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Laptops are a subclass of PCs. The microcomputer is by far the longest living of all generations, having survived through three decades. Rob Landley once keenl

Laptops are a subclass of PCs. The microcomputer is by far the longest living of all generations, having survived through three decades. Rob Landley once keenly noted the signature event that must occur for one computer generation to usurp another. It must become self-hosting, i.e. it must be able to compile itself. I cannot currently compile Android on Android or iOS on iOS.

yellowapple 11y ago
> I cannot currently compile Android on Android or iOS on iOS. You actually could, hypothetically, compile Android on Android, in a sense, by chrooting into a Debian environment and compiling from there. I've done at least the chroot part (I had a Debian chroot environment with Xfce installed on my Galaxy Tab 2 for quite a while, though it was really slow and limited by the tablet's measly RAM). The idea of running a GNU/Linux-like system on Android (reusing the device's kernel in a chroot or a similar setup) is basically the idea behind the Ubuntu for Android concept that fizzled away as Ubuntu's mobile version started to be developed: plug your phone into a dock, and the Ubuntu chroot takes over the peripheral devices and presents a desktop.
- vezzy-fnord 11y ago
  That's cheating. I mean actually using vanilla Android as your host. Yours amounts to using a chrooted debootstrap for cross-compiling to an Android target.
  - yellowapple 11y ago
    Some call it "cheating", I call it "bending the rules". The reality is that it's running on the Android device itself, using the device's own kernel. I personally think that qualifies in a technical sense.
rbanffy 11y ago
> must occur for one computer generation to usurp another. It must become self-hosting This is for completely superseding the previous generation. When the level of functionality of the new platform surpasses the needs of a all pure consumers, a general purpose computer will become a niche item, much like a Sony or Nintendo development system.

yellowapple 11y ago

> I cannot currently compile Android on Android or iOS on iOS. You actually could, hypothetically, compile Android on Android, in a sense, by chrooting into a Debian environment and compiling from there. I've done at least the chroot part (I had a Debian chroot environment with Xfce installed on my Galaxy Tab 2 for quite a while, though it was really slow and limited by the tablet's measly RAM). The idea of running a GNU/Linux-like system on Android (reusing the device's kernel in a chroot or a similar setup) is basically the idea behind the Ubuntu for Android concept that fizzled away as Ubuntu's mobile version started to be developed: plug your phone into a dock, and the Ubuntu chroot takes over the peripheral devices and presents a desktop.

vezzy-fnord 11y ago
That's cheating. I mean actually using vanilla Android as your host. Yours amounts to using a chrooted debootstrap for cross-compiling to an Android target.
- yellowapple 11y ago
  Some call it "cheating", I call it "bending the rules". The reality is that it's running on the Android device itself, using the device's own kernel. I personally think that qualifies in a technical sense.

rbanffy 11y ago

> must occur for one computer generation to usurp another. It must become self-hosting This is for completely superseding the previous generation. When the level of functionality of the new platform surpasses the needs of a all pure consumers, a general purpose computer will become a niche item, much like a Sony or Nintendo development system.