4 ms·

I disagree. I really want to have a phone which out of the box would have rich set of powerful, well-designed and integrated applications (Mail, Contact manager

by k_bx 13y ago

I disagree. I really want to have a phone which out of the box would have rich set of powerful, well-designed and integrated applications (Mail, Contact manager, Calendar, Notes, Todo, Maps, IM, Music player, Book reader, File manager, Alarm, Gallery/Camera). I think Android is far behind here in current state, and all the new stuff they do is so Google-centric that it makes me sick. So I do see a room for another OS that doesn't need tons of apps for each thing, but rather has great stack out of the box.

dublinben 13y ago
What makes you say Android is "far behind" your desired goal? That sounds exactly like what a contemporary Android device ships with.
- pmelendez 13y ago
  I agree with him... the key phrase for me is " well-designed", of course that is arguable and subjective.
- k_bx 13y ago
  Currently apps are badly designed, and google makes them feel half-online / half-offline, with oversimplifying interface, and pushing it's online services. Contemporary Android device has two email programs (GMail and Email), 2 photo galleries (Gallery and Photos), SMS called Hangouts (and merged in a weird way), Music player which doesn't have podcasts and also feels as half-mobile-website. I would really like a mobile phone which would have it's base programs be self-sufficient and well-designed, not something that feels like a lightweight front-end for a cloud API. And then it would integrate with google (or others) as a feature.
  - untog 13y ago
    What makes you say they're "badly designed"? I'd agree if we're talking about Android 2.x, but it's come a long way.
luxpir 13y ago
What you describe is more of a computer. I want that too, have done since those pocket organisers in the 90s, or the Casio Databank that played dial-tones of friends' numbers down the phone line. What we really want, I think, is the ultimate portable computer. With a phone feature. I'd actually rather it was VOIP and everyone used that over 3/4G networks for most calls, but imagine that happening in the next 5 years - fat chance. This ultra-portable device would have the perfect form-factor of usable screen and keyboard, all somehow tucked into a pocketable device. Much like those old Psion devices, or the N900, only packed with decent hardware.
- richardwhiuk 13y ago
  The 4G standard actually specifies using VOIP for all calls - current 4G networks use what's known as Circuit Switch FallBack (CSFB), but the plan longer term is to move to VoLTE (Voice over LTE). See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LTE#Voice_calls http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LTE#Voice_calls for more info.
- danford 13y ago
  This is sort of what canonical is trying to do with Ubuntu and Unity. The phones they'll be coming out with later this year are said to be a "full os" in the form factor of a phone. The interface is made to allow you to pair your device with an external device (say screen and keyboard) and the interface adjusts its self to that form factor (think "responsive design"). So at say a public library, they could have these cheap terminals that people with phones can just walk up to and use with their phone as the computing platform and the peripherals as just an input interface. Right now every major manufacturer is putting out two OSs (chrome/android, windows/winphone, osx/iOS), and I think they're just now realizing it doesn't make sense, I mean google even touts chrome as mobile OS, why the heck are they making two? I don't think they have any plans to combine the two projects, but I really hope we aren't using java vms everywhere in the future. It seems microsoft is now rethinking windows 8 and their phones aren't selling well (for a number of reasons) and I think most likely they'll be coming out with a convergent OS soon. It'll probably be a rip off of unity or gnome shell.
Pxtl 13y ago
WinPhone actually does that stuff very well. Better than Android, imho. However, you go from "google-centric" to "microsoft-centric" with Outlook.com in place of Gmail and OneDrive/SkyDrive in place of Google Drive. But then you lose out on the app ecosystem surrounding Android, and you're in an even-more-closed space. I mean, even if quality is a problem, there are ideological reasons to go Android over iOS. For WinPhone, the only advantage is cost - WinPhones are cheap and decent quality.

by k_bx 13y ago

dublinben 13y ago

What makes you say Android is "far behind" your desired goal? That sounds exactly like what a contemporary Android device ships with.

pmelendez 13y ago
I agree with him... the key phrase for me is " well-designed", of course that is arguable and subjective.
k_bx 13y ago
Currently apps are badly designed, and google makes them feel half-online / half-offline, with oversimplifying interface, and pushing it's online services. Contemporary Android device has two email programs (GMail and Email), 2 photo galleries (Gallery and Photos), SMS called Hangouts (and merged in a weird way), Music player which doesn't have podcasts and also feels as half-mobile-website. I would really like a mobile phone which would have it's base programs be self-sufficient and well-designed, not something that feels like a lightweight front-end for a cloud API. And then it would integrate with google (or others) as a feature.
- untog 13y ago
  What makes you say they're "badly designed"? I'd agree if we're talking about Android 2.x, but it's come a long way.

luxpir 13y ago

What you describe is more of a computer. I want that too, have done since those pocket organisers in the 90s, or the Casio Databank that played dial-tones of friends' numbers down the phone line. What we really want, I think, is the ultimate portable computer. With a phone feature. I'd actually rather it was VOIP and everyone used that over 3/4G networks for most calls, but imagine that happening in the next 5 years - fat chance. This ultra-portable device would have the perfect form-factor of usable screen and keyboard, all somehow tucked into a pocketable device. Much like those old Psion devices, or the N900, only packed with decent hardware.

richardwhiuk 13y ago
The 4G standard actually specifies using VOIP for all calls - current 4G networks use what's known as Circuit Switch FallBack (CSFB), but the plan longer term is to move to VoLTE (Voice over LTE). See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LTE#Voice_calls http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LTE#Voice_calls for more info.
danford 13y ago
This is sort of what canonical is trying to do with Ubuntu and Unity. The phones they'll be coming out with later this year are said to be a "full os" in the form factor of a phone. The interface is made to allow you to pair your device with an external device (say screen and keyboard) and the interface adjusts its self to that form factor (think "responsive design"). So at say a public library, they could have these cheap terminals that people with phones can just walk up to and use with their phone as the computing platform and the peripherals as just an input interface. Right now every major manufacturer is putting out two OSs (chrome/android, windows/winphone, osx/iOS), and I think they're just now realizing it doesn't make sense, I mean google even touts chrome as mobile OS, why the heck are they making two? I don't think they have any plans to combine the two projects, but I really hope we aren't using java vms everywhere in the future. It seems microsoft is now rethinking windows 8 and their phones aren't selling well (for a number of reasons) and I think most likely they'll be coming out with a convergent OS soon. It'll probably be a rip off of unity or gnome shell.

Pxtl 13y ago

WinPhone actually does that stuff very well. Better than Android, imho. However, you go from "google-centric" to "microsoft-centric" with Outlook.com in place of Gmail and OneDrive/SkyDrive in place of Google Drive. But then you lose out on the app ecosystem surrounding Android, and you're in an even-more-closed space. I mean, even if quality is a problem, there are ideological reasons to go Android over iOS. For WinPhone, the only advantage is cost - WinPhones are cheap and decent quality.