Comment by usr1106

4 months ago

I type these words on my year old Sailfish device. I had 2 other ones for roughly 10 years altogether.

The UI is astonishingly polished. It has not changed a lot for 10 years, but still nice to use. There is e.g. the tutorial video that comes installed on every device. Sorry, probably won't have time to share it later, I have a funeral to organize when I get out of bed. Maybe some other user can if it's not on Youtube.

The biggest problem areas IMHO:

- No hardware that meets my reqirements. The current one is too big for my pockets / my taste. It's not very good HW either, in the period when Sony Xperia were supported the situation was different. Even the original Sailfish phone over 10 years ago was relatively better at the time.

- Predictive keyboard is gone. I understand it's a licensing issue that they cannot offer it anymore. Blame Apple and Google for killing all small players.

- There is a severe maintenance backlog in many places and it's probably also growing. The browser is based on Firefox with a 2 digit version number. It crashes on many bloat sites and Cloudflare blocks it for being too old. I severly hope it won't crash now before I click reply. (I guess most users use a Browser on the Android compatibility environment)

11 comments

usr1106

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laserbeam  4 months ago

My point is not that it’s bad UX or not, my point is the website is bad at selling me their product and could never convince me that it’s good.

  • usr1106  4 months ago

    I understood your point. As a long time user I am not familiar with their Web site. I suffer from their lack of technical resources. But I have no doubt they also have a lack of marketing resources. They are just too few people.

m4rtink  4 months ago

Sony Xperia 10 series devices are still supported - including Xperia 10 V which is quite recent.

  • usr1106  4 months ago

    It says there is no license for 10 V yet. Have not looked into the details for a long time, but I guess the reason for that is that it's considered beta with too many bugs / features not working?

dotancohen  4 months ago 

  > The browser is based on Firefox with a 2 digit version number.

The OS runs (probably some subset of) Android applications, no? Is Mozilla's build of Firefox not supported?

  • usr1106  4 months ago

    Yes, there is Android app support. Firefox should work without major problems (I use it rarely.) But it's kind of backwards, first offering a Gnu/Linux phone, but then a fundmental application like web browser should be run under Android.

    • dotancohen  4 months ago

      Is it actually run in an Android VM?

      I use an OS as a step to run applications. Why would someone use Sailfish if it can not run applications, or do they expect mobile development firms to start supporting a distant third OS? Serious question, there is a real chicken and egg problem here.

      I think that I have simple needs from a mobile OS. CalDAV and CardDAV sync, provide a mobile hotspot, record calls. On Android those functions are provided by applications - so I consider myself a user of these applications, not a user of Android. I'm probably the ideal customer for a Sailfish OS, so long as it provides these features or can run apps that do.

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