Nah, the kernel isn’t that important for apps - you can replace the kernel and update the massive Android framework to work with the new one relatively easily (you will need some Linux compatibility for native code that does syscalls on its own, but that’s pretty much it - even WSL1 could do that).
It’s all the APIs and system apps provided by Google that have no reasonable alternative in AOSP that are the problem for compatibility. Look how incomplete projects like MicroG (an open-source implementation of Google Play Services) are, and their only goal is to provide Android compatibility for unofficial ROMs without installing the proper Google services.
One would think the fact that Android is Linux should jumpstart that somewhat. But here we are.
Nah, the kernel isn’t that important for apps - you can replace the kernel and update the massive Android framework to work with the new one relatively easily (you will need some Linux compatibility for native code that does syscalls on its own, but that’s pretty much it - even WSL1 could do that).
It’s all the APIs and system apps provided by Google that have no reasonable alternative in AOSP that are the problem for compatibility. Look how incomplete projects like MicroG (an open-source implementation of Google Play Services) are, and their only goal is to provide Android compatibility for unofficial ROMs without installing the proper Google services.