The Case for Ubuntu Phone

I don't understand the aversion to rooting, other than the obvious security implications. Few consumers install Ubuntu (or another desktop distro) on their machine and don't allow themselves root access, so it's difficult to imagine having much freedoms on your phone without doing so either. Try a custom ROM (e.g. CyanogenMod or its apparent descendant LineageOS) which adds many more options to AOSP and doesn't force you to use Google Play Services. I'm running this currently with an open source Google Play alternative [1] and it works surprisingly well, with far better battery life and performance.

[1]: https://github.com/microg/android_packages_apps_GmsCore/wiki

Just went through this research again for the first time in five or six years. One of the most frustrating things about US carriers is that they force manufacturers to limit their offerings in this market.

For example, dual SIM card phones are not offered on any phones built for the US market, since carriers make a lot of their money from financing new phones. There are also phones with three and four SIM cards made for other markets. Need two (or three or four) numbers? In the US, you have to buy two (or three or four) phones.

AT&T and T-Mobile use the GSM protocol on their networks, which is the protocol used in the rest of the world. The 2G bands use different frequencies in this hemisphere than the frequencies used in Europe and Asia. The 3G and 4G and LTE bands are different yet, but the basic protocol is the same, so if the radio works, the phone works.

Sprint and Verizon use a different protocol called CDMA which is incompatible with GSM. Phones designed for foreign markets do not work at all on their networks.

So to summarize, barriers built using different protocols and marketing limit the ability for US consumers to treat their handset for what it is (a commodity) and help lock them in to one of two carriers. This is why Apple and Samsung can get away with charging $600+ for devices that cost a very small fraction of that to manufacture using impoverished laborers.

I just bought a 2G Philips dual SIM phone made in China for the Russian market that will work on T-mobile's US 2G network. (It will not work on AT&T since they turned off their 2G network on January 1.) I plan to use two SIM cards for the two numbers I have, and to limit mobile data to a tablet for those times when I absolutely need it. Everything else (paying bills, looking for work, shopping, playing games, getting directions, etc.) will be done on a laptop or desktop.

I would welcome reform of the US cell market, but I'm not holding my breath for that to happen. They simply have too much power, and most Americans are completely unaware that it could be any different or better.

The problem is, Ubuntu is completely unsuitable for a mobile phone or tablet.

I bought one last year and had to return it because it was functionally unusable - https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2016/05/the-ubuntu-tablet-a-review-...

The OS doesn't support modern features like multi-touch, many apps require a physical keyboard, it can't connect reliably to Bluetooth devices, app switching doesn't work - even icons are missing from certain apps!

There's no app store to speak of, just a small collection of apps which haven't received even rudimentary testing. That's before we even get to the lack of "killer" apps like Angry Birds, Dropbox, Spotify.

> Carriers are also interested in this flexibility.

No, they aren't. I've just finished 10 years in European telcos - they don't care about flexibility. They care about profit margin and making sure that people don't ring call centres to complain about broken hardware.

My old employer (O2) sells a bunch of Cyanogen based Android devices - because the cost is right and the services are good enough. Ubuntu isn't even close to competing with that yet.

> Some they may provide themselves and some by well known providers; but by not being able to select options for those base services they have less flexibility on what they can do.

This is factually incorrect. Providers (in the UK at least) are able to bundle services and apps with iPhones, Android, Windows Phone. I've worked with handset manufacturers to add DropBox, replace DropBox with something else, have apps preinstalled, remove bloatware - and everything in-between.

> So that effectively makes it difficult for the carriers as well as alternate service providers (e.g. Dropbox, Spotify, etc) to compete.

Again, that's not really true. Dropbox has a multi-million dollar marketing budget. If your new service can pay an operator €10 per customer - guess what - they'll push you to the front of the user's home screen.

> I think that Ubuntu Phone has the fundamental DNA to win in this race.

I don't. I've installed Ubuntu on my MacBooks, my laptops, my servers, and my TV's media box. It's a brilliant OS. But it doesn't work on touchscreens. It cannot meet the efficiency demands of small battery devices. It has no alternative services which even come close to what's on the market.

I love Ubuntu - but I wouldn't let it near any of my phones.

The most logical thing for Ubuntu Phone to do would be to start out with making some kind of ROM that people could sideload onto their existing Android. The people who first started out using Ubuntu were interested enough and wanted an alternative to Windows badly enough that they didn't mind installing it as a replacement. Why can't Ubuntu Phone start out as a replacement to Android? The only "problem" being that Android has not really messed up too badly yet, other than in making everything go through the Google Play Services and shutting out AOSP and leaving it stuck in 2009.

And yes there is a ROM out there but it's not available on enough devices to create enough of a stir. This is the mistake Canonical is making, and they might regret leaving the job of porting to popular devices up to the 'community' (read: volunteers) instead of paying a team of developers to just get the ROM working to a point where it is a half-decent alternative to even Cyanogenmod. Microsoft made that same mistake before the iPhone and never really recovered.

The paragraph focused on carriers in this article makes me wonder : can ubuntu mobile guarantee OEM won't install any uninstallable apps as well?

I only buy nexus phones precisely because I don't want the carriers and OEM stuff, they always have been a bad experience for me. I can see how "build your own bundle" is a selling point for carriers, but it's hardly one for users.

That being said, I'm excited to see a true linux mobile distro. I've tried it on my nexus 7 when most apps were placeholders, can't wait to see a viable one. Any chance to have dual boot?