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If they have any sense they are already negotiating the sale of the physical business on to someone else. Keep the patent portfolio and recuop $6 billion of the

If they have any sense they are already negotiating the sale of the physical business on to someone else. Keep the patent portfolio and recuop $6 billion of the initial outlay. Also, "open" in name only.

Tyrannosaurs 15y ago
Who would be interested in buying a marginally profitable manufacturing business in a highly competitive market for any significant amount of money. Besides, I think Google are doing this, in part, to produce what everyone has been asking for - an Android phone without the crap heaped on it, a phone that will allow people to judge Android for what it is rather than for what Samsung, HTC and others think it should be.
rbanffy 15y ago
> Also, "open" in name only. "open" as in: $ repo init -u git://android.git.kernel.org/platform/manifest.git
- lojack 15y ago
  I believe the point is that google can now produce closed source motorola specific software, and not that android is no longer open source software.
  - rbanffy 15y ago
    Google always could. The Google apps you find on your Android phone are not open-source. HTC's Sense or Motorola's Blur aren't open source either. In fact, everyone could. My Nook is full of proprietary software. Android is just a software environment people build apps on top. The open-source core is fairly decent when compared to the competition, but no phone manufacturer I know ships only that.
- kinofcain 15y ago
  "open" would be if that actually got me the latest code.
  - rbanffy 15y ago
    I may be mistaken, but I believe (and you can check if you want) the last commit on that tree happened 40 hours ago.
    - ktsmith 15y ago
      Everyone is referring to the ice cream sandwich specific code which is not currently available.
    - d0nk 15y ago
      There still hasn't been a release of honeycomb's source (3.0-3.2).
    - kinofcain 15y ago
      You're not mistaken about the commits, but you're mistaken about what it means. That command will clone the 2.3 branch, aka Gingerbread. Honeycomb has been shipping on devices for months now, and Ice Cream is the current development branch. Even if you want to claim that I shouldn't be able to see the current work in progress in an "open" project, which is debatable, I should at least be able to get the code for the currently released version, which would be Honeycomb. I can't get access to those unless I'm in Google's Super Best Friends club. GPL issues notwithstanding, Google is completely within their rights to keep their code away from me. However, it makes their trite definitions of "open" look pretty hollow.
      - rbanffy 15y ago
        I am quite sure all the GPL parts of Gingerbread are available. I am also sure Google is not withholding parts of Gingerbread for no reason. I have no knowledge about their reasons to do so, but, considering many if not all 3.x tablets run on Nvidia chips, I'd bet this has some relationship to Nvidia's historic reluctance in supporting open-source. I am also quite sure Google is working on that as it's not in their best interest to alienate the open-source developer community.
- krakensden 15y ago
  unless you want the latest version...
  - runjake 15y ago
    I'm not sure why krakensden is being downvoted for their comment. This is a continual gripe in the Android developer/hacker community. Has all of the Android 3.0/3.2 source finally been posted to android.git.kernel.org? Ice Cream Sandwich?
    - rbanffy 15y ago
      The 3.x branch is not open (yet). The 2.x branch (we are talking about mobile phones, not tablets) is open.
    - mindcrime 15y ago
      I'm not sure why krakensden is being downvoted for their comment. Maybe because Google have been pretty emphatic about the fact that the Honeycomb / Ice Cream Sandwich code will be released, and because their delay in releasing this one specific revision is hardly the same thing as "closing Android" or whatever hyperbole is being floated around. That said, I didn't downvote him. I didn't think the comment added much to the conversation, but it's not worth a downvote in my eyes.
      - runjake 15y ago
        I'm not sure I see the point of opening an Android release after it's developed. It defeats a primary benefit of open source software. And even then, on most models (HTC, Motorola), unless I'm willing to violate my warranty and root it or unlock the bootloader, I'm not able to actually use the source. This whole "Android is open!" thing seems largely for marketing, not to actually promote any openness (unless you buy a Nexus phone, which is what I own, FWIW)
        mindcrime 15y ago
        I'm not sure I see the point of opening an Android release after it's developed. It defeats a primary benefit of open source software. Well, having the code released at all, is always better than not having it. The more code released to the world under a reasonable F/OSS license, the better, as far as I'm concerned. That said, you make a good point... Android isn't necessarily developed in the most open of fashions, despite the fact that the source itself is, technically, open source. :-( And even then, on most models (HTC, Motorola), unless I'm willing to violate my warranty and root it or unlock the bootloader, I'm not able to actually use the source. Nonetheless, you do have that choice. That's a fundamentally different scenario than with, say, a win7 phone or whatever, where you don't have access to the source at all. Plenty of people are willing to take the chance with the warranty situation in order to load custom versions of Android, so clearly this matters to some people.

Tyrannosaurs 15y ago

Who would be interested in buying a marginally profitable manufacturing business in a highly competitive market for any significant amount of money. Besides, I think Google are doing this, in part, to produce what everyone has been asking for - an Android phone without the crap heaped on it, a phone that will allow people to judge Android for what it is rather than for what Samsung, HTC and others think it should be.

rbanffy 15y ago

> Also, "open" in name only. "open" as in: $ repo init -u git://android.git.kernel.org/platform/manifest.git

lojack 15y ago
I believe the point is that google can now produce closed source motorola specific software, and not that android is no longer open source software.
- rbanffy 15y ago
  Google always could. The Google apps you find on your Android phone are not open-source. HTC's Sense or Motorola's Blur aren't open source either. In fact, everyone could. My Nook is full of proprietary software. Android is just a software environment people build apps on top. The open-source core is fairly decent when compared to the competition, but no phone manufacturer I know ships only that.
kinofcain 15y ago
"open" would be if that actually got me the latest code.
- rbanffy 15y ago
  I may be mistaken, but I believe (and you can check if you want) the last commit on that tree happened 40 hours ago.
  - ktsmith 15y ago
    Everyone is referring to the ice cream sandwich specific code which is not currently available.
  - d0nk 15y ago
    There still hasn't been a release of honeycomb's source (3.0-3.2).
  - kinofcain 15y ago
    You're not mistaken about the commits, but you're mistaken about what it means. That command will clone the 2.3 branch, aka Gingerbread. Honeycomb has been shipping on devices for months now, and Ice Cream is the current development branch. Even if you want to claim that I shouldn't be able to see the current work in progress in an "open" project, which is debatable, I should at least be able to get the code for the currently released version, which would be Honeycomb. I can't get access to those unless I'm in Google's Super Best Friends club. GPL issues notwithstanding, Google is completely within their rights to keep their code away from me. However, it makes their trite definitions of "open" look pretty hollow.
    - rbanffy 15y ago
      I am quite sure all the GPL parts of Gingerbread are available. I am also sure Google is not withholding parts of Gingerbread for no reason. I have no knowledge about their reasons to do so, but, considering many if not all 3.x tablets run on Nvidia chips, I'd bet this has some relationship to Nvidia's historic reluctance in supporting open-source. I am also quite sure Google is working on that as it's not in their best interest to alienate the open-source developer community.
krakensden 15y ago
unless you want the latest version...
- runjake 15y ago
  I'm not sure why krakensden is being downvoted for their comment. This is a continual gripe in the Android developer/hacker community. Has all of the Android 3.0/3.2 source finally been posted to android.git.kernel.org? Ice Cream Sandwich?
  - rbanffy 15y ago
    The 3.x branch is not open (yet). The 2.x branch (we are talking about mobile phones, not tablets) is open.
  - mindcrime 15y ago
    I'm not sure why krakensden is being downvoted for their comment. Maybe because Google have been pretty emphatic about the fact that the Honeycomb / Ice Cream Sandwich code will be released, and because their delay in releasing this one specific revision is hardly the same thing as "closing Android" or whatever hyperbole is being floated around. That said, I didn't downvote him. I didn't think the comment added much to the conversation, but it's not worth a downvote in my eyes.
    - runjake 15y ago
      I'm not sure I see the point of opening an Android release after it's developed. It defeats a primary benefit of open source software. And even then, on most models (HTC, Motorola), unless I'm willing to violate my warranty and root it or unlock the bootloader, I'm not able to actually use the source. This whole "Android is open!" thing seems largely for marketing, not to actually promote any openness (unless you buy a Nexus phone, which is what I own, FWIW)
      - mindcrime 15y ago
        I'm not sure I see the point of opening an Android release after it's developed. It defeats a primary benefit of open source software. Well, having the code released at all, is always better than not having it. The more code released to the world under a reasonable F/OSS license, the better, as far as I'm concerned. That said, you make a good point... Android isn't necessarily developed in the most open of fashions, despite the fact that the source itself is, technically, open source. :-( And even then, on most models (HTC, Motorola), unless I'm willing to violate my warranty and root it or unlock the bootloader, I'm not able to actually use the source. Nonetheless, you do have that choice. That's a fundamentally different scenario than with, say, a win7 phone or whatever, where you don't have access to the source at all. Plenty of people are willing to take the chance with the warranty situation in order to load custom versions of Android, so clearly this matters to some people.