Comment by TheCraiggers
3 months ago
> Maybe it's time for a third large phone OS
It's been that time for years. But it's easier said than done. The closest we've currently got are the various phone-targeted Linux distros out there. But they're not quite ready for serious usage for me; at least not on the Pinephone. Still, that's where to put your time & money if you're serious about wanting a change.
The thing is making a smart phone is hard. You need experienced and knowledgable embedded engineers to design every aspect of the phone. You need people who are knowledgable about RF and know how to go about regulations in various countries. You need software engineers to build up a whole operating system from scratch and probably do that multiple times as the available technology changes. Not to mention create an entire production line to fabricate the parts and assemble them.
And while efforts like Pinephone are good, they don't have the VC or talent to really make that a reality anytime soon on a massive scale. Most efforts in this space are open source which is great but doesn't really pay anything. People with these skills can easily work at any phone OEM and make good money. So I think it will take a massive company to do it. Maybe Microsoft wants to give it another go haha. Amazon has tried multiple times to make this a reality but it's just cost so much money and time that they keep shutting it down.
I don't have any answers, for something to become viable is has to appeal to the average consumer and getting to that point is like crossing a mountain.
There was Firefox OS, but they ended it too soon. Now, they’re just trying to make money from ads
Kai OS is a moderately successful continuation of Firefox OS.
Which isn't open source, unfortunately.
Mozilla if you're listening - now's your chance; please bring it back. We actually have a reason to switch now.
> easier said than done
This is true for both the engineering and business sides. Cyanogen’s failure showed that it ultimately doesn’t matter how good your software product is if your business side of things is poorly run. Same with the Pebble smartwatch - amazing product, terrible back office.
> The closest we've currently got are the various phone-targeted Linux distros out there. But they're not quite ready for serious usage for me; at least not on the Pinephone.
This isn't the closest, since we have Purism Librem 5 phone, which many people (including me) are using as a daily driver.
Is Pinephone still going? I was excited for it a few years ago, but I checked in recently and a lot of people are calling it dead. They discontinued to "pro" model and it doesn't sound like the software has much active development going on.
The phones still exist and work fine. I know it's fun to declare things "dead", but I don't think you can reasonably say it of pinephones.
Eh, that's a multi-faceted question. I personally am tired of Pine. They've made some questionable calls over the past couple years and their "make open hardware with almost nothing working software-wise and see what the community does" business plan has started feeling exploitative to me.
PPpro was mismanaged especially badly. Nothing against the amazing community- it's just there were some hardware/firmware decisions by pine that made it especially hard to develop for. Meanwhile, the non-pro version is handicapped by a very slow processor.
There's still some development happening, and the window managers like KDE are still improving stuff on the front end. But you're right, it has slowed down. That all said, this is still the only non-Google/Apple device you can get in the USA that actually kinda works. I used both the non-pro and pro versions for a few months a couple years ago as my daily driver. I could make calls, send texts, connect to matrix, etc. I wouldn't claim that "it just worked" but it did work.
> this is still the only non-Google/Apple device you can get in the USA that actually kinda works
You forgot Librem 5.
You can have Volla phone with Ubuntu Touch, Jolla C2 or Sony Xperia with Sailfish OS worldwide.