Never considered anything other than Android, but it’s an excellent idea. It’s a shame none of the options are good. Anyone have any insight as to why things suck?
As much as Alphabet sucks ass, I have had very good results with Nexus/Pixel devices and LineageOS. All the hardware seems to be supported right down to high-framerate mode on the camera on the Pixel2.
Google seems to be the exception, as they are working to upstream the Android kernel work as much as possible. This is a smart move, because it saves them money by reducing the work needed to keep Android in sync with Linux.
My understanding is: Android is here for many years now. When it was just released I got the HTC G1 and it was only barely better than what Mobian + Phosh present right now. Add to that many years of polishing by some of the most powerful corporations out there and you end up with Android as it is today.
Mobile Linux made unbelieveable progress. It is, in my opinion, almost as usable as a dumb phone as first Androids were. The problem is as others have pointed it out, we need people working tirelessly on thankless polishing of everything around it. It’s hard without throwing money at that issue.
Mostly agreed. Although I would say G1 was (relatively to its time) more advanced and stable than mobile Linux phones. It aged quickly, and the hardware felt somewhat underpowered (similar to what probably PinePhone owners feel right now); but it never had a problem to work as a phone or had serious stability issues.
Yes, I am aware we’re comparing apples to oranges, and that Google had enough resources to make it work well enough. Still, they probably didn’t make it work overnight, and neither should we expect mobile Linux could do that.
Disclaimer: while I did not use G1, I used Samsung Galaxy i7500 which had the same specs (minus the keyboard), and the experience I described is based on using it.
It can be just as well my memory telling me that G1 was worse than it actually was 😉
My, possibly unpopular, opinion about PinePhone’s hardware is that it’s more than fine, its just us that are wasting resources left and right. Sure, SXMO works like a charm, but one could say that it’s because of how minimalistic it is. But try flashing SailfishOS (unfortunately not fully OSS) and see how snappy and fluid it is - and it’s not short of animations in its UI. Heck, even Ubuntu Touch is pretty performant!
As others have said, it’s a mixture of being very early in development, wild differences in underlying system components, lack of funding and lack of support from manufacturers. If a large corporation wirh ties to amartphone manufacturers stood behind mobile Linux and threw enough money at the problem, it could become as good as, if not better than Android in a few years time. Not that it would happen, I’m just saying.
Never considered anything other than Android, but it’s an excellent idea. It’s a shame none of the options are good. Anyone have any insight as to why things suck?
Lack of funding. Throw enough money at this problem and it will be solved.
I’d say wildly variable hardware configurations with poor driver support.
The situation would improve if hardware vendors would upstream the code, but I just don’t see it.
As much as Alphabet sucks ass, I have had very good results with Nexus/Pixel devices and LineageOS. All the hardware seems to be supported right down to high-framerate mode on the camera on the Pixel2.
Google seems to be the exception, as they are working to upstream the Android kernel work as much as possible. This is a smart move, because it saves them money by reducing the work needed to keep Android in sync with Linux.
I have a PinePhone and the article is on point.
My understanding is: Android is here for many years now. When it was just released I got the HTC G1 and it was only barely better than what Mobian + Phosh present right now. Add to that many years of polishing by some of the most powerful corporations out there and you end up with Android as it is today.
Mobile Linux made unbelieveable progress. It is, in my opinion, almost as usable as a dumb phone as first Androids were. The problem is as others have pointed it out, we need people working tirelessly on thankless polishing of everything around it. It’s hard without throwing money at that issue.
Mostly agreed. Although I would say G1 was (relatively to its time) more advanced and stable than mobile Linux phones. It aged quickly, and the hardware felt somewhat underpowered (similar to what probably PinePhone owners feel right now); but it never had a problem to work as a phone or had serious stability issues.
Yes, I am aware we’re comparing apples to oranges, and that Google had enough resources to make it work well enough. Still, they probably didn’t make it work overnight, and neither should we expect mobile Linux could do that.
Disclaimer: while I did not use G1, I used Samsung Galaxy i7500 which had the same specs (minus the keyboard), and the experience I described is based on using it.
It can be just as well my memory telling me that G1 was worse than it actually was 😉
My, possibly unpopular, opinion about PinePhone’s hardware is that it’s more than fine, its just us that are wasting resources left and right. Sure, SXMO works like a charm, but one could say that it’s because of how minimalistic it is. But try flashing SailfishOS (unfortunately not fully OSS) and see how snappy and fluid it is - and it’s not short of animations in its UI. Heck, even Ubuntu Touch is pretty performant!
Even tho not fully free, there is SailfishOS, that looks usable. Haven’t tried it tho.
As others have said, it’s a mixture of being very early in development, wild differences in underlying system components, lack of funding and lack of support from manufacturers. If a large corporation wirh ties to amartphone manufacturers stood behind mobile Linux and threw enough money at the problem, it could become as good as, if not better than Android in a few years time. Not that it would happen, I’m just saying.