Linked by Thom Holwerda on Wed 2nd Jan 2013 19:05 UTC
Expected, but still insanely cool: Canonical has just announced Ubuntu for phones. This is a new mobile phone operating system, with its own user interface and development platform. It's built around Qt5 and QML, and the interface reminds me of MeeGo on the N9. It's supposed to be on the shelves in early 2014, but the developer preview is out today.
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RE[2]: A phone is all most people need
by Radio on Wed 2nd Jan 2013 21:31
in reply to "RE: A phone is all most people need"
Member since:2009-06-20
RE[3]: A phone is all most people need
by Nelson on Wed 2nd Jan 2013 21:41
in reply to "RE[2]: A phone is all most people need"
Member since:2005-11-29
True, I wonder how high of a priority it is for Google. I doubt OEMs want to get beat out by someone like Microsoft (who's moving at a snails pace in terms of aligning their platforms anyway).
I think Apple currently does the best job here, even if primitive, on iCloud. Their commercials also effectively show it off.
RE[2]: A phone is all most people need
by shotsman on Thu 3rd Jan 2013 09:42
in reply to "RE: A phone is all most people need"
Member since:2005-07-22
What happend when you lose your phone or have it stolen?
If it is your laptop repacement then you are in deep doo-doo.
Please don't say 'keep everything of value in the cloud'.
You will probably have setup the phone/laptop replacement to loging you your 'cloud' storage at startup. How secure is that? Yes people will do this despite being told that it is not good prectice. There is nowt as dumb as folk.
Then there is the Data cost while roaming. you will really need deep pockets to fund this sort of thing.
for me this is a total non starter but I suppose that there are some 'fans' out there who will leap on this with gusto.
I also think that Canonical is trying to do too many things at once. IMHO, they don't have the resources to do all of this properly. There are so many quality control issues with each Ubuntu release that I have to wonder why they want to open themselves up to even more flak from users.
News
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 22:33 UTC
Official Apple statement on PRISM and privacy: "Regardless of the circumstances, our Legal team conducts an evaluation of each request and, only if appropriate, we retrieve and deliver the narrowest possible set of information to the authorities. In fact, from time to time when we see inconsistencies or inaccuracies in a request, we will refuse to fulfill it." This is basically Apple re-publishing their earlier statement in a more official manner. You either believe it, or you don't.
Linked by Anonymous on 06/18/13 22:26 UTC
The open source Contiki operating system and its commercial Thingsquare distribution are making strides towards the connected home. According to a Computerworld article, a new LED light bulb manufacturer is putting small computers into their light bulbs. Each computer runs the Contiki OS, which gives each bulb an IP address and allows them to be controlled with a smartphone application. To connect the bulbs to the application, the bulbs use both Wi-Fi and the much lower power IEEE 802.15.4 mesh technology.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 22:25 UTC
"Google asked the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court on Tuesday to ease long-standing gag orders over data requests it makes, arguing that the company has a constitutional right to speak about information it's forced to give the government. The legal filing, which cites the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech, is the latest move by the California-based tech giant to protect its reputation in the aftermath of news reports about sweeping National Security Agency surveillance of Internet traffic." Draining the ditch after the cow has drowned in it.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 17:45 UTC
"I can't find one person who has been using the Nexus 7 for an extended period of time, and hasn't seen a massive downgrade in performance. Just what kind of downgrade are we talking here? I cannot pick up my Nexus 7 without experiencing problems like a lag of ten seconds, or more, just to rotate the display; touches refusing to acknowledged; stuttering notification panel actions; and unresponsive apps." Fully and utterly agreed. My Nexus 7 was blazing-fast and awesome for a few months, and at some point, it just started sucking. Just like that. I've tried loads of ROMs, and nothing helps.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 17:32 UTC, submitted by poundsmack
A new release of the hobby operating system MenuetOS! The release notes are a bit non-descript, but you'll have to take what you can get: "updates and improvements (picview, httpc, ehci, ...)".
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/17/13 17:58 UTC
"The Internet is one of the most transformative technologies of our lifetimes. But for 2 out of every 3 people on earth, a fast, affordable Internet connection is still out of reach. And this is far from being a solved problem. There are many terrestrial challenges to Internet connectivity - jungles, archipelagos, mountains. There are also major cost challenges. Right now, for example, in most of the countries in the southern hemisphere, the cost of an Internet connection is more than a month's income. Solving these problems isn't simply a question of time: it requires looking at the problem of access from new angles. So today we're unveiling our latest moonshot from Google[x]: balloon-powered Internet access." Insane.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/17/13 17:52 UTC
"MineAssemble is a tiny bootable Minecraft clone written partly in x86 assembly. I made it first and foremost because a university assignment required me to implement a game in assembly for a computer systems course. Because I had never implemented anything more complex than a 'Hello World' bootloader before, I decided I wanted to learn about writing my own kernel code at the same time. Note that the goal of this project was not to write highly efficient hand-optimized assembly code, but rather to have fun and write code that balances readability and speed. This is primarily accomplished by proper commenting and consistent code structuring." Just cool.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/14/13 21:03 UTC
Jon Rubinstein, former CEO of Palm: "Well, I'm not sure I would have sold the company to HP. That's for sure. Talk about a waste. Not that I had any choice because when you sell a company you don't get to decide that. Obviously, the board and shareholders decide that. If we had known they were just going to shut it down and never really give it a chance to flourish, what would have been the point of selling the company? I think the deal we had with Verizon really hurt us, but who knew that at the time? These things are all hindsight."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/14/13 20:46 UTC
"And so it is with Dell's Alienware X51 R2, a small form factor gaming PC in console digs. It's shaped similar to Microsoft's Xbox 360 Slim, and though it's slightly larger than either a 360 or PlayStation 3, the X51 R2 would be right at home in a living room setting nestled next to a large screen TV. Indeed, it's adept at running Steam's Big Picture mode, and if your primary objective is to play games in the living room, go ahead and consider the X51 R2 a hybrid game console." This is obviously not the only machine like this - still, these are very valid console alternatives even for those that don't like being hunched over with a cramped WASD-claw. Also, PC gamers among us: could you get away with the $699 model for gaming?
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/14/13 17:32 UTC
From Bloomberg: "Microsoft, the world's largest software company, provides intelligence agencies with information about bugs in its popular software before it publicly releases a fix, according to two people familiar with the process. That information can be used to protect government computers and to access the computers of terrorists or military foes." The lid has officially been blown off.More News »
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2005-11-29
I'm not sure I like the idea of magically turning my phone into a full blown desktop OS. It's great theory, but no one has really done it well yet.
Motorola failed, completely, and embarrassingly with their Atrix. It screams more of a gimmick than anything else. ASUS is the same with their PadFone.
I do think there is promise in connected devices and continuous clients, but only through the lens of cloud computing and synchronization.
Kinda like being able to start a movie on Netflix on my PS3 and continue it on my Surface from their Netflix app.
Or editing something in OneNote on my Lumia and opening the app on Windows 8 and having it pick up exactly where I was. (Note: This isn't currently do-able, but its an example of the type of scenarios I envision).
These type of scenarios are much richer and there is much less friction on the hardware side.
The phone spec war also worries me because it comes at the cost of battery life. These superphones can barely get through a day. Multicore is only worth it if your tooling is up to snuff to eek out every ounce of performance.