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

Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

fxtec.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

341–350 of 358 posts

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#341

Post by LilBytes »

usr1106 wrote: post #319
jk7tarYZAQNpTQa wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Top comment as of right now says [1] they ordered one but was never delivered, and the seller never answered to emails. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26662123

Well, the top comment says they waited for 6 months until they requested a chargeback. The grand parent says they got theirs after 7 months. Not a contradiction. The have been numerous such alternative phone and tablet projects during the last 12 years or so. Crowding funding or with a bit more of a commercial touch. All have failed to to deliver on time I would claim. Many if not most have failed to deliver at all.…

I've got a 100% fail rate with crowd sourced hardware. You won't see me throw money at hardware through indiegogo or kickstarter again.

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#342

Post by dingaling »

aerique wrote: post #217
seanhunter wrote: post #110

There's no free lunch, and it's easy to overlook the compromises involved in the devices that used to have physical keyboards. By modern standards, blackberrys had a woefully small screen and phones with slideout keyboards were very fat. This device doesn't look fat which suggests to me that the compromise might be either battery life or low processor power. That said, although this is definitely not for me, it's gen…

I've used its predecessor the Pro1 with Sailfish OS for 4 weeks. (While having fond memories of using my Nokia Communicator in the past for SSHing into servers to fix things.) For me, the compromises were not worth it. The phone is too clunky and heavy and virtual keyboards are good enough these days.

> and virtual keyboards are good enough these days

Good ebought for what, a quick comment on HN?

I made four onscreen errors just typing that first sentence because my fingers weren't perfectly centred on the pretend keys. And look, Gboard has no idea how to correct ebought.

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#343

Post by hyko »

ruph123 wrote: post #294
hyko wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Guess there’s always the Gemini - bonus is that it effectively has a Psion 5 keyboard https://store.planetcom.co.uk/products/gemini-pda-1

Or even their next product which looks very promising: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/astro-slide-5g-transforme...

Looks nice, seriously tempted!

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#344

Post by mariusor »

jeroenhd wrote: post #42
ekianjo wrote: post #12

Ubuntu touch is the worst of all choices for a linux phone right now. It is based on obsolete ubuntu sources and the browser is really limited

From what I've seen, Ubuntu Touch is the best mobile "Linux" distributions. Other, purely Linux operating systems lack common apps, have janky UIs and are barely functional on most hardware. Ubuntu Touch runs on whatever the manufacturer or Qualcom have put down as a basis, instead of relying on a standard, open Linux kernel with open drivers. This has all the downsides of the Android kernel, but at least it's functi…

> Other, purely Linux operating systems lack common apps, have janky UIs and are barely functional on most hardware.

You should probably take a look at Sailfish OS, they had about 5 years of head start to other mobile interfaces on top of vanilla linux. Jolla is one of the few companies that tried to innovate in the mobile UX space over this time in my opinion.

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#345

Post by _nalply »

nfriedly wrote: post #181
_nalply wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hopefully not as a slideout. My wife is handicapped and don't manage fiddly slideouts. She is happy with Blackberry Key2 style keyboards.

There's renderings on [1] and [2] and prototype photos on [3] and [4] that makes it look like more of a clamshell / laptop shape with the phone screen and keyboard folded against each other when it's closed. Kind of like a tablet with a keyboard case. Apparently the keyboard will also have a 22Wh/6000mAh batter in it. [1]: https://www.pine64.org/2020/12/15/december-update-the-longes... [2]: https://www.pine64.org/202…

Thanks. What's needed: no fiddly mechanics like folding or sliding out. The keyboard of the Blackberry Key2 is perfect.

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#346

Post by Fnoord »

Mediterraneo10 wrote: post #308
Fnoord wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See [1], source: FTA. This is the spiritual successor of the Nokia N900, and it isn't a very good keyboard (but a better layout than N900). Its pretty much a rebrand of the same device with the same name from 2019 without the 'X'. Difference is it has better OS support (thanks to XDA, I guess), different SOC (recent SD600 series instead of SD835), and a different colour (blue instead of grey). If you want a very good…

It can't really be called the spiritual successor of the Nokia N900 if it runs Android. What made the N900 special wasn't just the hardware, it was also that it was running a traditional Linux environment, which means you could use that physical keyboard for all the hacking you can do on your desktop computer.

Termux. Also, all of these devices (F(x)tec Pro1 X, Planet Gemini/Cosmo/Astro, ...) run a myriad of OSes, so if you don't want to run Android you got alternatives (including AOSP-based). As does Nokia N900, just not out of the box back in the days.

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#347

Post by JeremyNT »

minimalist wrote: post #300
k_ wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems like we're looking for similar things. I am currently waiting for delivery of my Astro Slide [0] [0]: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/astro-slide-5g-transforme... which has android / linux dual boot. Not sure if performance are what you are looking for.

I had a Cosmo Communicator and sold it in short order when I realized that: - Pinephone has better Linux support and always will. Planet Computers' phones all have mediatek chips, which will be stuck on ancient kernels with dogshit driver support for things like the camera. - It will be impossible to find parts, so I would have to gingerly baby the thing and worry about the hassle productivity loss if my phone broke.…

I love the pinephone (I own one) but the specs are pretty weak. Is the situation with support forthe SOCs used in the Planet devices as dire as you suggest? I was considering them but being stuck on an archaic kennel is a deal breaker.

I'm more than ready to pay for a premium device with the same level of hardware support the Pinephone has but I guess I'll need to keep waiting.

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#348

Post by ekianjo »

FlyingSnake wrote: post #72
ekianjo wrote: post #12

Ubuntu touch is the worst of all choices for a linux phone right now. It is based on obsolete ubuntu sources and the browser is really limited

Ubuntu Touch is alive and kicking as its new avatar at ubports.org. It has some rough edges, but I think it has lots of potential.

Still does not invalidate my point that the browser is downright horrible.

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#349

Post by ekianjo »

realusername wrote: post #50
ekianjo wrote: post #12

Ubuntu touch is the worst of all choices for a linux phone right now. It is based on obsolete ubuntu sources and the browser is really limited

It's not that bad, it was way ahead of it's time with the way the full screen navigation was handled. It's obviously a bit dated now but more due to a lack of users and interest than anything else, I'm sure it could be brought back to a more modern stack if the community was there.

Not so sure. Even native apps did not look great so not sure what devs can actually deliver with it even if they try.

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#350

Post by Normille »

LilBytes wrote: post #340
SamBam wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ayer having tried Swiftkey for a few hours, I've reverted back to gboard. I don't know if my old keyboard knows me more or I know it, but Swiftkey just could not get words right, even when I could clearly see the trail hitting the letters. Maybe its prediction was turned up too high, and yet not correctly? When I finally gave up I had been trying to write The Warmth of Other Suns, and it could not get "Suns," no matt…

Yeah, I'm not using swype. Just SwiftKey but I find it gets it wrong most of the time. It occasionally picks up typos and I'm actually writing this comment without manually correcting any errors. To try and gauge how well it does. And I don't type well. It seems. To be decent enough. Almost anyway. Tkl that last sentence.ortoq. (till that last sentence of two...)

I've been getting increasingly annoyed with SwiftKey lately. It's so fucking dumb, is unbelievable. I'll be typing a sentence with a really common phrase in it and it will substitute some absolutely ridiculous word I've never used in my life for the everyday one I wanted to type.

Inspired by this thread, I just went looking for an alternative and found Yandex.Keyboard. I've been using their browser on Android for a long time but had no idea they did a keyboard too. First impressions are pretty good. In typing this comment, I've had to correct 2 words so far. With SwiftKey, I'd have had that many corrections to do in each sentence!

YMMV --as I said, I've only been using it for under an hour

Post reply on HN