Apple’s Iphone, the various Google Android phones by Samsung, HTC and probably others, and Nokia’s Symbian phones are fighting on the smart phone market. As far as I know, Iphone is “closed” and you can only download those apps that Apple lets you have. Android lets you use any apps, and I assume Symbian is similar, though I’ve heard it’s old-fashioned. I don’t have real experience with any of these phones.
What’s really missing from the palette is an open source OS.
Well, there is one, Nokia’s Maemo, nowadays called MeeGo when they started co-operation with Intel. Only one phone, N900 uses it currently. I’m waiting for the next one, N9. Just look at a source example. All graphical development is done with Qt. It’s apparently not sucky since even XFLR5 managed to move into it quickly.
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I’m using Linux at home, Windows at work and a Mac every now and then, like when the Windows is acting up every day or when I’m not at home. So this writing comes from a Macbook.
I hate Windows’ instability and sucky performance, Apple’s quirks and desire to do things differently (how do I get {} brackets on this keyboard?) and Linux’ need to fiddle with configs to get things to work.
I love Windows’ hardware versatility and choice of programs, Apple’s “things just work”* approach to software and hardware and Linux’s powerfulness and openness.
As a phone, I’m using a Nokia 6310i from 2002. The battery lasts more than a week and the user interface is snappy. It has a monochrome display. Hope N9 will be ready soon. You could run Dosbox on N900. Irssi. XFLR5. Just anything. In case something goes wrong, Android will be my fallback option.
*who ever thought that waking from sleep mode should take 15 to 45 minutes, or connecting to a wireless connection should take forever and require ten different cross-preventing logic levels? That every week you should download updates that would require long installing times and reboots? That the additional desktop room should switch from the left to the right side... Apparently, someone at Microsoft, but nobody at Apple. I don't think it's great innovation, it's just making things not suck.
I thought Android was layered on top of Linux (with that big java-like engine concealing the penguin beneath.)
I guess it is in some ways. But I’ve heard you can compile (requires ARM) and run Linux apps directly on an N900, I think it runs an almost-Debian. Certainly console apps?
Though now that Nokia’s enabled Qt compile for anything (symbian or meego) then maybe some Symbian apps could get better again? I don’t know why it has gotten such low scores on the user interface sector.