Let's not forget that Ubuntu Touch is a Linux distro

Aug 27, 2015 13:45 GMT  ·  By

Ubuntu Touch is actually a Linux distribution and it's easy to forget that sometimes. This means that most of the stuff you can do in the OS can be done from the terminal, including dialing a number, for example.

One of the cool things about Ubuntu Touch is that it's a full Linux distribution. We're so used to see operating systems on phones that we don't give a second thought, but Ubuntu is closer to being a Linux distro more than any other OS that you currently find on mobile devices.

Operating systems for mobile devices are notoriously locked down, and they don't usually allow regular users to poke around. With Android things are a little bit different, and only developers can hope to make some modifications to the systems. This is why there are lots of Android variants for phones.

When Ubuntu Touch also doubles as a Linux distribution by connecting it to a desktop, it will become obvious why this is actually one of the best features. You can't even hope to get the same kind of access in other mobile Oses, but on Ubuntu it's going to be trivial. And there is a terminal included by default. Just imagine the possibilities.

Dialing a number from the terminal

Stuff like this might not seem important, but they reflect the kind of flexibility that we should get with Ubuntu.

Ubuntu developers answered some question from the community in a Q&A and revealed some interesting facts (many thanks to Blue Dragon for transcribing the notes).

“A use case for this would be i.e. your phone is docked to a screen and keyboard, and you are already working on your keyboard in a terminal but now you need to make a phone call. This already works, we just need to find out how, you can find it in the source code for the dialer app, it is a niche use case, it would be cool, though, especially with ascii art,” reads the entry on the blog.

You can check the entire Q&A sessions in the video below.