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Open Source Phone on the Way
prostoalex writes "Dr. Dobb's Journal reports on GPE Palmtop Environment's aim to create a full stack of open source software for mobile phones. Mobile operator Orange and France Telecom are contributing to the project. The goal is to have a fully featured mobile handset with applications like instant messaging and email, with only a portion of the price."
Call me old fashioned, but when I read the title Open Source Phone on the Way, I immediately thought of one of these and thought, "What's to open source? There are plans all over the internet already."
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
I'm curious - would it be possible to tweak something like this to do end-to-end encryption? (To make sure certain government agencies with three letter acronyms aren't listening in). Something like fast symmetric key encryption, using Diffie-Hellman key exchange?
To make laws that man cannot, and will not obey, serves to bring all law into contempt.
--E.C. Stanton
...check the dupe.
Breakfast served all day!
Good, because I'm running out of things to run Linux on around here!
There is no "I disagree" mod for a reason. Flamebait, Troll, and Overrated are not substitutes.
That's just silly. Kids still know what a vinyl record and 8 track tapes are....Second thought strike that.
I'm not really sure an "open source" phone is possible. These things are too miniaturized to be able to build in your garage. There are guys out there who build their own GSM phones, but these things are not something you can carry around in your pocket.
Hopefully, Open software for phones will fall a "build it, and they will come" path. Coming from the US, I hate how every phone is branded to a particular company. You have to jump through hoops to unlock it to use with another provider, if it's even possible at all. The phones are almost always crippled, too - Verizon disables a lot of the Bluetooth functions on their phones unless you pay to unlock them. If you want a new software Feature X on your phone, you pretty much have to throw it out and buy a new one with Feature X on it. Buying a phone is a game where you have to choose between what you want and what you can live without. Choose carefully, because you're going to be stuck with the phone for two years unless you want to pay $500 for it to go month to month. It's total bullcrap.
It'd be really nice if companies would start rolling out phones designed to work on an open platform, like what FIC did with the Neo1973.
-R
Just because they're using open source code and even give you whatever
source they have to give you, doesn't mean the device is "open" as in
you can change any binaries or config settings, add or remove software
etc. All the GPL forces them to do is to publish their source code
modifications / additions where it applies. It doesn't force them to
deliver the binaries on a device that allows modification of that code.
The GPE project is no exception. They are predated by about a couple of years by OpenEZX . It appears to have been around since 2005.
GPE might be bringing more applications to the party. And more P.R.. But they just aren't the first.
Oh, and this article is basically a dup of the previous announcement: http://linux.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/02/05/ 130208.
Granted, this is a reposting from Dr. Dobbs. But it's basically the same info.
Last year, it was Trolltech. And as you note, it isn't fully open. Furthermore, it's closed in arguably the most critical fashion. Namely, the device driver. Unfortunately, Trolltech selected a Broadcom chip. And if you've ever worked with Broadcom, this is a very bad sign. Their software quality sucks big time. So there are probably buffer overflows and other problems in the driver which just won't ever get fixed.
Then there have been the Java phones that have been touting BS about being an "Open Source" phone (one of them actually won an award a year ago as an "Open Source" phone at JavaOne). The only thing Open Source is the application layer, not the OS or the low level hardware. But again, each of them issues a Press Release proclaiming to be the first Open Source phone, and the media gobbles it up.
I've forgotten the other claims. But every 6-12 months, there's yet another group and another announcement.
So, yes, this is a lot of hoopla. And IMHO, it's a discredit to the GPE group to be making this noise. They should be honest if they want credibility.
But IMHO, this is all yesterday's news. The most interesting thing currently going on is the Open Source Software and HARDWARE effort being done by The Homebrew Mobile Phone Club . The effort here is to release everything, including schematics, so that anyone can use COTS parts to build their own cellphone, from scratch.
But regardless of who was first, it is very nice to see all of these efforts going into finally opening up the cell phone market. This is a far cry from where things were 5 years ago.
The best way to predict the future is to create it. - Peter Drucker.
http://www.openmoko.com/press/index.html
http://www.openmoko.com/press/index.html#pictures
which is a truly open platform based on all GPL'd software.
The first hardware using OpenMoko, the Neo1973 Smartphone by Taiwan's FIC, will be available to the public soon.
http://planet.openmoko.org/
Walter.