PinePhone Software Releases

This page contains a list of all available releases for the PinePhone as well as links to further resources.

See PinePhone Installation Instructions on how to install the operation systems.

Note: Some releases may not have a good setup for the backlight at low brightness. If configured too low the backlight shuts down completely, but the screen is still displayed and usable in bright front-light.

Software Releases

This is a list of OSes that specifically support the PinePhone, but as support is included in Mainline Linux, in principle any ARM Linux OS can be used. From Linux kernel V5.7 most drivers are included.

postmarketOS

postmarketOS is a preconfigured version of Alpine Linux for mobile devices that offers a choice of several desktop environments including Plasma Mobile and Phosh.

• Download location

Rather than downloading a demo image, postmarketOS recommends the use of their script, pmbootstrap, that can tailor build your SD card for you.

Note: pmbootstrap offers an option to install to the eMMC.

Demo images can be found here.

• user-id/password

demo/147147 (for demo images only - when building an image with pmbootstrap you set your own user-id and password.

The Phosh lock screen requires your password, but only presents a numeric keyboard. So you should use only numbers in your password.

• What works, what does not work

See postmarketOS dedicated PinePhone wiki page

If you install Firefox browser (or are using a demo image that already has it installed) then these hints in the pmOS wiki are recommended.

• How to contribute and report defects

postmarketOS issue tracker for PinePhone support

• Contributions

See postmarketOS wiki for options to contribute.

Ubuntu Touch by UBports

A Mobile Version of the Ubuntu Operating System made and maintained by the UBports Community.

A short, state-of-the-art (as at 2 April 2020) demo on YouTube.

Ubuntu touch is a mobile version of Ubuntu developed by the UBports community. Installation instructions can be found on the UBports PinePhone project. There is also a script to download the latest image and flash to your PinePhone. In the future, Ubuntu Touch will be able to be installed onto the PinePhone with the UBports installer GUI tool.

• Download location

UBports PinePhone project

• user-id/password

Set up during boot

• What works, what does not work

Scroll down to the bottom of this page.

• How to contribute and report defects

See UBports gitlab page.

• Contributions

See UBports website for how to donate.

Mobian

See this thread in the forum.

An unofficial Debian build for ARM64 running with the Phosh user interface (developed by Purism, Phosh uses Wayland instead of Xorg). The base system is pure Debian, with only the GUI applications and a few others (ModemManager, Wifi chip firmware) being built from modified sources (as well as the kernel and u-boot, of course). Current version is Debian Bullseye.

• Download location

Mobian downloadable images

Don't forget to extract the image before installing: $ gzip -d Downloads/mobian-pinephone-*.img.gz

See the project page for specific installation instructions.

• user-id/password

mobian/1234

• What works, what does not work

See the project's README file for most up to date status.

Check bug tracker for known issues. Questions? Ask on our thread.

• How to contribute and report defects

It is recommended that you log your bug reports in the project's issue tracker. As a general rule, issues with third-party apps (even the default ones) should be reported upstream. A Mobian issue would be related to getting the hardware to work on the PinePhone, but if unsure where the issue should be reported just open a ticket or ask.

• Contributions

Feel free to pick an open issue to work on, or send a merge request on Gitlab.

User Experience Notes

If not already mentioned on the project page, the thread might have known workarounds to software and user experience issues as contributed by the users.

Most of Debian's repository is available

There are packages that apt won't find, which need to be cross compiled ("ported") to ARM64 (see Debian's wiki on ARM64 port), but the process is fairly easy. Most developers package their software for the AMD64 version of Debian, so they will throw an error when run; if you have the source code, you can compile it to run on ARM64/PinePhone. If you do so, you should contact the developers so they can provide precompiled ARM64 packages for others in the future. You should also contact Debian if you have working ARM64 packages not listed on this page, since this helps them track the status of ARM64 with Debian. Give their wiki page some TLC.

Apps that don't work with Wayland

If you encounter an app that only works with X11 and not Wayland, report it upstream to the app's developers.

The Chatty app

Requires that in order to start a new text, you need to enter +[country code]-[phone number]. Without the + and the country code (+1 for USA) you won't be able to send a new text.

To use the USB port for networking

For serial port access:

sudo apt install pinephone-devtools

Note that this also installs openssh-server, see here.

If you want to share your PinePhone mobile data internet connection via the USB port then in addition to the above, you should

sudo nmcli connection modify USB-gadget ipv4.method shared

To enable WiFi hotspot

In "Settings > WiFi" enable your hotspot.

To adjust screen resolution

sudo apt install linux-libc-dev build-essential ninja-build meson cmake libwayland-dev yad

Continue the rest of the instructions on this page. When you finish, you will have a touch-capable app you can use to adjust resolution any time, useful when switching between various apps. Unlike other solutions, this works across reboots.

References: [1] [2] [3]

SailfishOS

Sailfish OS is a Linux-based operating system based on open source projects such as Mer and including a closed source UI.

• Download location

The SailfishOS image is built on Gitlab CI. The latest image can be installed using the flashing script.

The script downloads the image and bootloader from our CI, extracts everything and burns it onto the SD card. Note: The script will format and erase the SD card!

Instructions:

1. Download the flashing script
2. Insert a microSD card in your device
3. Make the script executable: chmod +x flash-it.sh
4. Verify that you have the bsdtar package installed
5. Execute it: ./flash-it.sh
6. Follow the instructions. Some commands in the script require root permissions (for example: mounting and flashing the SD card).

• user-id/password Set PIN on initialization.

• What works, what does not work

May 4th 2020: The SFOS image is now the latest 3.3.0.16 release. This has resolved many problems (for example MTP file transfer now works) but there are several glitches, the most serious being total freeze requiring reboot. Random hissing noise for about 10 seconds. This release of SF has Nextcloud integration.

May 9th 2020: Voice calls now work in pipeline, arriving in builds within days. If you have a Jolla registration a minor bug means you have to submit the request twice. WiFi is intermittent. The battery indicator previously only showed level at boot, now improved but far from reliable.

If you're not familiar with SFOS pay attention to the tutorial - the interface works great but isn't immediately obvious. If you are familiar with SF you can skip the tutorial by touching all 4 corners starting top left. There is a poor selection of apps available from the Jolla store, the vast majority are hosted on openrepos.net. The Storeman app for openrepos is now preinstalled, and also Webcat browser as the built in browser is not working at the moment.

Updates

OTA is supported: `zypper refresh && zypper update` as root (`devel-su` to get root access). Things that need reflash are bootloader specific at the moment. If improvements like crust or changes of partition layout are added then you need to reflash.

How to contribute and report defects

• See the SailfishOS wiki for links to their forum as well as info required when reporting an issue.

• See the SailfishOS wiki for options to contribute

PureOS

PureOS is a GNU/Linux distribution focusing on privacy and security, using the GNOME desktop environment. It is developed and maintained by Purism.

• Download location

This is an unofficial/unsupported PinePhone port by mozzwald and maintained by clover that can be downloaded here.

• source code

If you want to report a bug or look at what goes into the PinePhone build of PureOS, visit the Git repository.

• user-id/password

purism/123456

• Build instructions

If you want to build it yourself you can follow the instructions posted here.

Fedora

An (unofficial) vanilla Fedora rawhide build for aarch64 with megi's kernel and some additional packages to tie it all together. It aims to eventually be an upstream part of the Fedora project, rather than a phone-specific distribution.

See this thread in the forum.

• Download location

flashable images or build scripts

The images are compressed with zstd because the maintainer needs an excuse to use zstd.

• user-id/password

pine/1111

• What works, what does not work

WiFi, Bluetooth, SMS, Data, Calls all work!

There are still a few bugs though, and [some features don't have driver support yet https://xnux.eu/devices/pine64-pinephone.html#toc-feature-driver-support-matrix] on any PinePhone distribution.

• How to contribute and report defects

Please send your bug reports at the project's issue tracker. Be sure to include logs if applicable!

• Contributions

Please help! Send us merge requests on Github.

Arch Linux ARM

An (unofficial) barebone Arch Linux ARM image, all you have is just a shell and SSH.

• Download location

https://github.com/dreemurrs-embedded/Pine64-Arch/releases

• user-id/password

alarm/alarm

• What works, what does not work

It's just fast and smooth, there's nothing, you'll have to install a desktop at your own. GNOME is a good example to look at.

To access the device, ssh to 172.16.42.1 with the credentials above.

• Contributions

Feel free to send us merge requests on GitHub.

Manjaro ARM

Manjaro is a user-friendly Linux distribution based on the independently developed Arch operating system with the Plasma Mobile desktop environment.

• Download location

See Manjaro forum announcement of Alpha5 version

• user-id/password
  • manjaro/1234
  • root/root

• What works, what does not work

See Manjaro announcement.

In particular phone calls do NOT yet work from the Phone application.

• How to contribute and report defects

• Contributions

See the end of the announcement here.

Maemo Leste

Maemo is a trimmed-down version of Debian for mobile devices, originally a collaboration between Nokia and many open source projects (the Maemo community) before Nokia abandoned it. The community now takes full responsibility in developing fully open source Maemo for a variety of mobile devices.

The new version Maemo 7 "Leste" is an ARM64 port of Devuan (Debian without systemd) and runs the mainline Linux kernel. The default user interface stack is Hildon, Xorg, Matchbox WM, and GTK. The current version is Devuan Ascii (Debian Stretch) and they are working on an upgrade to Devuan Beowulf (Debian Buster) as well as simultaneous support for both Devuan and Debian. In addition to the main repository, they announced a community repository. To keep updated they use automation in their package maintenance with jenkins (similar to debian's buildd). Porting packages to Maemo Leste is basically a simple matter of porting to arm64 version of Debian/Devuan, which benefits both projects.

More detailed information can be found on the Maemo Leste wiki, or follow announcements on their website, and check out Frequently Asked Questions.

• Download location

Maemo Leste test builds. There is also an image builder, see their wiki for instructions on how to build a custom image.

• user-id/password

root/toor

You may use "sudo" directly.

• What works, what does not work

For current status and work arounds please read their PinePhone wiki page, and update as necessary (make sure to notify them of new issues by leaving a report on their github, see below).

• Where to Report Issues

Most discussion occurs at #maemo-leste on freenode IRC. The Maemo website also has an ongoing forum thread for feedback about Maemo Leste on the PinePhone BraveHeart edition.

All other contact information is listed on the main page of the Maemo wiki. You should submit bug reports on github. To track known issues, you may use these search terms: pinephone, pine64

• Development

Learn about development, porting packages, building packages, todo list, and general info on how to package for Debian. Some tasks have funding available.

Nemo Mobile

Nemo Mobile is the open source build of Sailfish OS, see the new website nemomobile.net.

You can install Nemo on any device that runs Sailfish, see the above website for details. Or you can flash the image to SD card/emmc on the PinePhone, download here https://yadi.sk/d/8oSZp-frGidscw (requires Yandex Disk account).

• Download location

Download location is here on GitHub. The latest version here is not an .img file and not for beginners!

Alternative easy installation method: install Sailfish on your PP first (follow instructions on this page under Sailfish). Enable developer mode. In the terminal run as root (devel-su):

ssu ar nemo-devel-ux http://repo.merproject.org/obs/home:/neochapay:/nemo-ux/sailfish_latest_armv7hl/

then

pkcon refresh

then install the nemo-specific Glacier packages:

pkcon install lipstick-glacier-home-qt5

If necessary, reboot.

• user-id/password

• What works, what does not work

Scroll down the page here.

• How to contribute and report defects

For more info please visit neochapay's github page

• Contributions

KDE Neon

Based on KDE Neon for the desktop, comes with Plasma Mobile.

• Download location

Plasma mobile images can be found here.

• user-id/password

phablet/1234

• What works, what does not work

• How to contribute and report defects

• Contributions

NixOS

NixOS support is handled through the Mobile NixOS project.

• Project home page
• Source code repository

There is no pre-built complete image. For now users are expected to follow the instructions in the Getting Started page, and on the device's page.

• What works, what does not work

This information may change, but currently it boots, it's as compatible as the Android-based devices are with Mobile NixOS. It even supports a bit more since it can use Wi-Fi.

Support for all of the hardware will be coming, this project is a breadth-first work, where the work spans multiple devices in parallel.

• How to contribute and report defects

On the project's repository. Please specify that you are using a PinePhone when reporting issues.

• Contributions

Details about contributions and donations are on the NixOS website.

LuneOS

Based on WebOS by LG, comes with Luna Next desktop environment.

• Download location

LuneOS test image for PinePhone Tofe recommends using bmaptool ; for example "bmaptool copy http://build.webos-ports.org/luneos-testing/images/pinephone/luneos-dev-image-pinephone-testing-0-15.rootfs.wic.gz /dev/mmcblk0". Rename .wic file to .img for standard dd usage.

• user-id/password

• What works, what does not work

• How to contribute and report defects

• Contributions

Factory Test OS

On the BraveHeart model there was a pmOS based basic factory test OS pre-installed on the eMMC. Martijn Braam from pmOS has improved the functionality of the image considerably.

Since the 20200501 version it is able to test all the hardware. It also includes functionality to install a new OS to the eMMC when using with an test image that includes that OS image. The downloadable image just does the hardware tests.

Do not flash eMMC to test your device, just copy it to mSD and test from there. New versions are distributed as part of the pmOS distribution.

Links:

• Software Images: (download the latest one that is marked pine-pinephone-YYYYMMDD-factorytestX.img.xz)
• Git repo
• Documentation

Installing other ARM64 distributions

Warning: Distributions not on this page may not even boot after you follow this section. In the best case, they will be barely usable. This is more for fun, or if you would like to port a new distribution to the PinePhone.

Note: This section uses megi's kernel releases, and not the official ones from PINE64. While it is possible to use the official (and in the future, mainline) kernel, megi provides binary releases, which makes it very easy.

If you would like to see specific commands for how to complete these steps, see https://github.com/nikhiljha/pp-fedora-sdsetup (an example for Fedora) or https://xnux.eu/howtos/install-arch-linux-arm.html (an example for Arch Linux).

1. Create a boot (from 4MiB to about 252MiB) and root (from 252 MiB to the end of the card) filesystem on the SD card.
2. Format the boot partition with vfat, and the root partition with f2fs.
3. Extract the root filesystem from your distribution's ARM image into the root filesystem on the SD card. Do not copy the partition, copy the files (in archive mode: like rsync -ar).
4. Edit /etc/fstab to match your partitions.
5. Grab megi's kernel from https://xff.cz/kernels/ (you probably want 5.6).
6. Follow the README instructions, which involves copying the kernel modules into the SD card rootfs and writing u-boot and the bootloader.

Other Resources

Community

• Links to the community services

Hardware information

• PinePhone hardware details in this Pine64 wiki.
• PinePhone_v1.1_-_Braveheart hardware details specific to the BraveHeart handsets.
• The postmarketOS wiki has a detailed page on the PinePhone hardware here, and the preceding devkit here.

Other software information

• sunxi community wiki
• megi feature/driver support matrix
• megi bootUI notes (for dualbooting/multibooting) see demonstration on YouTube,
• ayufan boot tools

Other

• Pine64 shop
• Pine64 blog on blobs
• Martijn Braam Librem 5 comparison, especially covering openness/blobs
• Bart Ribbers blog on Linux distributions and desktop environments on mobile devices.
• Jeff Geerling on testing micro SD cards.