The discussion I stumbled upon, about this SSH app for Android, is really worrying. Will Google really manage to make it impossible to root your phone?
But there’s more to this, it’s more complicated. In the Big Picture, Google has every incentive to make these changes — they lead to more security, and they’re aligned with Google’s corporate goals as well.
- When talking to users, Google will emphasize control over hackers.
- When talking to stockholders, Google will emphasize control over users.
Edit: I disagree with “they lead to more security”. That’s not “security”, let’s not turn words upside-down.
Does it run android apps?
Not really, no. I used Ubuntu Touch for about a year a few years ago and the method for running Android apps is essentially to run an emulator layer on the phone (anBox), which in practice is nearly unusable. It may have improved somewhat since then but I suspect you’re still going to need a relatively beefy phone at minimum to run whatever solutions there are at a decent speed.
Not natively, but with help of containers. I found two projects and to be honest I don’t know much about them yet, as I still use Android for device warranty reasons. (But I am eager to try as soon as the warranty expires.)
Anbox (discontinued since this year):
Waydroid took over and looks promising. https://waydro.id/
Of course you could also run Android emulators, but such container applications like Waydrois are more efficient.