13 ms·

Ubuntu smartphone offers alternative to apps

172 points by AndrewDucker 12y ago

CmonDev 12y ago
TL;DR: offering apps + widgety apps, not an actual atlernative.
- smorrow 12y ago
  Yes. When I was finally able to articulate what the problem with computing in general is, it was "I like tools better than applications." And everything is an application. As far as I can see, all that's different about this phone is that it's using "sub-menus in the Start menu" where other stuff is using "icons on the desktop". PDAs already had this, I think.
  - smorrow 12y ago
    Addendum: Redd about Scopes a bit, it's more than just a different way of invoking the same apps. A Scope is a frontend to components of apparently any kind.
fidotron 12y ago
I think this is closer to the Windows phone tiles than they're letting on, but still a neat idea. Not convinced about how well it would work with games (which are hilariously second class citizens for all mobile platforms in spite of PR efforts). One very curious thing about the scope idea is it will need tweaking for different cultures around the world. Gross oversimplification, but generally in the west we categorize by what something is, whereas in the east it's what something is for.
- keithpeter 12y ago
  "...generally in the west we categorize by what something is, whereas in the east it's what something is for." Interesting comment. Have you got more information or a reference? (I must be 'Eastern' as I characterise my software tools by function).
  - fidotron 12y ago
    I'd digested that largely from this: http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781439838730 http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781439838730 That book is slightly out of date, but details a lot of actual studies (of varying quality) into both variation in priorities of users globally and how information architecture should vary. The example that stays with me was the Chinese having a strong preference for stores that group objects based by the room the object belongs in (imagine how lamps would be sold in a department store - either all together or lamps for the kitchen in the kitchen section etc.), whereas either the Koreans or Japanese were the exact opposite, as were most western nations. It's not a great book by any stretch, but it did persuade me that successful localization needs to consider much more than just language. Additionally working out how to invert the structure of what you're doing proves to be a useful exercise which can help improve the structure for all users. Finally, they emphasised that these patterns change with time, and surprisingly fast. Again in China there are strong generational differences, which they put down to the economic changes.
    - keithpeter 12y ago
      "It's not a great book by any stretch, but it did persuade me that successful localization needs to consider much more than just language." Nice reference. The perspective is the important thing, the book is just the vehicle.
- ytjohn 12y ago
  I think it's a lot closer to the PalmOS cards functionality, which a lot of people really enjoyed.
untog 12y ago
It's a really interesting idea, but I suspect it will fail - The market is too ingrained in the idea of "apps" to do anything else. When it first came out, Windows Phone had one of the most interesting UIs out there. It combined all of your social networks into one single messaging hub, had a novel concept in tiles and the sliding panes (or whatever they were called). Unfortunately, every app maker wanted to more or less port what they were already doing on Android/iOS to Windows Phone, so few ever used the functionality MS provided. As of Windows Phone 10, it all seems to be gone.
- Zigurd 12y ago
  I'm not sure the article is accurate regarding apps, or it might be some Canonical talking point that obscured the issue, but "QML" implies you can write Qt apps that are "native" to the Ubuntu phone environment.
  - slgeorge 12y ago
    You can write native or HTML5 apps for the phone. Scopes themselves give you different ways of looking at content. The first couple of pages of Ubuntu Developer give the best information (http://developer.ubuntu.com/en/ http://developer.ubuntu.com/en/)
- drapper 12y ago
  Not sure about the other things you mentioned, but "all of your social networks in one single messaging hub" functionality was removed in 8.1 update (which, apart from that one change, made Windows Phone really so much better), but, MS says, it's gonna be back in Win10.
numbsafari 12y ago
Seven swipes to the right in order to find the camera app? Hopefully there's a shortcut. EDIT: Ahh... looks like there's a slide out shelf of quick-access "apps" from the left side.
bryanlarsen 12y ago
I certainly hope that Ubuntu is ready with software that provides a phone interface on a phone and a desktop interface when plugged into a monitor. Because unlike a year and a half ago when they tried the Edge, hardware is (almost) ready for it. The next generation of monitors, PC's, phones and tablets will all have USB 3.1 Type C ports. These are true docking ports, able to supply 100W of power, and transmit DisplayPort, PCIExpress and USB simultaneously. You'll only have a single cable connected between your laptop and your monitor, with power, keyboard, mouse, network, printer, et cetera plugged into the monitor. We've been able to do that before, but it's always been expensive and/or proprietary. But what's really new is that this same cable will also be able to plug into your phone, letting you replace the laptop with a phone.
- Grazester 12y ago
  The article states "Unlike the original proposal, the handset does not become a desktop PC when plugged into a monitor." There is no need for a PC interface therefore.
  - totalrobe 12y ago
    So, functionally just a low end mobile phone with a quirky interface feature? This seems like a dead end to me...
  - bryanlarsen 12y ago
    The phone doesn't have a USB 3.1 type C port, either.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- thirdtruck 12y ago
  I desperately want an all-in-one device like that which I can clip onto my belt, with my phone or desktop or tablet serving as a thin client. Makes me wonder if that could be the future of mobile gaming.
vidarh 12y ago
The ability for it to "become a desktop PC when plugged into a monitor" was 90% of the appeal to me when they first talked about an Ubuntu powered smartphone. That they've stripped that out makes it relatively uninteresting.
- cwyers 12y ago
  Yeah. I never much saw the value of that, myself -- PCs are relatively cheap these days. But it's the only feature that the Ubuntu phone was offering that made it stand out from Android/iOS/Windows Phone/Blackberry/FirefoxOS/Sailfish. It's launching far later than most of its competitors, with fewer features and a less developed ecosystem to support it -- without some kind of killer app (which this might have been) it's probably DOA.
  - bentcorner 12y ago
    I think it'll be a useful feature to have. Say what you will about "the cloud" and all - syncing local storage and personal customizations is not well solved, so keeping "your pc" in your pocket at all times would be a useful thing to have.
  - vidarh 12y ago
    Mobile devices are getting powerful enough to be your PC. PC prices and performance have stagnated because most people are deeming the low end of the market "powerful enough", and so mobile devices are rapidly catching up. As much as cloud services help gloss over the effect of moving from device to device, there is still plenty of state on my devices, and it would be great to have all of that state in one place, and then it needs to be on the smallest device. My laptop is on its way to becoming a dumb terminal anyway: I keep less and less state on it, because I don't always have it with me. My phone on the other hand is always in my pocket.
    - bane 12y ago
      Right. My workday basically starts fishing my laptop out of my bag and plugging in all the stuff so I have a decent keyboard, mouse and monitor. Why shouldn't my PC just be my phone? I actually have everything I need for most of my work on my phone: several reasonable Office productivity softwares (including the official Office mobile), a tabbed terminal window with ssh, a browser. My phone has 3d acceleration, 3GB of RAM, 32GB of storage (with an sd card slot so I could bump it up). The resolution it operates at 1080x1920 or something ridiculous and more than sufficient for desktop needs. It has a usb port I can hook up to a hub for keyboard and mouse and it supports MHL so I can mirror the screen on a decent monitor. Hell, if I stick under my hand it's a decent touchpad interface and my Note 3 even has pen input so I could use it as an "artist tablet". The problem is of course not hardware, but software. The hardware is more than sufficient, the apps are functionally capable, but they lack the right kind of UI metaphor to make it work as a desktop. It's so close, but somehow so far.
emehrkay 12y ago
"Unlike the original proposal, the handset does not become a desktop PC when plugged into a monitor." This is what I found most interesting about the device. I loved the idea of how the OS transformed when other things were attached to the phone. There were questions about background tasks and apps running, but your phone turning into your computer via a dock did make sense and seemed like the future.
- olla 12y ago
  That was actually the only thing i was really interested in. I guess if they would have done just that and added some text and data and image manipulation apps to the bunch that could downscale nicely to phone, it would have been a crowd magnet. I am not even expecting all features of apps to be present on mobile. Just preview would be often ok too.
drapper 12y ago
The phone it is based on is probably this: http://www.bqmobile.com/products/details/0e5e9019-78e8-4d44-a7dc-e55df54d7489 http://www.bqmobile.com/products/details/0e5e9019-78e8-4d44-...
- javipas 12y ago
  It's not. It's almost identical to the bq Aquaris E4.5 except for the screen, that has no virtual/capacitive buttons. I spoke with bq yesterday about the phone, http://www.xataka.com/moviles/ubuntu-en-smartphones-a-por-todas-llega-el-bq-aquaris-e4-5-ubuntu-edition http://www.xataka.com/moviles/ubuntu-en-smartphones-a-por-to... And was able to use it for a few hours. Not what anyone that thought about buying an Ubuntu Edge would have expected, but anyway, a cheap way to see if that experience is really worthy to you. I won't say if it's worthy for me yet. I've got to write about it next week :)
arca_vorago 12y ago
So how open will it really be? Will I be able to compile whatever proprietary blobs that are bound to be using and install debian instead?
- slgeorge 12y ago
  It will be as open as it's possible to be on phone hardware platforms. Which means that some SOC's will have binary drivers. Unless you're currently not using a phone then that's pretty much the same position as with any other phone OS.
  - smorrow 12y ago
    Yep. There's nothing stopping you from rooting an Android phone, taking Android off it (or just preventing it from starting up), and then building your own thing on top of the underlying Linux.
weavie 12y ago
When I first heard about an Ubuntu smart phone I got excited because I thought it would mean that finally after all this talk of having a computer in my pocket, I would actually get a proper computer (read laptop replacement) in my pocket. By that I mean something where I can install whatever software I want.. any linux executable.. and it would run fine. I had dreams of running XMonad and firing up Emacs and doing a bit of node development, or perhaps spending a bit of time learning Rust, all while waiting for the bus. Stick it on some hardware that had a physical keyboard and I would be sold. It seems it was not to be, and the Ubuntu phone is going to be another device that can only run programs created specifically for it and running in some sandboxed environment.
mdm_ 12y ago
Does anyone know if the QML mentioned is the same QML used to construct BlackBerry 10 apps?
- towelguy 12y ago
  It is Qt's QML https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UnityNextSpec https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UnityNextSpec
  - doublec 12y ago
    Blackberry 10 uses Qt's QML as well: http://developer.blackberry.com/native/documentation/cascades/dev/integrating_cpp_qml/ http://developer.blackberry.com/native/documentation/cascade...
sp332 12y ago
I was very impressed with Windows Phone's integration of Facebook, Twitter etc. I could see in one native-styled list all the updates and replies from all my connections on both networks. I could reply and post right there. I didn't have to launch the Facebook app and then the Twitter app and then the LinkedIn app etc. That basic functionality was much more painful on Android. Hopefully these Ubuntu scopes can capture some of that.
dgregd 12y ago
Slightly off topic, Ubuntu and Redhat are building their own display servers, Mir and Wayland. Why they can't simply use SurfaceFlinger? It should be simpler to add X Server emulation to SurfaceFlinger than to create whole display server from scratch.
- higherpurpose 12y ago
  Isn't that what they did for Ubuntu Touch?
bayesianhorse 12y ago
They sort of forgot to mention why this phone is better than Android, IPhone, Firefox OS and so on... My guess: Better support for Python. Probably also some kind of Docker support. Nothing to sneeze at.
kolanos 12y ago
The desktop mode is compelling enough that I'd be fine if Canonical delayed the Ubuntu Phone further to get it right. It's already been delayed considerably and the buzz it once had has mostly disappeared. The ability to plug it into a monitor and have it function as a desktop, or plug it into an HDTV and have it behave like a Roku would be a massive edge over what's on the market now. Not sure why Canonical is content with releasing an "also ran" phone.
- notatoad 12y ago
  >Not sure why Canonical is content with releasing an "also ran" phone. It's a $200 device, off contract. The goal is probably just like the early firefoxOS devices - a minimal effort step to get out of the emulator and get the product into the hands of some users who aren't ubuntu enthusiasts. If the only people trying your product are the ones willing to flash their nexus devices, you're going to get kind of skewed feedback.
- keithpeter 12y ago
  I have to agree that the idea of rocking up to work and plopping my Ubuntuphone into a dock and having desktop functionality was a major attraction. Anyone know why Canonical are releasing early like this? Need for volume? Desire to get feedback on the 'card' interface? Limited processor power on the target hardware?
breckinloggins 12y ago
They lost the one factor that was truly differentiating. Arguably, it was the reason we got so excited the first time around. I feel as though the entire market is screaming for something obvious to exist. It's so obvious, so compelling, so useful... And so far away. Why do we even have "desktops" and "laptops" and "phones" and "tablets" and "wearable watches" and so forth? Actually, the rise of the wearable watch gives us the biggest clue: it's because we care about form factors. When I'm on the subway, I want something to hold in my hand. When I'm in a big hurry or on a jog, I want to glance at something on my wrist. When I'm in bed but don't want to disturb my partner, I want to interact with a larger yet personal tablet. When I want to type something (including code) or interact with content in more involved ways, I want something with a mouse and a keyboard. When I want to have a state of the art immersion experience, I want something with a lot of horsepower (and preferably a head mounted display of some sort). Why do I have to have different computers for all of this when all I want is different I/O modalities (and related computing expansion devices)? Why do we keep ignoring the fact that what we want is the ability to experience our virtual world in the input / output environment that suits us at this moment? Everything else is secondary. I was so excited when the original Ubuntu Edge was announced, because I felt that FINALLY someone had figured out how to make the thing we've all been screaming for. But now I'm not so sure Canonical really "got it" after all. If they did, it would have been the first feature they kept, not the first one they cut. To even call it a "feature" is diminutive. It's a paradigm that wants to exist. We've seen already with the Motorola Atrix that it's harder than it sounds to get this right. But why is it THIS hard? Why can't we start with a phone that can be the CPU for wearables and tablets, and that can dock into a higher horsepower "GPU station" with a mouse and a keyboard and a monitor when we need it? You don't have to nail the performance profile as much as you have to nail why the experience is obviously better. I argue that you don't need a supercomputer in your pocket to pull that off. Is it just me on this, or what?
- killface 12y ago
  You've basically described the Star Trek universe...
- Scorponok 12y ago
  We're getting close to this - you can buy graphics cards that plug into a PCI Express port on a laptop, for example. But the hardware's not quite there yet.
vinceguidry 12y ago
I am eagerly awaiting this. I've been wanting to write my own smartphone apps for a long time. I don't care about writing games, what I want to write is my own music player. I want it to replace the stock music player. I want access to the Bluetooth chipset so I can actually know why the damn thing doesn't just play when my car starts up. I want the music player given priority over all other apps so I get no stutters instead of 4+ per song with my Nexus 5. I want to order my phone's interface around it. I want all other apps shut down when it goes into standby, standby time is the difference between me having to charge my phone before I go out for the night and not having to worry about it. The music player is 95% of what my phone is doing for me, yet the Nexus treats it as a second-rate concern. I want Linux on everything, even (especially!) my toaster.
maratc 12y ago
"The Ubuntu fan base will clamour to buy the phone just because they will be curious to see what it is" Who is this "Ubuntu fan base"? I connect to ten Ubuntu machines a day, and my parents use Ubuntu laptops. I don't consider myself a "fan", and my parents don't know what their OS is called. Where are these "Ubuntu faithful" the article talks about?
- slgeorge 12y ago
  There are fans of everything out there, it's almost the point of the Internet - connecting people together from around the world with specialist interests! You don't have to be a fan to use Ubuntu (as you said) - but there are lots of people that are interested in Open Source and alternative technology options who will be excited about a new software launch. I'm sure there are fans of the colour Orange who'll be excited it's getting more coverage today! :)
pastalex 12y ago
There's a lot to be disappointed about, but Scopes are interesting. More thoughts on this here: http://www.fastcompany.com/3041969/ubuntu-phone-scopes-specs-release http://www.fastcompany.com/3041969/ubuntu-phone-scopes-specs...
jrochkind1 12y ago
I doubt they'll show up in the U.S anytime soon.
leke 12y ago
So will this phone be free from OS updates having to come from the hardware manufacturer?
unimportant 12y ago
$200 for a phone that relies on new HTML5 apps to be better than a phone at half of it's cost? I see another failure in the making...
sdrizo 12y ago
I wish they would put the mic on the front of the device so peole could hear me when I speak.

172 points by AndrewDucker 12y ago

CmonDev 12y ago

TL;DR: offering apps + widgety apps, not an actual atlernative.

smorrow 12y ago
Yes. When I was finally able to articulate what the problem with computing in general is, it was "I like tools better than applications." And everything is an application. As far as I can see, all that's different about this phone is that it's using "sub-menus in the Start menu" where other stuff is using "icons on the desktop". PDAs already had this, I think.
- smorrow 12y ago
  Addendum: Redd about Scopes a bit, it's more than just a different way of invoking the same apps. A Scope is a frontend to components of apparently any kind.

fidotron 12y ago

I think this is closer to the Windows phone tiles than they're letting on, but still a neat idea. Not convinced about how well it would work with games (which are hilariously second class citizens for all mobile platforms in spite of PR efforts). One very curious thing about the scope idea is it will need tweaking for different cultures around the world. Gross oversimplification, but generally in the west we categorize by what something is, whereas in the east it's what something is for.

keithpeter 12y ago
"...generally in the west we categorize by what something is, whereas in the east it's what something is for." Interesting comment. Have you got more information or a reference? (I must be 'Eastern' as I characterise my software tools by function).
- fidotron 12y ago
  I'd digested that largely from this: http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781439838730 http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781439838730 That book is slightly out of date, but details a lot of actual studies (of varying quality) into both variation in priorities of users globally and how information architecture should vary. The example that stays with me was the Chinese having a strong preference for stores that group objects based by the room the object belongs in (imagine how lamps would be sold in a department store - either all together or lamps for the kitchen in the kitchen section etc.), whereas either the Koreans or Japanese were the exact opposite, as were most western nations. It's not a great book by any stretch, but it did persuade me that successful localization needs to consider much more than just language. Additionally working out how to invert the structure of what you're doing proves to be a useful exercise which can help improve the structure for all users. Finally, they emphasised that these patterns change with time, and surprisingly fast. Again in China there are strong generational differences, which they put down to the economic changes.
  - keithpeter 12y ago
    "It's not a great book by any stretch, but it did persuade me that successful localization needs to consider much more than just language." Nice reference. The perspective is the important thing, the book is just the vehicle.
ytjohn 12y ago
I think it's a lot closer to the PalmOS cards functionality, which a lot of people really enjoyed.

untog 12y ago

It's a really interesting idea, but I suspect it will fail - The market is too ingrained in the idea of "apps" to do anything else. When it first came out, Windows Phone had one of the most interesting UIs out there. It combined all of your social networks into one single messaging hub, had a novel concept in tiles and the sliding panes (or whatever they were called). Unfortunately, every app maker wanted to more or less port what they were already doing on Android/iOS to Windows Phone, so few ever used the functionality MS provided. As of Windows Phone 10, it all seems to be gone.

Zigurd 12y ago
I'm not sure the article is accurate regarding apps, or it might be some Canonical talking point that obscured the issue, but "QML" implies you can write Qt apps that are "native" to the Ubuntu phone environment.
- slgeorge 12y ago
  You can write native or HTML5 apps for the phone. Scopes themselves give you different ways of looking at content. The first couple of pages of Ubuntu Developer give the best information (http://developer.ubuntu.com/en/ http://developer.ubuntu.com/en/)
drapper 12y ago
Not sure about the other things you mentioned, but "all of your social networks in one single messaging hub" functionality was removed in 8.1 update (which, apart from that one change, made Windows Phone really so much better), but, MS says, it's gonna be back in Win10.

numbsafari 12y ago

Seven swipes to the right in order to find the camera app? Hopefully there's a shortcut. EDIT: Ahh... looks like there's a slide out shelf of quick-access "apps" from the left side.

bryanlarsen 12y ago

I certainly hope that Ubuntu is ready with software that provides a phone interface on a phone and a desktop interface when plugged into a monitor. Because unlike a year and a half ago when they tried the Edge, hardware is (almost) ready for it. The next generation of monitors, PC's, phones and tablets will all have USB 3.1 Type C ports. These are true docking ports, able to supply 100W of power, and transmit DisplayPort, PCIExpress and USB simultaneously. You'll only have a single cable connected between your laptop and your monitor, with power, keyboard, mouse, network, printer, et cetera plugged into the monitor. We've been able to do that before, but it's always been expensive and/or proprietary. But what's really new is that this same cable will also be able to plug into your phone, letting you replace the laptop with a phone.

Grazester 12y ago
The article states "Unlike the original proposal, the handset does not become a desktop PC when plugged into a monitor." There is no need for a PC interface therefore.
- totalrobe 12y ago
  So, functionally just a low end mobile phone with a quirky interface feature? This seems like a dead end to me...
- bryanlarsen 12y ago
  The phone doesn't have a USB 3.1 type C port, either.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
thirdtruck 12y ago
I desperately want an all-in-one device like that which I can clip onto my belt, with my phone or desktop or tablet serving as a thin client. Makes me wonder if that could be the future of mobile gaming.

vidarh 12y ago

The ability for it to "become a desktop PC when plugged into a monitor" was 90% of the appeal to me when they first talked about an Ubuntu powered smartphone. That they've stripped that out makes it relatively uninteresting.

cwyers 12y ago
Yeah. I never much saw the value of that, myself -- PCs are relatively cheap these days. But it's the only feature that the Ubuntu phone was offering that made it stand out from Android/iOS/Windows Phone/Blackberry/FirefoxOS/Sailfish. It's launching far later than most of its competitors, with fewer features and a less developed ecosystem to support it -- without some kind of killer app (which this might have been) it's probably DOA.
- bentcorner 12y ago
  I think it'll be a useful feature to have. Say what you will about "the cloud" and all - syncing local storage and personal customizations is not well solved, so keeping "your pc" in your pocket at all times would be a useful thing to have.
- vidarh 12y ago
  Mobile devices are getting powerful enough to be your PC. PC prices and performance have stagnated because most people are deeming the low end of the market "powerful enough", and so mobile devices are rapidly catching up. As much as cloud services help gloss over the effect of moving from device to device, there is still plenty of state on my devices, and it would be great to have all of that state in one place, and then it needs to be on the smallest device. My laptop is on its way to becoming a dumb terminal anyway: I keep less and less state on it, because I don't always have it with me. My phone on the other hand is always in my pocket.
  - bane 12y ago
    Right. My workday basically starts fishing my laptop out of my bag and plugging in all the stuff so I have a decent keyboard, mouse and monitor. Why shouldn't my PC just be my phone? I actually have everything I need for most of my work on my phone: several reasonable Office productivity softwares (including the official Office mobile), a tabbed terminal window with ssh, a browser. My phone has 3d acceleration, 3GB of RAM, 32GB of storage (with an sd card slot so I could bump it up). The resolution it operates at 1080x1920 or something ridiculous and more than sufficient for desktop needs. It has a usb port I can hook up to a hub for keyboard and mouse and it supports MHL so I can mirror the screen on a decent monitor. Hell, if I stick under my hand it's a decent touchpad interface and my Note 3 even has pen input so I could use it as an "artist tablet". The problem is of course not hardware, but software. The hardware is more than sufficient, the apps are functionally capable, but they lack the right kind of UI metaphor to make it work as a desktop. It's so close, but somehow so far.

emehrkay 12y ago

"Unlike the original proposal, the handset does not become a desktop PC when plugged into a monitor." This is what I found most interesting about the device. I loved the idea of how the OS transformed when other things were attached to the phone. There were questions about background tasks and apps running, but your phone turning into your computer via a dock did make sense and seemed like the future.

olla 12y ago
That was actually the only thing i was really interested in. I guess if they would have done just that and added some text and data and image manipulation apps to the bunch that could downscale nicely to phone, it would have been a crowd magnet. I am not even expecting all features of apps to be present on mobile. Just preview would be often ok too.

drapper 12y ago

The phone it is based on is probably this: http://www.bqmobile.com/products/details/0e5e9019-78e8-4d44-a7dc-e55df54d7489 http://www.bqmobile.com/products/details/0e5e9019-78e8-4d44-...

javipas 12y ago
It's not. It's almost identical to the bq Aquaris E4.5 except for the screen, that has no virtual/capacitive buttons. I spoke with bq yesterday about the phone, http://www.xataka.com/moviles/ubuntu-en-smartphones-a-por-todas-llega-el-bq-aquaris-e4-5-ubuntu-edition http://www.xataka.com/moviles/ubuntu-en-smartphones-a-por-to... And was able to use it for a few hours. Not what anyone that thought about buying an Ubuntu Edge would have expected, but anyway, a cheap way to see if that experience is really worthy to you. I won't say if it's worthy for me yet. I've got to write about it next week :)

arca_vorago 12y ago

So how open will it really be? Will I be able to compile whatever proprietary blobs that are bound to be using and install debian instead?

slgeorge 12y ago
It will be as open as it's possible to be on phone hardware platforms. Which means that some SOC's will have binary drivers. Unless you're currently not using a phone then that's pretty much the same position as with any other phone OS.
- smorrow 12y ago
  Yep. There's nothing stopping you from rooting an Android phone, taking Android off it (or just preventing it from starting up), and then building your own thing on top of the underlying Linux.

weavie 12y ago

When I first heard about an Ubuntu smart phone I got excited because I thought it would mean that finally after all this talk of having a computer in my pocket, I would actually get a proper computer (read laptop replacement) in my pocket. By that I mean something where I can install whatever software I want.. any linux executable.. and it would run fine. I had dreams of running XMonad and firing up Emacs and doing a bit of node development, or perhaps spending a bit of time learning Rust, all while waiting for the bus. Stick it on some hardware that had a physical keyboard and I would be sold. It seems it was not to be, and the Ubuntu phone is going to be another device that can only run programs created specifically for it and running in some sandboxed environment.

mdm_ 12y ago

Does anyone know if the QML mentioned is the same QML used to construct BlackBerry 10 apps?

towelguy 12y ago
It is Qt's QML https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UnityNextSpec https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UnityNextSpec
- doublec 12y ago
  Blackberry 10 uses Qt's QML as well: http://developer.blackberry.com/native/documentation/cascades/dev/integrating_cpp_qml/ http://developer.blackberry.com/native/documentation/cascade...

sp332 12y ago

I was very impressed with Windows Phone's integration of Facebook, Twitter etc. I could see in one native-styled list all the updates and replies from all my connections on both networks. I could reply and post right there. I didn't have to launch the Facebook app and then the Twitter app and then the LinkedIn app etc. That basic functionality was much more painful on Android. Hopefully these Ubuntu scopes can capture some of that.

dgregd 12y ago

Slightly off topic, Ubuntu and Redhat are building their own display servers, Mir and Wayland. Why they can't simply use SurfaceFlinger? It should be simpler to add X Server emulation to SurfaceFlinger than to create whole display server from scratch.

higherpurpose 12y ago
Isn't that what they did for Ubuntu Touch?

bayesianhorse 12y ago

They sort of forgot to mention why this phone is better than Android, IPhone, Firefox OS and so on... My guess: Better support for Python. Probably also some kind of Docker support. Nothing to sneeze at.

kolanos 12y ago

The desktop mode is compelling enough that I'd be fine if Canonical delayed the Ubuntu Phone further to get it right. It's already been delayed considerably and the buzz it once had has mostly disappeared. The ability to plug it into a monitor and have it function as a desktop, or plug it into an HDTV and have it behave like a Roku would be a massive edge over what's on the market now. Not sure why Canonical is content with releasing an "also ran" phone.

notatoad 12y ago
>Not sure why Canonical is content with releasing an "also ran" phone. It's a $200 device, off contract. The goal is probably just like the early firefoxOS devices - a minimal effort step to get out of the emulator and get the product into the hands of some users who aren't ubuntu enthusiasts. If the only people trying your product are the ones willing to flash their nexus devices, you're going to get kind of skewed feedback.
keithpeter 12y ago
I have to agree that the idea of rocking up to work and plopping my Ubuntuphone into a dock and having desktop functionality was a major attraction. Anyone know why Canonical are releasing early like this? Need for volume? Desire to get feedback on the 'card' interface? Limited processor power on the target hardware?

breckinloggins 12y ago

They lost the one factor that was truly differentiating. Arguably, it was the reason we got so excited the first time around. I feel as though the entire market is screaming for something obvious to exist. It's so obvious, so compelling, so useful... And so far away. Why do we even have "desktops" and "laptops" and "phones" and "tablets" and "wearable watches" and so forth? Actually, the rise of the wearable watch gives us the biggest clue: it's because we care about form factors. When I'm on the subway, I want something to hold in my hand. When I'm in a big hurry or on a jog, I want to glance at something on my wrist. When I'm in bed but don't want to disturb my partner, I want to interact with a larger yet personal tablet. When I want to type something (including code) or interact with content in more involved ways, I want something with a mouse and a keyboard. When I want to have a state of the art immersion experience, I want something with a lot of horsepower (and preferably a head mounted display of some sort). Why do I have to have different computers for all of this when all I want is different I/O modalities (and related computing expansion devices)? Why do we keep ignoring the fact that what we want is the ability to experience our virtual world in the input / output environment that suits us at this moment? Everything else is secondary. I was so excited when the original Ubuntu Edge was announced, because I felt that FINALLY someone had figured out how to make the thing we've all been screaming for. But now I'm not so sure Canonical really "got it" after all. If they did, it would have been the first feature they kept, not the first one they cut. To even call it a "feature" is diminutive. It's a paradigm that wants to exist. We've seen already with the Motorola Atrix that it's harder than it sounds to get this right. But why is it THIS hard? Why can't we start with a phone that can be the CPU for wearables and tablets, and that can dock into a higher horsepower "GPU station" with a mouse and a keyboard and a monitor when we need it? You don't have to nail the performance profile as much as you have to nail why the experience is obviously better. I argue that you don't need a supercomputer in your pocket to pull that off. Is it just me on this, or what?

killface 12y ago
You've basically described the Star Trek universe...
Scorponok 12y ago
We're getting close to this - you can buy graphics cards that plug into a PCI Express port on a laptop, for example. But the hardware's not quite there yet.

vinceguidry 12y ago

I am eagerly awaiting this. I've been wanting to write my own smartphone apps for a long time. I don't care about writing games, what I want to write is my own music player. I want it to replace the stock music player. I want access to the Bluetooth chipset so I can actually know why the damn thing doesn't just play when my car starts up. I want the music player given priority over all other apps so I get no stutters instead of 4+ per song with my Nexus 5. I want to order my phone's interface around it. I want all other apps shut down when it goes into standby, standby time is the difference between me having to charge my phone before I go out for the night and not having to worry about it. The music player is 95% of what my phone is doing for me, yet the Nexus treats it as a second-rate concern. I want Linux on everything, even (especially!) my toaster.

maratc 12y ago

"The Ubuntu fan base will clamour to buy the phone just because they will be curious to see what it is" Who is this "Ubuntu fan base"? I connect to ten Ubuntu machines a day, and my parents use Ubuntu laptops. I don't consider myself a "fan", and my parents don't know what their OS is called. Where are these "Ubuntu faithful" the article talks about?

slgeorge 12y ago
There are fans of everything out there, it's almost the point of the Internet - connecting people together from around the world with specialist interests! You don't have to be a fan to use Ubuntu (as you said) - but there are lots of people that are interested in Open Source and alternative technology options who will be excited about a new software launch. I'm sure there are fans of the colour Orange who'll be excited it's getting more coverage today! :)

pastalex 12y ago

There's a lot to be disappointed about, but Scopes are interesting. More thoughts on this here: http://www.fastcompany.com/3041969/ubuntu-phone-scopes-specs-release http://www.fastcompany.com/3041969/ubuntu-phone-scopes-specs...

jrochkind1 12y ago

I doubt they'll show up in the U.S anytime soon.

leke 12y ago

So will this phone be free from OS updates having to come from the hardware manufacturer?

unimportant 12y ago

$200 for a phone that relies on new HTML5 apps to be better than a phone at half of it's cost? I see another failure in the making...

sdrizo 12y ago

I wish they would put the mic on the front of the device so peole could hear me when I speak.