3 ms·

What are you looking for in a smartphone?

old-gregg 17y ago
Even though you didn't ask me I just couldn't resist anyway: I'm looking for a 100% POSIX-compliant machine, i.e. I walk into my house, it grabs my Wi-Fi, I ssh into it, compile and run any POSIX-compliant C code leveraging thousands (if not millions) of POSIX programs and libraries: from Python, Haskell and vim to RoR, Apache or MySQL if I wanted to... I could also run a proxy, establish ad-hoc WiFi network to several laptops to tether via 3G. I want to write software that runs on my Linux, Mac and my phone simply by recompiling. I see no reason why not - these phones are equivalents of Pentium II of late 90s, they ran Linux just fine. I don't need custom platform-dependent "development kits", fuck that - we've been through this on the desktop and it seems that unixes are winning, why going back into dark ages of platform APIs? Yes, there are phone-specific things like graphics/GPS/address book integration, etc - give us specs and we'll write open sourced multi-phone libraries that abstract all that crap away, but the core should be POSIX/libc, not a locked up proprietary toy - there's no fun in it.
- rbanffy 17y ago
  "we've been through this on the desktop and it seems that unixes are winning" As much as I would love thet to be true, I cannot agree. The Windows crap still seems to have a long future. And unless you are talking GNUStep, you more or less can't compile a Mac app on a Linux box and expect it to work. A POSIX app, sure, but that's not a Mac application - it only goes as far as not being Mac-proof.
- jrockway 17y ago
  That's OpenMoko. You probably also want a good mobile web browser, good software for making and receiving phone calls, etc. I think every OS I listed above fails at one or both of those, which is why I am annoyed. (I would write OpenMoko software, but they made some dumb design decisions I don't agree with, so it is not worth the effort. It's much easier to carry around an eeepc.)
- deleted 17y ago
  [deleted]
- joeyo 17y ago
  If you jailbreak an android phone you get this, more or less.

Even though you didn't ask me I just couldn't resist anyway: I'm looking for a 100% POSIX-compliant machine, i.e. I walk into my house, it grabs my Wi-Fi, I ssh into it, compile and run any POSIX-compliant C code leveraging thousands (if not millions) of POSIX programs and libraries: from Python, Haskell and vim to RoR, Apache or MySQL if I wanted to... I could also run a proxy, establish ad-hoc WiFi network to several laptops to tether via 3G. I want to write software that runs on my Linux, Mac and my phone simply by recompiling. I see no reason why not - these phones are equivalents of Pentium II of late 90s, they ran Linux just fine. I don't need custom platform-dependent "development kits", fuck that - we've been through this on the desktop and it seems that unixes are winning, why going back into dark ages of platform APIs? Yes, there are phone-specific things like graphics/GPS/address book integration, etc - give us specs and we'll write open sourced multi-phone libraries that abstract all that crap away, but the core should be POSIX/libc, not a locked up proprietary toy - there's no fun in it.

rbanffy 17y ago
"we've been through this on the desktop and it seems that unixes are winning" As much as I would love thet to be true, I cannot agree. The Windows crap still seems to have a long future. And unless you are talking GNUStep, you more or less can't compile a Mac app on a Linux box and expect it to work. A POSIX app, sure, but that's not a Mac application - it only goes as far as not being Mac-proof.
jrockway 17y ago
That's OpenMoko. You probably also want a good mobile web browser, good software for making and receiving phone calls, etc. I think every OS I listed above fails at one or both of those, which is why I am annoyed. (I would write OpenMoko software, but they made some dumb design decisions I don't agree with, so it is not worth the effort. It's much easier to carry around an eeepc.)
deleted 17y ago
[deleted]
joeyo 17y ago
If you jailbreak an android phone you get this, more or less.