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KaiOS – A Smartphone Operating System

kaiostech.com

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Re: KaiOS – A Smartphone Operating System

#51

Post by chc4 »

djsumdog wrote: post #7
l1ambda wrote: post #3

I'd like to see https://www.redox-os.org/ ported to mobile phones and perhaps integrated with this or FirefoxOS somehow.

Do they have any mobile work in the Redox tree yet?

No, and they said several times that they had no plans for it (which might have changed, to be fair). Their roadmap was to target servers, which have a use for secure OS and sane driver requirements.

(https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15293436 is the only source I can find, but I'm sure I've seen it elsewhere)

Re: KaiOS – A Smartphone Operating System

#52

Post by killerstorm »

rootw0rm wrote: post #28
rootw0rm wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember. There was excellent Nokia hardware and shit software. The only way to get access to proper APIs that the other 2 platforms had was to become a Microsoft partner. The blame for that debacle rests entirely with Microsoft. They had lots to say, but not an ounce of willpower to back it up.

to be fair, by "shit" I mean boring or uninteresting. The core components were lean and performant, no complaints there. However, it was near impossible to make new/exciting/relevant software for the WP platform if you didn't have their blessing to do so. It was a grave sin imo. An underdog mobile OS needs all the talent it can get; they sabotaged themselves.

Symbian programming platform was a nightmare: C++ with no exceptions, no STL and no RAII. You couldn't use any normal C++ programming idioms, you had to use Symbian-specific memory management primitives. A quote from TheRegister article:

> "Symbian is the only platform that has to spend one day teaching people how to use strings before they can code in it. The approved method is that you create an HBufC (a Heap allocated, BUFfer that is Constant), then Call Des() on it (which returns a TPtr - a pointer to a writable descriptor),"

Re: KaiOS – A Smartphone Operating System

#53

Post by bachmeier »

zokier wrote: post #36
djsumdog wrote: post #11

I'd really like to see a truly open alternative on the mobile space. The biggest issue is the hardware. It's just not standardized and there's no incentive to do so. It's really preventing the way Linux took off on developers desktops back in the late 90s/early 2000s. FirefoxOS and Ubuntu Touch looked promising, but they lacked good hardware to run on. I'd really like to try Plasma, but I don't like any of the device…

> It's really preventing the way Linux took off on developers desktops back in the late 90s/early 2000s. It is somewhat ironical that the Wintel monopoly that standardized so much of PC space ultimately ended up helping Linux desktops, despite the grumblings of UNIX greybeards.

I don't really agree with the claim. What allowed the Linux desktop to take off was extreme security problems in Windows and generally a terrible user experience. Anyone adopting Linux had to put up with constant hardware incompatibility issues. It's just that Windows was so bad that it was worth it. (I made the switch sometime around 2003, and have been Linux-only for more than a decade.)

In contrast, there is no obvious need to move away from Android, and if you don't like it, you can move to the iPhone. The Mac was not a good alternative 15 years ago.

Re: KaiOS – A Smartphone Operating System

#54

Post by Apocryphon »

djsumdog wrote: post #11

I'd really like to see a truly open alternative on the mobile space. The biggest issue is the hardware. It's just not standardized and there's no incentive to do so. It's really preventing the way Linux took off on developers desktops back in the late 90s/early 2000s. FirefoxOS and Ubuntu Touch looked promising, but they lacked good hardware to run on. I'd really like to try Plasma, but I don't like any of the device…

It appears that Sailfish OS might be getting bought by a Russian firm: https://www.telecompaper.com/news/rostelecom-cleared-to-acqu...

Re: KaiOS – A Smartphone Operating System

#56

Post by beeflaw »

protomyth wrote: post #10

From the FAQ Can I develop apps for KaiOS? KaiOS is a curated platform for apps and we are working closely with app developers to provide the best experience for our users. At the moment we are not accepting submissions into the Store, but will do so in the future. If you are interested in developing apps for KaiOS in the future, leave your email in our developers section. We will notify you when of important product…

It's a good way to not get developers on board. Yes, you can easily develop for iOS/Android and as a result the respective stores are drowned in crap. Merely publishing on there will give you zero visibility. On curated platforms, there's the benefit of being a big fish in a small pond.

Re: KaiOS – A Smartphone Operating System

#57

Post by Apocryphon »

pjmlp wrote: post #16
fabrice_d wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's probably why Google is using the Progressive Web App version of Google Maps on Android Go instead of a native app... The issue with web UIs in general is that it's still too hard to get optimal performance (eg. make sure you leverage the GPU as much as possible, don't force reflows, etc.). That could be solved by better tooling but we're not there yet.

Google is a schizophrenic company. Just watch a few Google I/O tracks, and there is always the future of mobile apps is Android on the Android tracks, while the Chrome/Web tracks are pushing for the future of mobile apps is Web, with an occasional jab at native devs, as if on the room next door they weren't talking about native development. Then to make it even better, now we have Flutter as the third track. While PW…

Perhaps their product mismanagement style alone is enough of an indictment for Google to be broken up into smaller companies.

Re: KaiOS – A Smartphone Operating System

#58

Post by beeflaw »

cwyers wrote: post #49

Competing with the Android/iOS duopoly was a war of attrition the Microsoft, Firefox, Canonical and Samsung (Tizen) all lost. If you don't have the resources that those companies do I have a hard time seeing how you survive, and I have no interest in investing in a platform that has an extremely high risk of being orphaned. I wish it was otherwise - earlier today I was lamenting that my Samsung Galaxy S7 is laggier a…

How do you define success? This is not a competitor to iOS/Android, it's for cheap low-end devices, which is still a sizable market. Try running Android on 256MB of RAM...

Re: KaiOS – A Smartphone Operating System

#59

Post by indymike »

beeflaw wrote: post #56
protomyth wrote: post #10

From the FAQ Can I develop apps for KaiOS? KaiOS is a curated platform for apps and we are working closely with app developers to provide the best experience for our users. At the moment we are not accepting submissions into the Store, but will do so in the future. If you are interested in developing apps for KaiOS in the future, leave your email in our developers section. We will notify you when of important product…

It's a good way to not get developers on board. Yes, you can easily develop for iOS/Android and as a result the respective stores are drowned in crap. Merely publishing on there will give you zero visibility. On curated platforms, there's the benefit of being a big fish in a small pond.

This is what Apple did in the beginning, too. I felt as you did about it at the time. Six months later things opened up and the rest is history.

Re: KaiOS – A Smartphone Operating System

#60

Post by beeflaw »

nkkollaw wrote: post #46

I don't know. I really liked Microsoft's phones, but there was no Google Maps, no Google Inbox, and bunch of other apps that I use daily were missing. Software is the problem for these OSes. The only way to be able to compete IMHO is to make it compatible with APKs, installable via a store. Otherwise, it's a nice effort but you'll never reach the adoption necessary to make it worth continuing working on the project.

Remember all those feature phones with a plethora of custom operating systems? Almost none of the users cared (or knew) what the OS was. This is an OS for that kind of device. Nokia is shipping it right now.
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