Motorola Launches A760 Linux and Java Smartphone

securitas writes "Motorola launched its A760 Linux and Java smartphone in China today. The dual-mode GSM/GPRS phone uses a version of MontaVista Linux, Motorola's i250 chip for communications, Intel's 200 MHz PXA262 chip (based on the XScale PXA250) for computing with 256 MB RAM, and software that includes a personal information management application, digital camera, a video player, MP3 music player, and an instant-messaging tool. The A760 is the first of Motorola's Linux-based phones. Eventually Motorola plans to use Linux in most of its phones."

Comments

Nice win for Linux, but what does it really mean?

[G4from128k]

I find the proliferation of Linux-based devices interesting. It would seem to suggest a growing base of devices that will attract application developers and create more reasons for both users and platform manufacturers to adopt Linux.

But I wonder if a common kernel is sufficient from the perspective of the end-user. In particular, I wonder how compatible the various flavors of Linux are when it comes to GUI-based applications that most people want to use. Unless all these various devices can run some common GUI, most of the real applications that people want to use will will be impossible to port between all these devices or hard to use if they get ported but use different interface guidelines.

Perhaps the volume of devices running Linux is less important than the volume of devices running a standardized UI layer and set of interface guidelines on Linux.