Android Desktop Environment Setup Guide

Prerequisites

First enable this in Developer Options:
- Navigate to Android Settings → System → Developer options → Disable child process restrictions
- This prevents killing of extra phantom processes (>32) and processes using excessive CPU

Installation

The source of most of this is from https://github.com/termux/termux-app

1. Install termux
2. Install termux-x11

Setup

1. Open the Termux app
2. Run update and upgrade commands:

   pkg update -y
   pkg upgrade -y

3. Install required packages:

   pkg install x11-repo
   pkg install termux-x11-nightly
   pkg install pulseaudio
   pkg install tur-repo

4. Install XFCE4 desktop environment:

   pkg install xfce4

5. Install browser of your choice:
   - For Chromium:

     pkg install chromium

• For Firefox:

     pkg install firefox

6. Install VS Code:

   pkg install code-oss

8. For ‘advanced coding’ [you wont need for basic usage]

pkg install rust
pkg install binutils

Desktop Launcher Setup

1. Download the desktop launcher script:

   pkg install wget -y
   wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Iamnod/termux-own-desktop/main/xfce4.sh

2. Make the script executable:

   chmod +x xfce4.sh

3. Run the script:

   ./xfce4.sh

Termux-X11 Settings

Open Termux-X11 app and go to PREFERENCES:
- Turn ON: Fullscreen on device display
- Turn ON: PIP mode
- Turn OFF: Show additional keyboard

Alternative Setup Using Proot-Distro

If you prefer using a Linux distribution:

pkg update && pkg upgrade -y
pkg install proot-distro
proot-distro install debian
proot-distro list     # to see all available distros
proot-distro login debian    # open the Debian environment

This is the content of xfce4.sh [you don’t need it]

#!/data/data/com.termux/files/usr/bin/bash

# Kill open X11 processes
kill -9 $(pgrep -f "termux.x11") 2>/dev/null

# Enable PulseAudio over Network
pulseaudio --start --load="module-native-protocol-tcp auth-ip-acl=127.0.0.1 auth-anonymous=1" --exit-idle-time=-1

# Prepare termux-x11 session
export XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=${TMPDIR}
termux-x11 :0 >/dev/null &

# Wait a bit until termux-x11 gets started.
sleep 3

# Launch Termux X11 main activity
am start --user 0 -n com.termux.x11/com.termux.x11.MainActivity > /dev/null 2>&1
sleep 1

# Set audio server
export PULSE_SERVER=127.0.0.1

# Run XFCE4 Desktop
env DISPLAY=:0 dbus-launch --exit-with-session xfce4-session & > /dev/null 2>&1

exit 0