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>"How can anyone invest time developing for them?" What alternative do you suggest? I suggested they were the best remaining option for an open-source mobile O

>"How can anyone invest time developing for them?" What alternative do you suggest? I suggested they were the best remaining option for an open-source mobile OS now that Ubuntu were dropping out of the race. What other options are there? Sailfish? Anything else?

pjmlp 10y ago
There are no alternatives. This ideology of open-source mobile OS goes back to Openmoko. None of them managed to sell enough devices to keep a profitable business.
- ZenoArrow 10y ago
  >"None of them managed to sell enough devices to keep a profitable business." Nokia managed it with the N900 and the N9, the only reason they didn't continue is they lost their bottle and sold out to Microsoft.
  - pjmlp 10y ago
    If you were fine with "open source" on those Nokia devices, you should be happy with "open source" on Android. Also as a former employee I can tell they didn't sell that much units, specially when compared with Symbian devices.
nickpsecurity 10y ago
What he said. On top of it, maybe next failed attempt can try building on one of these for a stronger foundation: https://github.com/ExpressOS/expressos https://github.com/ExpressOS/expressos http://genode.org/ http://genode.org/
- ZenoArrow 10y ago
  Tizen is an alternative, whether you like it or not is another matter.
  - nickpsecurity 10y ago
    Oh, you make it sound so simple. A platform is an alternative to dominating ecosystems if it exists at all. It having apps, locking you into Microsfot, or even existing 5+ years down the road doesn't matter? If that's true, there should be all kinds of people on all kinds of smartphone platforms right now instead of most of them on two. Meanwhile, Tizen is available for people wanting whatever their changing offering is. I guess just budget regular rewrites in a new language/platform you had to learn into your FOSS app on Tizen with either few contributors or the more common zero. That's some great ROI.
skierpage 10y ago
KDE's Plasma Mobile? Like Ubuntu Phone/Unity 8 it's also using Qt QML to build flexible layout apps that support touch and keyboard+mouse. https://plasma-mobile.org/ https://plasma-mobile.org/

pjmlp 10y ago

There are no alternatives. This ideology of open-source mobile OS goes back to Openmoko. None of them managed to sell enough devices to keep a profitable business.

ZenoArrow 10y ago
>"None of them managed to sell enough devices to keep a profitable business." Nokia managed it with the N900 and the N9, the only reason they didn't continue is they lost their bottle and sold out to Microsoft.
- pjmlp 10y ago
  If you were fine with "open source" on those Nokia devices, you should be happy with "open source" on Android. Also as a former employee I can tell they didn't sell that much units, specially when compared with Symbian devices.

nickpsecurity 10y ago

What he said. On top of it, maybe next failed attempt can try building on one of these for a stronger foundation: https://github.com/ExpressOS/expressos https://github.com/ExpressOS/expressos http://genode.org/ http://genode.org/

ZenoArrow 10y ago
Tizen is an alternative, whether you like it or not is another matter.
- nickpsecurity 10y ago
  Oh, you make it sound so simple. A platform is an alternative to dominating ecosystems if it exists at all. It having apps, locking you into Microsfot, or even existing 5+ years down the road doesn't matter? If that's true, there should be all kinds of people on all kinds of smartphone platforms right now instead of most of them on two. Meanwhile, Tizen is available for people wanting whatever their changing offering is. I guess just budget regular rewrites in a new language/platform you had to learn into your FOSS app on Tizen with either few contributors or the more common zero. That's some great ROI.

skierpage 10y ago

KDE's Plasma Mobile? Like Ubuntu Phone/Unity 8 it's also using Qt QML to build flexible layout apps that support touch and keyboard+mouse. https://plasma-mobile.org/ https://plasma-mobile.org/