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Can anyone recommend a good framework or analysis of the barriers to open-source, general-purpose computing on mobile devices? I have read with interest the var
by cproctor 5y ago
Can anyone recommend a good framework or analysis of the barriers to open-source, general-purpose computing on mobile devices? I have read with interest the various open-source mobile operating systems posted to HN, but don't feel like I have a good sense of the landscape. Switching to open source feels urgent (mobile has become so important and so privacy-invasive), but it also feels like this is a steep uphill battle; that mobile has been culturally positioned as not-for-open-source.
I'd love to see this problem analyzed in terms of layers. My sense is that one barrier is walled-garden apps. I'm happy to give these up. But I also have the sense that there are hard barriers involving firmware (especially cellular modems?), identity (SIM cards are designed to contain secrets you can't access), and connectivity (you can't decouple a phone number from its client as easily as you can with an IP address).
- teddyh 5y agoPurism, the makers of the Librem 5 phone, have addressed these issues many times in their news/posts: https://puri.sm/news/ https://puri.sm/news/
- swiley 5y agoNon-free graphics drivers and the incompleteness of gnome-calls and libpurple-sms. Those two are really the main issues.
- swiley 5y ago(Sorry to reply twice but my noprocrast timer is still running out.) If you want it in wiki/git form: postmarketos.org is the project you're looking for as far as stuff on the application processor goes. Most people prefer to treat modems as black boxes due to the belief that modem firmware needs go through regulatory testing (I'm not too sure that's true but I've only done WiFi stuff.)