4 ms·

Why would you even want to develop on someone's corporate platform to begin with? Apple or Adobe or Microsoft or Google or whoever... In the end, you always get

by tx 18y ago

Why would you even want to develop on someone's corporate platform to begin with? Apple or Adobe or Microsoft or Google or whoever... In the end, you always get fucked, either by your "patron" or by market forces, when your "platform" loses out. This ain't 90s anymore.

elai 18y ago
Other than openmoko, that platform is???
- mechanical_fish 18y ago
  Whatever happened to openmoko? They appear to have released actual hardware while I wasn't looking! Does anybody have one, and how do they like it?
  - sharksandwich 18y ago
    I ran across this review the other day http://blog.wolfman.com/articles/2008/07/11/openmoko-freerunner-first-impressions http://blog.wolfman.com/articles/2008/07/11/openmoko-freerun... Sounds like it's got a lot of promise, but a long way to go before it's ready for mainstream use
    - jcl 18y ago
      Hadn't seen that one, thanks. The most thorough review I've found so far is the Ars Technica one, which is older but comes to similar conclusions: http://arstechnica.com/reviews/os/open-moko-software.ars http://arstechnica.com/reviews/os/open-moko-software.ars
  - nuclear_eclipse 18y ago
    I have one, and the software isn't very stable, but the device itself is great, and the display is amazingly beautiful and crisp (640x480, 280DPI FTW). Some things like waking up from suspend is hit or miss (just like on desktops/laptops), wifi setup is not yet integrated with any of the software, and there seems to be a lack of coherence on the development front. However, it's a very promising platform, and the hackability of the device is out of this world. There are already people who have put Debian installs on their SD card to boot from, and use a full XFCE interface to run it more like an internet tablet than a phone. The device allows developers to create applications in Gtk, Qt, or any other widget toolkit, using any of a wide variety of languages. Users can ssh into their phone over USB or Wifi, and update/upgrade packages, add new package repositories, and do anything you could ever do on any other "normal" Linux system. While the current software array is lacking, there is a driving effort to create an overarching D-bus framework (freesmartphone.org) that will allow any application in any language/toolkit to access the same system functions, data storage, and more, as a single set of consolidated D-bus APIs. Overall, I don't consider it stable enough for an everyday phone, so I have a secondary prepaid SIM in it for testing and development until I feel that it can fully replace my real phone. However, I know there are also a lot more people that already use it as their only cellphone, and they are very happy with it. I wouldn't yet recommend the device for anyone who isn't a Linux junky/developer, but hopefully the platform will stabilize soon enough that I can change my mind. All hail freedom!

by tx 18y ago

elai 18y ago

Other than openmoko, that platform is???

mechanical_fish 18y ago
Whatever happened to openmoko? They appear to have released actual hardware while I wasn't looking! Does anybody have one, and how do they like it?
- sharksandwich 18y ago
  I ran across this review the other day http://blog.wolfman.com/articles/2008/07/11/openmoko-freerunner-first-impressions http://blog.wolfman.com/articles/2008/07/11/openmoko-freerun... Sounds like it's got a lot of promise, but a long way to go before it's ready for mainstream use
  - jcl 18y ago
    Hadn't seen that one, thanks. The most thorough review I've found so far is the Ars Technica one, which is older but comes to similar conclusions: http://arstechnica.com/reviews/os/open-moko-software.ars http://arstechnica.com/reviews/os/open-moko-software.ars
- nuclear_eclipse 18y ago
  I have one, and the software isn't very stable, but the device itself is great, and the display is amazingly beautiful and crisp (640x480, 280DPI FTW). Some things like waking up from suspend is hit or miss (just like on desktops/laptops), wifi setup is not yet integrated with any of the software, and there seems to be a lack of coherence on the development front. However, it's a very promising platform, and the hackability of the device is out of this world. There are already people who have put Debian installs on their SD card to boot from, and use a full XFCE interface to run it more like an internet tablet than a phone. The device allows developers to create applications in Gtk, Qt, or any other widget toolkit, using any of a wide variety of languages. Users can ssh into their phone over USB or Wifi, and update/upgrade packages, add new package repositories, and do anything you could ever do on any other "normal" Linux system. While the current software array is lacking, there is a driving effort to create an overarching D-bus framework (freesmartphone.org) that will allow any application in any language/toolkit to access the same system functions, data storage, and more, as a single set of consolidated D-bus APIs. Overall, I don't consider it stable enough for an everyday phone, so I have a secondary prepaid SIM in it for testing and development until I feel that it can fully replace my real phone. However, I know there are also a lot more people that already use it as their only cellphone, and they are very happy with it. I wouldn't yet recommend the device for anyone who isn't a Linux junky/developer, but hopefully the platform will stabilize soon enough that I can change my mind. All hail freedom!