TIL Google's Pixel phones don't support HDMI out – they ship with hardware support (like every USB-C device forever), but it's disabled by Google at the OS level.
Speculation is that they've done this to sell more Chromecast devices, but it's really inconvenient when your screen is broken. Do I pay $250 for a new screen, or $500 for a new phone? Either way, Google wins. 🙃
(I wonder if the internal product fight about this is why Google finally added 2FA code sync? 🧐)
Aha! I take it back about the USB HID devices. I tried a hub that didn't work and came up short on links saying it was supported, but @falken pointed me at a link that suggested it *should* work, and trying a different dock, indeed it does!
In my case, I don't need display support, but it's silly that Google only support DisplayLink (a proprietary protocol that requires a pre-installed app *and* a display device that supports DisplayLink)
@boris @mauve yeah, it's a good reminder that having HDMI (technically DisplayPort, I guess?) out on inexpensive Android devices would be amazing for general-purpose computing for people that can't afford both a phone and a standalone computer. Such a missed opportunity, especially as mobile devices get better and better.
@blaine @boris @mauve I tried Dex on a recent Samsung phone, only thing that wasn’t working well was the resolution to my screen, else it picked everything up from my USB-C dock – screen, keyboard etc – and it used the touchscreen of the phone as a trackpad
Installing VSCode as a PWA there and connecting to a remote server for running stuff in terminal = all many devs need?
