Okay, so the other day I was trying to figure out how to get text from my Android phone over to my Linux machine. It’s something I do pretty often, and I was using copy and paste with some cloud storage before, which was kind of a pain.
I did some digging and found this thing called KDE Connect. Apparently, it’s a tool that lets your phone and computer talk to each other. There’s even a version for GNOME called GSConnect, which is what I ended up using since I’m on Ubuntu.
Here’s what I did to get it set up:
- First, I installed GSConnect on my Ubuntu machine. I just searched for it in the Ubuntu Software app and clicked install. Super easy.
- Then, I grabbed the KDE Connect app from the Google Play Store on my phone and installed it.
- Next, I opened up GSConnect on my desktop. Right away, it showed my phone in the list.
- So I tapped my desktop’s name in the KDE Connect app on my phone and hit “Request Pairing”.
- A popup showed up on my desktop, and I just clicked “Accept”. Boom, paired!
After that, sharing text was a breeze. I just copied something on my phone, and then in GSConnect, there was an option to send the clipboard contents to my computer. It showed up instantly! I could also do it the other way around, from my computer to my phone. Seriously, it’s so much better than what I was doing before.
This also lets you do other cool stuff like share files, see your phone’s notifications on your computer, and even use your phone as a remote control. I haven’t messed with all the features yet, but just the text sharing alone is a huge time-saver for me. If you’re always bouncing between your Android and Linux machines like me, you should definitely check this out!
