John Navas <[email protected]> wrote in
news:[email protected]:

> According to today's Wall Street Journal the Schaumberg,
> Illinois-based company is dumping three of its mobile operating
> systems to focus on Windows Mobile, Android and P2K OS, its
> proprietary Linux-based platform. Motorola also has used Qualcomm's
> BREW, Nokia-owned Symbian and the Symbian-based UIQ.
>
>

As usual, America will be splitting off from the mainstream standardization
of the rest of the planet so it cannot attract cutting edge technologies
from other countries (115VAC, 60 Hz, NTSC TV, 88-108Mhz 200Khz deviation FM
radio, CDMA and other odd phones, odd frequency bands noone else supports
for all kinds of services and other half-assed, poorly engineered,
corporation-proprietary-centered goofy ideas to try to isolate the American
consumer so the FCC-favored corporations can fleece them without proper
competition. This stupidity continues with ATSC digital TV, Ubiquity AM
and FM digital stereo, and other continually goofy isolation schemes so
your goddamned sellphone won't work if you fly to almost any other country
on the planet. My condolences to the Canadians for dragging you people
into our stupidities.

Most of the rest of the planet runs on Symbian, soon to be upgraded across
the planet to Symbian 3. One wonders what our handsets would be doing
today without all this odd proprietary bull**** spinning off in different
directions. Too bad, just like in computers. We got lucky there. The
PUBLIC and BUSINESS decided DOS was the operating system of choice that
lead us into having personal computers everyone's software ran on, instead
of the hodgepodge of operating systems spinning off in incompatible
directions before the first IBM PC was built. That was horrible. Even
BASIC programs wouldn't run as they were all different.

Sometimes it just doesn't make sense.

--
Creationism is to science what storks are to obstetrics.

Larry

On Thu, 20 May 2010 12:21:39 -0400, Moshe <[email protected]>
wrote in <[email protected]>:

>On Thu, 20 May 2010 17:56:07 +0200, Hadron wrote:
>
>
>> The current versions/distro hell that is muddying the waters in Android
>> land will hopefully be cleaned up.
>>
>> There is hardly a single 3rd party app in the Market that does not have at least one
>> "doesn't work on Phone XYZ" or "freezes on phone ABC" comment.
>>
>> I am currently targeting Android development and the API changes and
>> things to consider are quite daunting compared to a single platform
>> development for the customer favorite iPhone.
>
>I'm thinking of buying one of these (Verizon) but the lack of
>compatibility with applications vs versions is scaring me away.
>
>Sounds much like the typical Linux fragmentation and confusion
>with 500+ distributions.
>Too many Indians and no chief.

While there are some problems, my own experience is that such problems
are more an annoyance for developers than for users, that it shouldn't
scare you away.

>P.S For the Verizon guys, which Android is *the one* to get?
>I'm due for my new every two years upgrade.

The HTC Incredible is, well, incredible.

--
Best regards,
John <http:/navasgroup.com>

If the iPhone is really so impressive,
why do iFans keep making excuses for it?

Moshe <[email protected]> writes:

> On Thu, 20 May 2010 17:56:07 +0200, Hadron wrote:
>
>> The current versions/distro hell that is muddying the waters in Android
>> land will hopefully be cleaned up.
>>
>> There is hardly a single 3rd party app in the Market that does not have at least one
>> "doesn't work on Phone XYZ" or "freezes on phone ABC" comment.
>>
>> I am currently targeting Android development and the API changes and
>> things to consider are quite daunting compared to a single platform
>> development for the customer favorite iPhone.
>
> I'm thinking of buying one of these (Verizon) but the lack of
> compatibility with applications vs versions is scaring me away.
>
> Sounds much like the typical Linux fragmentation and confusion
> with 500+ distributions.
> Too many Indians and no chief.
>
> P.S For the Verizon guys, which Android is *the one* to get?
> I'm due for my new every two years upgrade.
> TIA


I would recommend the HTC Incredible. Great HW.

I use a Motorola Milestone myself and following the upgrade to 2.1 (you
need Windows to do it) its great. Battery life sucks of course, but you
can't have it all.

On Thu, 20 May 2010 17:56:07 +0200, Hadron wrote:


> The current versions/distro hell that is muddying the waters in Android
> land will hopefully be cleaned up.
>
> There is hardly a single 3rd party app in the Market that does not have at least one
> "doesn't work on Phone XYZ" or "freezes on phone ABC" comment.
>
> I am currently targeting Android development and the API changes and
> things to consider are quite daunting compared to a single platform
> development for the customer favorite iPhone.

I'm thinking of buying one of these (Verizon) but the lack of
compatibility with applications vs versions is scaring me away.

Sounds much like the typical Linux fragmentation and confusion
with 500+ distributions.
Too many Indians and no chief.

P.S For the Verizon guys, which Android is *the one* to get?
I'm due for my new every two years upgrade.
TIA

On Thu, 20 May 2010 23:53:50 +0000, Larry <[email protected]> wrote in
<[email protected]>:

>John Navas <[email protected]> wrote in
>news:[email protected]:

>Most of the rest of the planet runs on Symbian, soon to be upgraded across
>the planet to Symbian 3. One wonders what our handsets would be doing
>today without all this odd proprietary bull**** spinning off in different
>directions. Too bad, just like in computers. We got lucky there. The
>PUBLIC and BUSINESS decided DOS was the operating system of choice that
>lead us into having personal computers everyone's software ran on, instead
>of the hodgepodge of operating systems spinning off in incompatible
>directions before the first IBM PC was built. That was horrible. Even
>BASIC programs wouldn't run as they were all different.
>
>Sometimes it just doesn't make sense.

Depends of personal taste and perspective.
I'm not a fan of Symbian.
I prefer Palm, iPhone, and Android.

--
Best regards,
John <http:/navasgroup.com>

"At every crossway on the road that leads to the future, each progressive
spirit is opposed by a thousand men appointed to guard the past." -Maeterlinck

On Wed, 19 May 2010 17:23:07 -0600, Todd Allcock
<[email protected]> wrote in
<[email protected]>:

>At 19 May 2010 09:08:53 -0700 John Navas wrote:

>> Such "wandering around" is a big part of what got Motorola into so much
>> trouble. (It's all too easy to forget that Motorola once led the cell
>> phone market the way Nokia does now.) Focus, as demonstrated by Apple
>> under Jobs, tends to be a much more successful business strategy than
>> "wandering around".
>
>I'm not sure it was wandering that got Motorolainto trouble as much as
>the lack of wandering- once the RAZR was a runaway hit, Motorola's
>definition of innovation became limited to painting the RAZR different
>colors!

Knowledgeable folks both inside and outside the company have pointed to
a proliferation of models on >> too many platforms << with too little to
distinguish them; e.g., (October 2008)

<http://www.internetnews.com/mobility/article.php/3781456/Motorola-to-Pare-Down-Staff-Mobile-OS-Support.htm>

Embattled No. 3 mobile phone maker Motorola is expected to announce
layoffs and a restructuring of its mobile platform strategy during
its third-quarter earnings report tomorrow.

According to today's Wall Street Journal the Schaumberg,
Illinois-based company is dumping three of its mobile operating
systems to focus on Windows Mobile, Android and P2K OS, its
proprietary Linux-based platform. Motorola also has used Qualcomm's
BREW, Nokia-owned Symbian and the Symbian-based UIQ.

...

But it's reducing mobile platforms that Dulaney and other observers
say is a key step -- and long overdue.

"They've just had too many platforms and they've been under pressure
to reduce them as they're facing a crisis in software," Dulaney said,
adding that he hopes Motorola will also step up its support of
Android, given its openness and its lack of license fee costs.

<http://seekingalpha.com/article/100734-motorola-s-android-phone-too-little-too-late>

While Motorola can stir up some excitement with an Android phone, the
company is still burdened by building phones on too many different
platforms. Some Moto phones are still running a Moto operating system
called P2K, which was supposed to die in 2004. Some run Windows
Mobile. A lot of underlying software gets tweaked for specific phones
and specific carriers. All this adds to Moto's time to getting a
phone to market. (Nokia, by contrast, builds all its phones on one
software platform.)

Jha is trying to untangle this mess, but it's still a mess.

--
Best regards,
John <http:/navasgroup.com>

"Good judgment comes from experience,
and a lot of that comes from bad judgment." -Will Rogers

On Tue, 18 May 2010 20:09:54 -0600, "Todd Allcock"
<[email protected]> wrote in
<[email protected]>:

>"Larry" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>news:[email protected]...

>> I agree Nokia "wanders around" way too much. All the tablets seem
>> "abandoned" now as I don't expect we'll ever see an N800/N810-friendly
>> MeeBo OS to ever materialize. The hackers are still expanding the
>> tablets' app base, though, at least for a while....plenty of toys to play
>> with.
>
>I think the "wandering around" is a good thing, though- it allows a company
>as large as Nokia to get real feedback from end users, rather just from
>internal testing, or focus groups. Nokia's playing a long game- they are
>certainly large enough to make a few mistakes, and that's fine, as long as
>they learn something from them.

Such "wandering around" is a big part of what got Motorola into so much
trouble. (It's all too easy to forget that Motorola once led the cell
phone market the way Nokia does now.) Focus, as demonstrated by Apple
under Jobs, tends to be a much more successful business strategy than
"wandering around".

--
Best regards,
John <http:/navasgroup.com>

If the iPhone is really so impressive,
why do iFans keep making excuses for it?

Snit <[email protected]> writes:

> Todd Allcock stated in post n%[email protected] on 5/17/10
> 9:48 PM:
>
>> I wanted to like Maemo, but it seems pretty unpolished. When a slick
>> phone like the iPhone is missing a basic feature it looks like a design
>> decision. when Mameo is missing a basic feature it feels like no one got
>> around to it!
>
> This is how I, and many, feel about many OSS programs on Linux... nobody
> ever got around to fixing some basic oddities and clear problems. It is one
> of the things that keeps desktop Linux from really taking off.

Usual response : "problem? patches welcome".

Interestingly the only two people ("advocates") here who post under their real names
(and fair play to them for that) are Windows programmers and still dont
seem to realise that most (not all) of the best FOSS SW is also on
Windows and yet they, themselves, contribute NOTHING to GPL code base.

Hypocrites? Let the reader decide.

Todd Allcock stated in post n%[email protected] on 5/17/10
9:48 PM:

> I wanted to like Maemo, but it seems pretty unpolished. When a slick
> phone like the iPhone is missing a basic feature it looks like a design
> decision. when Mameo is missing a basic feature it feels like no one got
> around to it!

This is how I, and many, feel about many OSS programs on Linux... nobody
ever got around to fixing some basic oddities and clear problems. It is one
of the things that keeps desktop Linux from really taking off.


--
[INSERT .SIG HERE]

Todd Allcock <[email protected]> wrote in news:n%oIn.15266$rE4.8489
@newsfe15.iad:

> I think the N900 was such an
> experiment- a "toe in the water" of a possible future of non-Symbian
> smartphones.
>

As an N800 tablet owner, I think N900 was a mistake and MeeBo or whatever
the hell they're calling that abortion with Intel an even bigger mistake.
There's no use of the duality of Meebo and Symbian. If all the resources
wasted were poured into Symbian, it'd be a huge success from all the new
stuff plus all the brand recognition it has across the non-American planet.

I agree Nokia "wanders around" way too much. All the tablets seem
"abandoned" now as I don't expect we'll ever see an N800/N810-friendly
MeeBo OS to ever materialize. The hackers are still expanding the
tablets' app base, though, at least for a while....plenty of toys to play
with.



--
Creationism is to science what storks are to obstetrics.

Larry

Todd Allcock <[email protected]> wrote in news:n%oIn.15266$rE4.8489
@newsfe15.iad:

> I wanted to like Maemo, but it seems pretty unpolished. When a slick
> phone like the iPhone is missing a basic feature it looks like a design
> decision. when Mameo is missing a basic feature it feels like no one got
> around to it! so, if Nokia is trying to reclaim the N95-style
> excitement, maybe Symbian 3 was the way to go.
>
>
>

Interesting. Which basic features is Maemo 4 Diablo missing?



--
Creationism is to science what storks are to obstetrics.

Larry

On 2010-05-17, Todd Allcock <[email protected]> wrote:
> It seems to me that Nokia is floundering, throwing the proverbial crap at a
> wall and is hoping something sticks. The own the dumbphone market, but
> they've failed to get a foothold in the higher-margin smartphone market.

I don't know, but this seems a little bit at odds with the published
numbers. Nokia has failed to get a foothold in the US smartphone
market, but they don't have a real big share of the US dumbphone
market either. Worldwide, however, their smartphone market share
is about the same as their overall market share, i.e. just shy of
40%. See, e.g.

<http://www.macobserver.com/tmo/article/idc_iphone_global_market_share_jumps_to_16.1_in_q1_2010/>

There are a lot of people in the rest of the world who really like
Symbian, for reasons which mostly elude me.

Margins are a different matter. Nokia gets their 39% market share
by selling dozens of different models (if you count market-specific
variants) while Apple gets their 16% selling basically one phone.
Manufacturing is not so flexible, even today, to keep this from
making a difference.

> The N8 seems like just more typical Nokia: excellent hardware with
> lackluster software.

Something like that. I have a fetish for good radios that support
all available bands so I'm finding the N8 hard to ignore, but the
software is not exactly to my taste.

> If Nokia is determined to play "OS of the Month Club" on their handsets, I
> suggest they give Android a spin- it's the darling of the moment, and
> coupled with Nokia's hardware and sense of style (something HTC and Motorola
> lack!) that marriage could be a force to be reckoned with! Now that Nokia
> has made Symbian open-source, I don't see why they feel compelled to stick
> with it exclusively. HTC, once an exclusive Windows Mobile phone maker, has
> certainly shown that a company can provide handsets with multiple OSes, and
> even offer essentially the same handset in multiple OS variants.

I don't actually see it like that. If the N900 has added to Nokia's
market share at all it is in the digits to the right of the decimal
point (it just might not seem that way in the US since they don't
sell many of the other phones in that market). The 39% market share
is essentially all Symbian. If you want to join an "OS of the Month
Club" buying Motorola or HTC products is probably a much better entry.

> Nokia could build an Android hanset and "skin it" to be more Symbian-like,
> if Nokia feels the need to pander to their Symbian fans.

The trouble is, of course, that worldwide there are apparently
significantly more Symbian fans than there are fans of anyone
else's smartphone operating system. There's no accounting for
taste. Of course tastes do change, and worries about that may
be driving Nokia to figure out what they want to do when they
grow up.

Dennis Ferguson

In article
<d7f0795a-d70f-4b9d-9f9c-2a53541f8c61@j27g2000vbp.googlegroups.com>,
MuahMan <[email protected]> wrote:

> If you at the internals of OS X you can pretty much see it's Xerox
> technology that was stolen.

not even remotely true. os x is essentially nextstep and unix not to
mention that nothing was stolen from xerox anyway.

On May 17, 1:26*pm, Alan Baker <[email protected]> wrote:
> In article <[email protected]>,
> *"Richard B. Gilbert" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > George wrote:
> > > On 5/17/2010 11:39 AM, Todd Allcock wrote:
>
> > >> "Alan Baker" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> > >>news:[email protected]...
> > >>> And after failing with OS/2 (remember OS/2?) Microsoft dumped it for one
> > >>> based on VMS.
>
> > >> OS/2 was an IBM product, rather than MS, wasn't it? IIRC, it was a
> > >> Windows competitor, not a replacement.
>
> > > No, There was an IBM-MS partnership. OS/2 was the operating system and
> > > Windows was the presentation shell. MS walked away from the partnership
> > > for whatever reason and developed their own OS which was based on VMS..
>
> > I believe that you are mistaken about *windows being based on VMS.
> > Microsoft DID hire Dave Cutler who was one of the principal architects
> > of VMS.
>
> If you look at the internals of Windows NT, you'd see that it is pretty
> much Cutler recreating VMS.
>
> --
> "The iPhone doesn't have a speaker phone" -- "I checked very carefully" --
> "I checked Apple's web pages" -- Edwin on the iPhone
> "It is Mac OS X, not BSD.' -- 'From Mac OS to BSD Unix." -- "It's BSD Unix with Apple's APIs and GUI on top of it' -- 'nothing but BSD Unix' (Edwin on Mac OS X)
> '[The IBM PC] could boot multiple OS, such as DOS, C/PM, GEM, etc.' --
> 'I claimed nothing about GEM other than it was available software for the
> IBM PC. (Edwin on GEM)
> 'Solaris is just a marketing rename of Sun OS.' -- 'Sun OS is not included
> on the timeline of Solaris because it's a different OS.' (Edwin on Sun)

If you at the internals of OS X you can pretty much see it's Xerox
technology that was stolen.

In article <[email protected]>,
"Richard B. Gilbert" <[email protected]> wrote:

> George wrote:
> > On 5/17/2010 11:39 AM, Todd Allcock wrote:
> >>
> >> "Alan Baker" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> >> news:[email protected]...
> >>> And after failing with OS/2 (remember OS/2?) Microsoft dumped it for one
> >>> based on VMS.
> >>
> >>
> >> OS/2 was an IBM product, rather than MS, wasn't it? IIRC, it was a
> >> Windows competitor, not a replacement.
> >
> >
> > No, There was an IBM-MS partnership. OS/2 was the operating system and
> > Windows was the presentation shell. MS walked away from the partnership
> > for whatever reason and developed their own OS which was based on VMS.
> >
>
> I believe that you are mistaken about windows being based on VMS.
> Microsoft DID hire Dave Cutler who was one of the principal architects
> of VMS.

If you look at the internals of Windows NT, you'd see that it is pretty
much Cutler recreating VMS.

--
"The iPhone doesn't have a speaker phone" -- "I checked very carefully" --
"I checked Apple's web pages" -- Edwin on the iPhone
"It is Mac OS X, not BSD.' -- 'From Mac OS to BSD Unix." -- "It's BSD Unix with Apple's APIs and GUI on top of it' -- 'nothing but BSD Unix' (Edwin on Mac OS X)
'[The IBM PC] could boot multiple OS, such as DOS, C/PM, GEM, etc.' --
'I claimed nothing about GEM other than it was available software for the
IBM PC. (Edwin on GEM)
'Solaris is just a marketing rename of Sun OS.' -- 'Sun OS is not included
on the timeline of Solaris because it's a different OS.' (Edwin on Sun)