Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Chromium OS ported to iPad

engadget.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 30 posts

Re: Chromium OS ported to iPad

#11

Post by borism »

buro9 wrote: post #7
pornel wrote: post #3

Besides hacking coolness, is there any point in swapping iOS for Chromium? You get almost same WebKit browser, but without iOS apps?

* Multi-user * Flash (I browsed the Bowmore whiskey site on my iPad last night... I still hit this occasionally - http://www.bowmore.co.uk/ ) * The chance of getting some native Google apps from the Chrome appstore * Perhaps a chance to break the dependence on iTunes for updates (just give me OTA already and don't require a link to a computer) * Chrome Sync so your tabs, passwords, bookmarks go with you Hell, I'd wan…

Multi-user?

Re: Chromium OS ported to iPad

#12

Post by cryptoz »

code_duck wrote: post #6
pornel wrote: post #3

Besides hacking coolness, is there any point in swapping iOS for Chromium? You get almost same WebKit browser, but without iOS apps?

This is 'Hacker News'. That question shouldn't need to be asked! I think it's pretty cool, but then, I still have QNX 4 on a floppy disk. ChromeOS is a bit more open than Apple's system, isn't it? That's not a rhetorical question, I actually don't know.

Chromium OS is fully open source. Chrome OS is the closed, Google-compiled version that will arrive on physical machines. As far as I know, iOS is fully closed-source.

So yes, Chromium OS is much more open than iOS.

Re: Chromium OS ported to iPad

#14

Post by nuclear_eclipse »

borism wrote: post #11
buro9 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

* Multi-user * Flash (I browsed the Bowmore whiskey site on my iPad last night... I still hit this occasionally - http://www.bowmore.co.uk/ ) * The chance of getting some native Google apps from the Chrome appstore * Perhaps a chance to break the dependence on iTunes for updates (just give me OTA already and don't require a link to a computer) * Chrome Sync so your tabs, passwords, bookmarks go with you Hell, I'd wan…

Multi-user?

Meaning you could share the iPad with other members of the house, and each member could have their own login with their own preferences, their own bookmarks, plugins, history, saved passwords, etc.

Re: Chromium OS ported to iPad

#15

Post by buro9 »

borism wrote: post #11
buro9 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

* Multi-user * Flash (I browsed the Bowmore whiskey site on my iPad last night... I still hit this occasionally - http://www.bowmore.co.uk/ ) * The chance of getting some native Google apps from the Chrome appstore * Perhaps a chance to break the dependence on iTunes for updates (just give me OTA already and don't require a link to a computer) * Chrome Sync so your tabs, passwords, bookmarks go with you Hell, I'd wan…

Multi-user?

Yes.

Screenshot: http://f.cl.ly/items/c7779c1655181c328845/4ac9757b00d99e9143...

From: http://hexxeh.net/?p=328117590

If you look at the Chromium OS http://chromeos.hexxeh.net/ blog http://chromeos.hexxeh.net/wiki/doku.php?id=faq#what_are_the... then in the FAQ you'll note:

"What are the default username/passwords for this build?

Default username is facepunch, default password is facepunch."

It's multi-user.

You can share the iPad with others in your household and instead of being a social device in the shared nature, you can opt to return it to being a user device that many people can have their own account on.

The essence of this is that unlike the Kindle or iPad, you could access whatever you want, download whatever you want, safe in the knowledge that the next user of the device wouldn't see it.

Re: Chromium OS ported to iPad

#16

Post by snippyhollow »

cryptoz wrote: post #12
code_duck wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is 'Hacker News'. That question shouldn't need to be asked! I think it's pretty cool, but then, I still have QNX 4 on a floppy disk. ChromeOS is a bit more open than Apple's system, isn't it? That's not a rhetorical question, I actually don't know.

Chromium OS is fully open source. Chrome OS is the closed, Google-compiled version that will arrive on physical machines. As far as I know, iOS is fully closed-source. So yes, Chromium OS is much more open than iOS.

iOS is based on Darwin/XNU. These are all the upper layers that are closed-source.

Re: Chromium OS ported to iPad

#17

Post by angusgr »

Looking forward to seeing more details on this... I'm guessing an ARM build of Chromium OS' userspace components[1], ported to run on iOS' Darwin kernel?

If that's the case, I'm guessing there could be a Chromium OS "App" for "normal" jailbroken iPads (running in a chroot jail or similar.)

As I see it, the alternative way would be a working port of Linux to Apple's A4 SoC, but AFAIK that doesn't exist. :(

[1] http://code.google.com/p/chromium-os/wiki/ArmWIP

Re: Chromium OS ported to iPad

#18

Post by tmlee »

nuclear_eclipse wrote: post #14
borism wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Multi-user?

Meaning you could share the iPad with other members of the house, and each member could have their own login with their own preferences, their own bookmarks, plugins, history, saved passwords, etc.

i guess Apple will somehow port that feature out into the iPad sometime into the future... Pretty sure Jobs did not see the iPad becoming a family shared pc substitute household device...

Re: Chromium OS ported to iPad

#19

Post by wrath »

If this actually works without any roadblock like catches, I wonder if Apple will start modifying the iPad to make chromeOS (or any other OS for that matter) can't run on it. I don't know if there's anything you can do from a Hardware perspective to stop someone from installing a different OS, but the cat and mouse game will be fun to watch nevertheless.

Re: Chromium OS ported to iPad

#20

Post by bruceboughton »

buro9 wrote: post #7
pornel wrote: post #3

Besides hacking coolness, is there any point in swapping iOS for Chromium? You get almost same WebKit browser, but without iOS apps?

* Multi-user * Flash (I browsed the Bowmore whiskey site on my iPad last night... I still hit this occasionally - http://www.bowmore.co.uk/ ) * The chance of getting some native Google apps from the Chrome appstore * Perhaps a chance to break the dependence on iTunes for updates (just give me OTA already and don't require a link to a computer) * Chrome Sync so your tabs, passwords, bookmarks go with you Hell, I'd wan…

OTA sync? Wireless is still not fast enough for that. And what's the point if you still need to be in your house? 3G networks are definitely not fast enough, which leaves USB sync.
Post reply on HN