11–20 of 48 posts
Have you seen the low-end laptop market? 1366x768 and terrible build quality everywhere.
Everyone else might love their tablets and phones, but you can pry my desktop from my cold, dead hands.
I just wish all devices were more like PC's. My desktop computer is a glorious, glorious device. I have millions of different bits of software for it, many operating systems, open source, proprietary, etcetera. It's all there. It really feels like my machine. If I don't want Windows, I blow it away and install Linux, BSD, Plan 9, code my own bootloader, whatever. My laptop is a bit less so (can't find the perfect for…
I'm not sure what's going on with the project. Two months later you still have to email the developer to get a beta build, even though it was supposedly open sourced.
Approaching it from the other direction, https://plus.google.com/111524780435806926688/posts/fkQ1BMjN... shows a nearly mainline kernel running on the 2013 Nexus 7, including hardware accelerated graphics. It should be a hop skip and 14 hour build step [1] to get Debian running on it.
[1] repo sync -j24 / make -j24 droidcore can be painful
Speculating from a single anecdote, I have a nontechnical friend that switched to using a smartphone instead of a PC. Part of it is that the smartphone can do everything they need from a computer. Browsing the internet, messaging and email, etc. But that answer alone isn't very satisfying, because even when doing nontechnical stuff on a smartphone, like browsing reddit or watching youtube, I find it very inconvenient…
However, I find browsing reddit on my phone a more pleasant experience than on a desktop computer. Swipe gesture to collapse comment threads and the improved UI that some of the reddit apps have make it easier to consume comment threads than when I'm on a PC.
I just wish all devices were more like PC's. My desktop computer is a glorious, glorious device. I have millions of different bits of software for it, many operating systems, open source, proprietary, etcetera. It's all there. It really feels like my machine. If I don't want Windows, I blow it away and install Linux, BSD, Plan 9, code my own bootloader, whatever. My laptop is a bit less so (can't find the perfect for…
Have a look at http://maruos.com/ , the dev has an interesting idea - AOSP when the phone's working by itself, plug in a Slimport connector and pair a Bluetooth keyboard and there's Debian running, ready for you to use. I'm not sure what's going on with the project. Two months later you still have to email the developer to get a beta build, even though it was supposedly open sourced. Approaching it from the other dir…
Killing off Android and getting X11/Wayland on there with a regular DE would be amazing.
I can deal with WiFi only - a workaround would be to just carry around an android device or similar as a hotspot.
I just wish all devices were more like PC's. My desktop computer is a glorious, glorious device. I have millions of different bits of software for it, many operating systems, open source, proprietary, etcetera. It's all there. It really feels like my machine. If I don't want Windows, I blow it away and install Linux, BSD, Plan 9, code my own bootloader, whatever. My laptop is a bit less so (can't find the perfect for…
I just wish all devices were more like PC's. My desktop computer is a glorious, glorious device. I have millions of different bits of software for it, many operating systems, open source, proprietary, etcetera. It's all there. It really feels like my machine. If I don't want Windows, I blow it away and install Linux, BSD, Plan 9, code my own bootloader, whatever. My laptop is a bit less so (can't find the perfect for…
You say that like it's a bad thing. For the vast majority of people, they wish their computers behaved more like toasters, rather than finicky, customizable, yet extremely powerful pieces of computing machinery that they are.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Have a look at http://maruos.com/ , the dev has an interesting idea - AOSP when the phone's working by itself, plug in a Slimport connector and pair a Bluetooth keyboard and there's Debian running, ready for you to use. I'm not sure what's going on with the project. Two months later you still have to email the developer to get a beta build, even though it was supposedly open sourced. Approaching it from the other dir…
Very interested in the Nexus 7 progress. I may have to pick one up and grab a hardware keyboard. Killing off Android and getting X11/Wayland on there with a regular DE would be amazing. I can deal with WiFi only - a workaround would be to just carry around an android device or similar as a hotspot.
I've got one here but some emails sent to me in private have caused me to hold off on running anything custom on it (email for details, not sure if I can release publically).
The article seems to be saying that PC makers are looking for some way to woo back tablet/mobile users to using PCs instead. But tablet sales are flat too, aren't they? Rather what they're looking for is to sell some reason for people to upgrade their 5 year old PC that still works fine. And all they can think of is "thinner" and crazy gimmicks.
At least for Apple, since 2012 that seems to be roughly the case. iPad sales are about on par with Mac sales, maybe a bit higher, but both iPad and Mac sales are dwarfed by iPhone sales [1].
[1] http://www.statista.com/statistics/382260/segments-share-rev...
And I want an even bigger screen! I'd like one the size of my desk, with retina pixel density.
I just wish all devices were more like PC's. My desktop computer is a glorious, glorious device. I have millions of different bits of software for it, many operating systems, open source, proprietary, etcetera. It's all there. It really feels like my machine. If I don't want Windows, I blow it away and install Linux, BSD, Plan 9, code my own bootloader, whatever. My laptop is a bit less so (can't find the perfect for…
>Phones and tablets? Complete write off. My smartphone is basically a toaster. You say that like it's a bad thing. For the vast majority of people, they wish their computers behaved more like toasters, rather than finicky, customizable, yet extremely powerful pieces of computing machinery that they are.
I don't want the world to change so that these devices don't exist. I'm just sad that there aren't options. It feels like a huge waste of potential. Creation benefits us all.
In a world without something like the IBM-compatible PC we'd likely never have gotten to the point of creating smartphones because the tools simply wouldn't exist.