Is the future of computing in the palm of your hand?

For years, we have pondered the possibility of Chrome OS running on a phone. Our idea was that the phone would run the containerized version of Android much as a Chromebook does but when you were using it as a phone, Android would be front and center. Then, when you docked your “Chrome Phone” to an external display, Chrome OS takes the lead and you have a full-fledged Chromebook experience powered by your handheld.

The concept isn’t unheard of. As a matter of fact, Samsung has been doing this for years with the company’s Dex software that not only gives you a desktop version of Android but can also be used to launch a variety of Linux distributions. Apple has thought about the idea, as well. Below, you can see a concept from Apple in which an iPhone would dock into a laptop and host the OS while using the phone’s display as a touchpad.

Razer took this idea one step further with Project Linda and actually presented a proof of concept at CES 2018. The concept was pretty cool but very buggy at the time and unfortunately(or fortunately), it never made it to market.

Well, it appears that Google may be taking the concept in-house and the first release of the Android 13 Developer Preview gives us our first look at full-blown virtualization via the Pixel 6. Now, virtualization can mean many things and take many forms but for this particular post, we’re talking about VMs(virtual machines) that can run other operating systems alongside Android thanks to virtualization. I won’t spend any more time diving into the ins and outs of how it works. If you’re interested in learning more about virtualization on Android 13, Mishaal Rahman has a great write-up about it over on esper.io where he is the Senior Technical Writer and an absolute Wizard Genius with all things Android and more.

Anyway, moving on. With the release of the Android 13 DP1, we see the addition of the virtualization framework necessary to run complete virtual machines using the Android operating system. One savvy Android developer has already taken the wraps off of the new VM tech in Android 13 and recently took to Twitter to show off some very exciting discoveries. Below, @kdrag0n shares some saucy videos of Windows 11 running in a VM on a Pixel 6.

You read that correctly. He is running Doom in a VM on a Pixel phone and it is running surprisingly well. He goes on to state that, after some tweaking, Windows 11 is actually “really useable” and that the VM is getting near-native performance and that’s a very big deal. I’ve used VMs on Chrome OS and while they do work, the experience is rough enough that I wouldn’t want to do it on a daily basis.

Why it matters

This could be a huge update to the Android ecosystem. Some signs point to Google using the VM tech on Android, initially at least, to create a more secure update and boot process for Android but the potential of VMs on Android has now grown exponentially. Google is porting to Android the same crosvm that Chrome OS uses to run Linux on Chromebooks and that means Android phones could eventually utilize all flavors of customized VMs. Linux distros, Windows, and even Chrome OS if Google decided to go that route.

Perhaps we will see a Chrome Phone after all. It may not look quite like we had hoped but Android 13 could potentially be the mobile operating system that finally merges the blurred line between phones and computers. With the increasing power available from ARM-based processors such as Apple’s M1 and the latest Snapdragon SoCs, it’s very feasible that a smartphone could have more than enough horsepower to double as a Chrome OS device or even a Linux machine. Imagine strolling into the office, dropping your phone into a dock, and you’re up and running with a bona fide desktop operating system that fits in your pocket. Can’t wait to see how this fleshes out. In the meantime, I’ll be tinkering with Android 13 and the new VM environment to see what’s possible. Stay tuned.

Source: Liliputing