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Internet Devices Get Their Own Ubuntu Version
Barence writes "A version of Ubuntu targeted specifically towards mobile internet devices (MIDs) has been released by Canonical, although there is presently only one product on the market which can use it. According to the company, the pithily titled Mobile Internet Device Edition 8.04 has been optimized for use with handheld internet platforms, and designed to run smoothly on Intel's Atom chips as well as with small touchscreen displays. This follows Canonical's announcement earlier this month that it would be creating a version of Ubuntu for netbook devices such as the Asus Eee PC and the Acer Aspire One called Netbook Remix."
No good OS release? What are you talking about? Emacs 22.2 came out in March!
I could certainly be wrong; but I'm strongly inclined to doubt the viability of Symbian on the MID. Symbian is, to be sure, superior to Linux in terms of small footprint and low resource demands. However, Linux is far more general in terms of design and body of available software.
Looking at the history of Palm OS, I am inclined to believe that expanding a specialized OS is harder than slimming a general one. Back in the day, Palm OS was hilariously superior as a handheld system. It ran practically forever on pitiful hardware and a couple of AAA's, and the system of "conduits" was a fairly elegant structure by which a handheld could function as an extension to a desktop computer. Over time, though, Palm OS didn't grow very well. Features like a network stack(sync over network was a nice feature; but just wasn't the same thing as actual network access, which never really meshed with the Palm OS structure) and interaction with mass storage devices with user visible filesystems just didn't fit with the old structure of tying data directly to applications.
Even now, with the benefit of significant advances in silicon and battery technology, it would be hard to get a linux system to match the old Palm OS devices in their areas of strength; but the fact that Linux has by nature features that Palm OS could never really integrate properly has proven to be more important. In the case of Symbian, I would also note that Nokia's own N770, N800, and N810 "Internet Tablets" are Linux, rather than Symbian, devices.
Since the purpose of a MID is to bring a limited number of the functions of a full computer to a handheld device in as close to their full form as possible(e.g. webbrowsing, not general purpose apps; but full webbrowsing, not cut down mobile phone crap), Linux is a pretty natural candidate; being, as it is, modular enough to shrink down while offering pretty much any computer function ready for the taking.
I agree with you and I have seen this kind of input all around: Ubuntu 8.04 it's great on old hardware, specially laptops.. so, getting on topic, An Ubuntu release for PID's/NETBooks should be a killer. Anyone know If this release works on old laptops or it's just intended for NEW specific machines?
Maybe that it's what I like about Ubuntu, it's Linux, it's mostly FOSS but they manage to do it in a commercial and asertive way, I mean, they release specific version that works on a variety of platforms, it's easy on Joe Beigebox and teaches to develop the community way of thinking, so you know somewhere on the intertubes theres an answer or some dude ready to help, also it teaches you that computing it's way more than start button and Ctrl+Z.
Don't bash Ubuntu for being so user friendly or the "bloat" in the GUI.. think that most of the people starting on Ubuntu will move forward to another distros as they advance in their knowledge, someday I will make the step to Slackware I love it, but I just don't feel ready, but hey! I'm loving learning this stuff as many people out there. No one of them are 1337s, maybe some will become.. lend a hand to the little brothers, you just don't know what ta13nts are coming in the way.