydroid, since I have an Android smartphone lying around, unused. I’m quite good at Linux, so technically, even a 1 GB device would be useful for me. I think writing/editing texts (markdown files) and reading some epubs/pdfs would be 99% of my use cases for such a device. Hence, I don’t really care about cameras, speakers, even the sensor for rotating the screen (however, that would be handy for some reading-mode). Reading is possible from an iPad though (I have iPad 3 lying around at home, and I think I charged it about 3 times over 6 months, its battery life is insane!). A couple of hours of battery life is good, if I can charge that thing from a lying somewhere charger. Say, USB-C is ideal, microUSB is tolerable too, if I’d have some cable on me. That way, I’d just carry the thing in my backpack, and if I’m free somewhere (not at home), I could power it on, and do some light text editing.

          Surface looks overpowered and too good for this, but since they’re quite cheap, and getting cheap over time, I think I’d buy one. Perhaps not very soon, I’ll see. I found some cheapo Chinese no-name brand locally, for $20, I think I’d go with it, just to play with the concept of such a device. I considered Chromebooks, they seem very good at what I’m looking for, but I think I’d just not take it with me all the time. While a 500…600 g device is not much heavier than a smartphone, so I could have it with me all the time. A couple of hours of Linux time with it sounds very good, if from a single charge.

          Then, it depends. Theoretically, such a device with Linux… you know, I think I’d prefer it over iPad even for watching videos, but I’m not very sure. I’m having just the very first generation of iPad Pro, and it looks like even the next model (not to say about the next-next models) is very good for media consumption, the screen is just very good. But apart from consumption, I think I’d like such a device. My research today returned me the results that most of the things are supported quite good, and you confirmed it that the mainline kernel just works. I thought it’s quite ironic the device from Microsoft no less is such a good Linux tablet! I didn’t know Linux tablets were even a thing! It’s all about Android vs iOS these days, you know. On the software department, I find Linux mostly good, by the way. It covers most of my basic needs well, frankly, I realised it covers most of my needs. I haven’t used Windows for like 15 years now, but it’s not fair to say that since I am was an Apple guy. Last time I used macOS was in 2019, I think. I use SwayWM, it’s very lightweight, so I expect it would work quite good with any cheap and underpowered laptop. I cannot do much work-related tasks with such a device, and there’s no point. My main machine has 32 GB of RAM, however I don’t think I use more than 16, I just bought +16 a year or two ago, and it was a right decision, as I’ve got them for like $30 or something. But I think a device like that (a Surface with Linux) can do quite a lot, and not in an irritating way (looking at both Windows and iOS). Apple’s Desktop system, macOS, was very good last time I used it. But I still like Linux more, due to its do-it-yourself nature. (I use mostly Arch on my computers, and Fedora on shared computers, where less nerdy people might use them.)

          Have to go now, thanks for your input again, have a nice rest of the day!