I’ve been looking at options for controlling my Ubuntu Media Center computer from Android. Mainly Mouse, but Keyboard is good too. Looked at a lot of stuff but the most interesting ones were:
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KDE Connect. This is the one I decided on because it is common, readily available and Ubuntu has the GSConnect package to work with Gnome. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.kde.kdeconnect_tp . F-Droid also has a version that I have not tried.
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XMouse (In F-Droid, Not in Play). This actually was a dream to setup and worked well. The downside is that it is not in Play. https://f-droid.org/en/packages/com.stripe1.xmouse .
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remote-touchpad. A cool app that is server side only and uses the a browser on the Android side. The biggest issue is it is not that secure. Also only on Ubuntu as a snap and not on Debian.
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Bluetooth Keyboard & Mouse (serverless). Fremium and not FOSS. Should have been good but I could never get it to work. The Linux Bluetooth system sees the packets, and the USB, Input, and XInput subsystems see the keyboard and mouse but no data flow. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=io.appground.blek .
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WiFiMouse. Have not tried this one. It seems like another FOSS app. Just added for reference and if anyone has tried. https://alternativeto.net/software/wifimouse/about/ .
So in short I found KDE Connect was the most obvious but I really liked how XMouse worked in terms of ease of setup and simplicity. Frankly probably would have used it if it was in Play too.
I was thinking that BlueTooth would be better and more universal. The issue I found was FOSS apps seem to be missing and I could never get the one freemium app I found to actually work. This seems to be an area that needs a good FOSS alternative that actually works. Let me know if you have any idea of other options OR why I loose the data stream somewhere between the bluetooth stack and the Linux input subsystem.
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Have you checked out Unified Remote? It’s been the gold standard for Android-PC remote control for several years now, before KDE Connect was even a thing. It’s open-source and is also on the Play Store.
As for your Bluetooth woes, I’m unsure, in my experience Bluetooth has always been a bit iffy, and it’s succeptible to interference as it uses the 2.4GHz band. Better to stick to WiFi I reckon, it’s faster and you don’t get any interference issues (if you’re using 5/6GHz bands).
Looks pretty good, but are you sure it’s open source? I don’t see the source linked anywhere on their website, and the “Description of Other Rights and Limitations” section of their terms of service suggests that it’s proprietary.
This link says it is Freemium Proprietary: https://alternativeto.net/software/unified-remote/about/ .
Thanks.
Do you have a link to the source and the license? Not sure it is FOSS. Looks popular though.
Maybe I am mistaken but I do not think there is any server or client app code posted here. Looks like just plugins. Also saw no mention of licensing anywhere even for the plugins.