So after my last post I have had a play with Android x86 on the Linux PCs with very mixed results. Quite why Facebook finds it difficult to support the desktop / browser based version of Instagram with the ability to post images is hard to fathom considering how well they have made Facebook work on the browser (better than a lot of apps) and clearly the only reason Facebook bother continuing to support Instagram is to ward off competition in the mobile app marketplace.
The biggest issue with Android x86 is that the developers have given it a landscape orientation by default and Instagram will auto rotate this into portrait which means you actually have to have a screen you can physically rotate or have hotkeys to turn the screen sideways itself. That is partly the reason I have wanted to run it on Windows where the hotkeys are well supported. I am not sure about Linux support for screen rotation hotkeys. Androidx86 has some hotkeys that will sometimes rotate the screen, sometimes not. So turning the screen or pressing the screen rotation hotkeys seem to be the only realistic options.
The other option is if the developers come up with something that will allow you to choose a landscape orientation by default. I have also tried this with changing video modes but wasn’t able to find something that the version of Android itself could cope with so I guess I will be talking to them to see what can be done. Obviously I am quite keen to be able to post in Instagram from my PC without all this having to switch to a handheld to post on IG. But there are pros and cons to the different approaches and I have got around it up to now by composing the posts in Google Docs and then pasting that on the phone. And that approach does have its advantages particularly as you can review the document’s character count which has to be held under 2200.
At any rate upgrading the Windows PC will go ahead, and I think putting Windows 10 on it is a highly likely outcome as well. Having Windows 10 means I will also have to buy a Pro license for it sooner or later since I have to migrate off using schools’ licenses at some point. Whether the Windows computer when upgraded is going to be good enough with Androidx86 is something still to be tested out. Right now I am going to be probably keep using a handheld with Google Docs composition on the PC which has been very productive (and transferring images using Bluetooth). It is not really that hard and almost makes it unnecessary to have Androidx86 considering the hassle involved with that platform.