Honestly, I haven't played with this too much, so this is not authoritative by any means. I mainly set it up to see if my USB to Serial connector would work and it does.

I have a Prolific Technology PL2303 Serial Port / Mobile Action MA-8910P which I have used for a long time since it “just works” under Linux. See https://linux-hardware.org/?id=usb:067b-2303. Since I regularly have to connect to a server or network device via Serial, this has been handy with my laptop.

To try this, I installed the Linux subsystem on my Chromebook. See https://chromeos.dev/en/linux/setup for Googles instructions. I only put a 5G hard drive since I won't be using it much, and it is easy to change size.

This is some kind of Debian derivative, so it uses apt to install packages. I like minicom, so I installed minicom, then plugged in the PL2303. The brain dead journalctl didn't show me the new device, but /dev/ttyUSB0 showed up and I tried it. Plugged it into my router and all was good. Wish I could install Devuan instead and not have to muck with System-D.

sudo su # become root
apt install -y minicom # install minicom
minicom -o -D ttyUSB0
# Press enter a couple of times
# connected. BTW, ^a-Q to quit

If you're new to minicom, the parameters are

• -o – Do not initialize modem
• -D – use the serial port following for the connection
• ^a-T brings up a menu

minicom is pretty ancient, but so am I.