this post was submitted on 22 Apr 2026
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I bought a Linux tablet, and it’s both better and worse than Android (www.howtogeek.com)
submitted 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) by ekZepp@lemmy.world to c/linux@lemmy.world
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By Bertel King - Published Apr 22, 2026

From the moment GNOME 3 launched back in 2011, I felt like it was perfect for a touchscreen, and I’m happy to say that it absolutely is. I’d even go so far as to say that the GNOME interface is a better way to navigate a touchscreen than that of Android or iOS. I’ve said before that I would love to see an official GNOME-only OS, and this experience has only strengthened that desire.

Every aspect of GNOME is easy to tap with a finger. Opening the app drawer and swiping between workspaces feels completely natural with three-finger gestures. Windows are easy to drag around, maximize, or pin to the side. The virtual keyboard that pops up when I tap an input field is the only visual distinction from desktop GNOME. (...)

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[–] panda_abyss@lemmy.ca 2 points 1 week ago (3 children)

Encrypting my hard drive requires a password at boot, which meant physically plugging in a keyboard until I could figure out how to decrypt using a USB drive instead. For a device that can easily be forgotten in public and one whose back can be easily taken off, I’m willing to deal with this slight inconvenience for encryption, but it’s one Android doesn’t require.

This is an issue I run into running a headless Linux computer as well. On macOS I’m never running headless, so never ran into this issue. But needing to enter a password before the OS boots is a decision that makes Linux kind of awkward to use disk encryption with.

And I’m almost certainly doing it wrong, so would appreciate being nudged in the right direction.

I’ve seen a post about storing the encryption keys in TPM, but others say then you can lose your keys if the mobo dies. I’ve heard you can use ssh keys, but I’m not sure how — and here that would require a second device to unlock your tablet.

macOS uses a read only OS partition to boot and then encrypts your user data partition, can I do that with Linux?

[–] tofu@lemmy.nocturnal.garden 1 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Yes, the dual partition approach is what I usually do with LUKS

[–] panda_abyss@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Okay, on the weekend I’ll see if that can work with NixOS (so far my favourite distro).

[–] kork349d@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 week ago

You can write a luks key to a usb stick and use that to automatically decrypt at boot. https://wiki.nixos.org/wiki/Full_Disk_Encryption#Unattended_Boot_via_USB

[–] ghen@sh.itjust.works 0 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

What's the general concept for setting up a dual partition for this purpose? I'm thinking of making a Linux server myself pretty soon.

[–] Fmstrat@lemmy.world 2 points 1 week ago

Might want to try this instead: https://lemmy.world/comment/23441076

[–] Fmstrat@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

I'm about to make you happy. The below script puts SSH into initramfs, so you can SSH in to a prompt and type your LUKS password at boot. No part of the system is accessible over this SSH connection, just the prompt. You also still get the prompt locally on screen.

PORT=22
PUBKEY=...
sudo apt install -y dropbear-initramfs
echo "DROPBEAR_OPTIONS=\"-I 180 -j -k -p ${PORT} -s\"" |sudo tee -a /etc/dropbear/initramfs/dropbear.conf
echo "no-port-forwarding,no-agent-forwarding,no-x11-forwarding,command=\"/bin/cryptroot-unlock\" ${PUBKEY}" |sudo tee /etc/dropbear/initramfs/authorized_keys
sudo dropbearconvert openssh dropbear /etc/ssh/ssh_host_ecdsa_key /etc/dropbear/initramfs/dropbear_ecdsa_host_key
sudo dropbearconvert openssh dropbear /etc/ssh/ssh_host_ed25519_key /etc/dropbear/initramfs/dropbear_ed25519_host_key
sudo dropbearconvert openssh dropbear /etc/ssh/ssh_host_rsa_key /etc/dropbear/initramfs/dropbear_rsa_host_key
sudo update-initramfs -u -k all

@tofu@lemmy.nocturnal.garden for if this is easier than what you are doing.

[–] Amaterasu@lemmy.world 0 points 1 week ago (1 children)

TPM2 + Secure Boot via systemd-cryptenroll is the closest to the "just works" FileVault/Android experience. Keep a recovery passphrase in your password manager. You don't lose your data if the motherboard dies, you just use the recovery key.

I use this on my daily drive laptop. Only real hiccup is that I still keep the dual boot because fwupd does not cover my laptop BIOS firmware updates but in a Linux tablet this a no issue.

[–] Fmstrat@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Why not use LUKS? Hibernate to partition (even LVM) works, all native, and full disk support.

[–] Amaterasu@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

LUKS isn’t the alternative here, it’s the baseline. The question is how to unlock LUKS without manual passphrase entry at boot.

Using TPM2 + Secure Boot (e.g. via systemd-cryptenroll) binds the LUKS key to platform integrity, so it auto-unlocks when the system hasn’t been tampered with. You still keep a recovery passphrase, so you’re not locked out if hardware changes or fails.

[–] Fmstrat@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

But then anyone can just walk up to the machine and turn it on and have it be decrypted. Am I missing something?

[–] Amaterasu@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

TPM auto-unlock still relies on measured boot integrity (Secure Boot/PCRs), so it protects against offline theft and tampering when the machine is off or storage is removed.

But if an attacker has repeated physical access during boot, the protection depends on whether you’ve added extra factors like a TPM PIN or pre-boot passphrase. Login prompts don’t re-protect the disk once it’s decrypted.

In practice, for my use case (mostly shutdown or battery-dead scenarios), this is an acceptable trade-off for convenience. If your threat model includes targeted physical access during boot, then keeping a pre-boot secret is still the safer choice.

[–] Fmstrat@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago

Ahh so the pin or passphrase would basically give the same protection. Thanks.