Comments on: The Mobile Linux War

By: ARM Says Browser Drives the Mobile Web - GigaOM

ARM Says Browser Drives the Mobile Web - GigaOM — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 14:40:02 +0000

[...] A lot of talk has been devoted to mobile operating systems lately, with Windows Mobile, Symbian, LiMo and Android getting the lion’s share of the attention. But if you consider that the mobile phone will [...]

By: PuneTech » Azingo to raise Rs 200 cr for acquisitions in India

PuneTech » Azingo to raise Rs 200 cr for acquisitions in India — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 09:07:51 +0000

[...] The Mobile Linux War [...]

By: stuart carlaw

stuart carlaw — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 13:06:25 +0000

Thanks for all the feedback on the forecast. I was the author. To be clear we are forecasting a market that now includes high mid tier, smartphones and MIDs. Our forecast is actually more positive in that we are appropriating more share to Linux across a larger market. I hope that explains the confusion.

Stuart

By: Delayed: Android, aka Google Phone - GigaOM

Delayed: Android, aka Google Phone - GigaOM — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 05:53:57 +0000

[...] The Mobile Linux War. [...]

By: JFFS2 - Linux Flash File System

JFFS2 - Linux Flash File System — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 22:08:24 +0000

[...] establishing itself as the predominant OS in the embedded industry. ABI research report suggested that 23% of Smartphones will be based on Linux by 2013. High-profile industry support from Android and the LiMo foundation [...]

By: Estate

Estate — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 21:16:51 +0000

linux will win any war waged against it. http://www.sunsetstriprealty.com/First_Time_Home_Buyers/page_1938194.html

By: The Mobile Linux War | Just About Linux

The Mobile Linux War | Just About Linux — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 00:07:39 +0000

[...] Mobile Linux Warread more | digg [...]

By: Atul

Atul — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 18:34:14 +0000

We should all take analysts’ research reports with several grains (or a bucket) of salt, particularly in growing markets where technology, market and consumer trends are hard to figure. It is hard enough to forecast numbers in a 12-18 month period (e.g. who’d have thought about Google’s Android a year and half ago), let along over a 4-5 year time period. Especially in these technology markets, it is hard to trust any numbers beyond a 3 year period.

The most that one could trust the reports is on their being “directionally correct”, which is a cute euphemism for being 50% correct. Last I checked, any techie with an ounce of grey matter could make a “directionally correct” forecast.

Coming to the more substantial part of post, there is tremendous fragmentation in the mobile OS/platform market. Symbian, Windows Mobile, Palm, Blackberry, LiMO, Android, Apple’s mobile, etc. all vie for attention from the same set of consumers. And while the market is growing, other players also jump in. For a more cynical or pragmatic (take your pic) view of Android, see: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/04/03/android_qualcomm/ However, sooner or later, Operators will start reigning in their development and maintenance costs. Vodafone has already declared its intention to limit their supported OS. More carriers will likely do that. At the same time, new OS versions will likely spring up that offer consumers more variety and freedom (such as the Open Handset alliance supposes to do so).

In a few year’s time, though, there’s bound to be consolidation to a fewer number of mobile OSes. And it will be consumers and developers who decide it when they encounter incompatibilities in their services. Local and fringe offshoots will continue to exist, but they are unlikely to be affect the market in a big way.

That’s my 2c take.

By: Scott Morris

Scott Morris — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 06:47:27 +0000

Let's think about a couple of things for a second. The open source community thrives on a variety of options, selections, and the ability to customize. This is one of the very things that has made it so popular. In many recent Linux migrations, one of the reasons stated for the migration was to avoid vendor lock-in. People like freedom to choose. Diversity creates this. You think people are going to be bothered by two main mobile phone distributions? That pales greatly in comparison to the number of different processor architectures currently supported by the Linux kernel, some of which include: x86, alpha, amd64, arm, hppa, ia64, mips, ppc, ppc64, sparc. Not only that, how many Linux distributions exist? At least 348, likely much more. You think that developers will be phased in the slightest? It is my experience that given the current variety of architectures and distributions, having 2 major mobile Linux platforms will be but a start. If history is an indicator of the future, having two mobile Linux distributions will only last as long as enough people want and are willing to support additional ones.

By: stonemirror

stonemirror — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 23:59:34 +0000

There's some misapprehension, apparently, about ACCESS' involvement here, and the LiMo Foundation's general direction. ACCESS is not simply "developing our own version of Linux", we're a member of the LiMo Foundation and are working closely in that context with the other members to ensure that the ACCESS Linux Platform is, indeed, LiMo-compliant moving forward. That's something our customers want, and something we're going to deliver. So we are, in fact, "Flying with LiMo" (Android is flying squarely against the world of mainstream open source, but that's another story entirely...)

ACCESS is committed to using mainstream open source code as much as possible, and for all the usual reasons: no sense in reinventing wheels, and we get a great deal back by working as a member of the open source community than we would trying to work against it, or without regard to it.

Linux doesn't need reinvention (a la Android). It does require that some gaps be filled in the basic platform to enable full cell phone functionality (e.g. telephony, SMS and MMS messaging, device management according to OMA specifications, etc.) By and large, however, the APIs that you'd use to program an ACCESS Linux Platform phone (or, indeed, any other "LiMo platform" phone) are going to be the same APIs that you're used to on desktop Linux. GTK+, Gstreamer, BlueZ and other open source projects are core components.

LiMo will enable the smartphone market by providing a common set of APIs for third-party developers to use. "Smart phones" are all about the applications you can add, and LiMo is very much committed to the creation and support of a thriving developer ecosystem.

And, most certainly, ACCESS and other LiMo members are fully committed to observing the license obligations of working with open source code. Those are the rules, and we play by them.

ACCESS works with the open source community, not outside it: we're a member, to give just one example, of the GNOME Foundation Advisory Board and are (for the second year in a row) a Silver sponsor of GUADEC, the GNOME Users and Developers Conference.

David "Lefty" Schlesinger Director, Open Source Technologies ACCESS Co., Ltd.

By: The Mobile Linux War | Universe's Tech Blog

The Mobile Linux War | Universe's Tech Blog — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 06:13:56 +0000

[...] estimating that 23 percent of the world ’s smartphones will have a Linux operating system by 2013.read more | digg story This post has been read 1 [...]

By: Nikolai

Nikolai — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 21:45:21 +0000

Linux war? Interesting ideia! My campro rumito la vento, Windows :)

By: Jose Miguel Cansado

Jose Miguel Cansado — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 16:17:54 +0000

I have had Windows Mobile, Mokia Symbian and Blackberry and my next phone will be Linux based. See what Android can do:

http://tech-talk.biz/2008/05/29/my-next-phone/

It is an iPhone but open for developers, and see how many developers are on Android, and it is not launched yet…

http://tech-talk.biz/2008/05/14/if-iphone-is-a-revolution-wait-to-see-android/

By: Vipin

Vipin — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 15:18:41 +0000

"how hard it will be to lower costs, as developers will still have to build for multiple platforms."

Very well said. I don't understand when will these guys realize how hard is it for mobile application developer to port it on different platforms esp when all platform do not provide same capabilities.

By: charlie

charlie — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 15:06:16 +0000

I think the point of Linux phone is that the "smart-phone" market is slowly degenerating into a "featurephone+" market. You only need one or two developer applications outside the core set the phone provides out of the box. Developer mindshare becomes less important, and so multiple versions of Linux can flourish.

UNIX on phones. What a waste. Ten years ago we would have laughed at it, but between Apple and the Linux Phones it may be 30% of the market soon.

By: BloggerBen

BloggerBen — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 15:02:05 +0000

Thanks for the post!

I think that it is detrimental that developers have to build their applications for two systems. From what I’ve seen though, these Linux systems are great and will be taking enough market share to make themselves long time platforms. Hopefully that will mean they create some development standards so the application creation gets easier.

My vote goes for Anroid though. With Google backing them and with the super sweet gyroscopic mechanism they are developing for it, I don’t think it could loose.

Check out this fun video Google released about their Street View implemented with Android:

http://pixible.com/2008/06/does-the-google-android-dream-of-sheep/