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Nvidia Lauds Windows CE Over Android For Smartbooks

Posted by timothy on from the this-is-2009-ce-after-all dept.

ericatcw writes "Google's Android may enjoy the hype, but an increasing number of key industry players say the mobile OS isn't ready for ARM netbooks, aka smartbooks. Nvidia is the most recent to declare Android unfit for duty, stating its preference for Microsoft's Windows CE, which an Nvidia exec praised for having a "low footprint" and being "rock solid." Nvidia is busy optimizing its multimedia-savvy Tegra system-on-chip for Windows CE. Such improvements won't arrive for at least a year to Android, which has an inflexible UI and poor graphics support for devices larger than a smartphone, says Nvidia. Other firms echoing similar criticism include ARM and Asustek."

263 comments

  1. Microsoft is better than Google by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    jews, niggers, etc...

  2. So... by MBCook · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So you're saying software designed for mobile phones doesn't work as well on a little computer like device as software which was designed for little computer like devices?

    Wow. Amazing. Incredible.

    And they're the same age too!

    No, wait, Windows CE is 13 years old. It's had a little more time to design the window manager for different screen sizes.

    --
    Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
    1. Re:So... by nicolas.kassis · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Let's not forget that it still sucks and I hoped they would see that and go "Geez, maybe we can help this new guy out so that maybe they will get us out of this lame ass no one wants these things because windows CE sucks issue"

    2. Re:So... by Xocet_00 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      "No, wait, Windows CE is 13 years old. It's had a little more time to design the window manager for different screen sizes."

      While I agree with everything you've said here, and that the age of Windows CE makes the comparative shortcomings in Android somewhat excusable, it doesn't change the fact that Windows CE seems to do what NVidia wants and Android doesn't.

      Android being new is a perfectly valid excuse, but in a here-and-now business sense Nvidia just has to go with what works... I guess.

      Writing this is hurting me. I really, really hate Windows CE (or Windows Mobile or whatever they call it these days.)

    3. Re:So... by oldspewey · · Score: 4, Funny

      I really, really hate Windows CE (or Windows Mobile or whatever they call it these days.)

      I'm still fond of calling it "wince"

      --
      If libertarians are so opposed to effective government, why don't they all move to Somalia?
    4. Re:So... by ColdWetDog · · Score: 1

      Wince, hell. It's CRINGE.

      --
      Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
    5. Re:So... by ShadowRangerRIT · · Score: 1

      When I was working at MS, it took me awhile to figure out some of the code. I kept seeing:
      #ifdef OS_WINCE
      and wondered "Why would the OS wince?" It took a few weeks before I realized that those parts of the code were there to replace system functions that didn't exist on Win CE (to be fair, I never actually worked with that code, so my ignorance was irrelevant).

      --
      $_ = "wftedskaebjgdpjgidbsmnjgcdwatb"; tr/a-z/oh, turtleneck Phrase Jar!/; print
    6. Re:So... by sexconker · · Score: 1

      They're in fact two different things.

      Windows CE is used in a lot of places.
      Windows CE is in fact rock solid, as Nvidia says.

      Android is not targeted for the same applications (as in uses, not as in programs) that Windows CE is.

      Regardless, this is all marketing. MS agrees to use Nvidia's platform in shit like the Zune HD.
      Nvidia agrees to praise Windows CE and say they're optimizing for it. Nvidia doesn't give a rat's ass what they actually use, as long as it's competent (as Windows CE and Android both are).

    7. Re:So... by the_womble · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Well the ARM quote, if you RTFA, is:

      I do think that there is more work that can and will be done to bring the things we love about Android into form factors [such as netbooks]

      She also mentions Moblin as a possible alternative.

      I cannot actually see what is so good about Android. Why not Maemo, or the mobile optimised versions of distros such as Ubuntu. It is going to take Android a long time to catch up with the range of software available for real Linux.

    8. Re:So... by Chris+Burke · · Score: 2

      I'm still just confused by the terminology. In the explosion of marketing names for things in between a phone and a laptop, I guess I missed the "smartbook". I assume that's like a netbook, only retarded? Because if there's one thing I know about computer terminology, it's that the word "Smart" always means anything but.

      --

      The enemies of Democracy are
    9. Re:So... by qoncept · · Score: 1

      What the hell are you trying to say here? At first it looks like your argument is that both OS's are designed for netbooks/PDAs/whatever, and that because of that, its impossible for one to be better. Just as an F-22 couldn't possibly be better at shooting down other planes than an F-16, because they were both designed to do it.

      Then it looks like you concede that "Yeah, Windows CE probably is better." But instead of just leaving it alone, you make an excuse for Android. As if the guy said "Windows CE is better and it's due to a fault of Google's." Who fucking cares WHY one choice is better than the other? Are you going to choose inferior software because they had a sloppy drunk dev team, so, considering the handicap, they did alright?

      --
      Whale
    10. Re:So... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Windows CE and Windows Mobile are 2 different things my friend...

      god I hate Slashdot..why do I find it irresistable to read the comments?!?!

    11. Re:So... by Chyeld · · Score: 1

      It's 'hot off the presses' new, and appearently just a way of selling a particular brand of 'netbooks'.

      A bit like how nVidia 'invented' the GPU back when the GeForce first came out by coining a new name for graphics acceleration cards.

    12. Re:So... by katpurz · · Score: 0

      Windows CE and Windows Mobile share some elements, but are 2 different beasts. Windows CE is a real-time capable emedded OS...made for low footprint devices (factory machinery, in-car GPS devices, etc). Windows Mobile is built upon some of the embedded pieces of CE, and then has it's own bits...made for smart phones and pdas and handhelds and such.

    13. Re:So... by The+Wooden+Badger · · Score: 1

      Holy carp! That's like 91 dog years!

      --
      Heroscape, it's like legos combined with anachronistic wargames.
    14. Re:So... by Lord+Ender · · Score: 1

      Wince 6 on my HTC phone seems to be very not-ready for consumer use. This device routinely freezes or lags by several seconds from when a button is pressed. It supports everything, including full Bluetooth support, but I can't stand waiting and waiting for my keypresses to be registered by device.

      Android may lack features, but if it responds promptly to user input, it is more mature a product than Wince 6.

      --
      A slashdotter who didn't build his own computer is like a Jedi who didn't build his own lightsaber.
    15. Re:So... by Klistvud · · Score: 1

      Corporations have a deep aversion toward anything that is "free" -- be it free as in beer or as in libre! This is an important factor to consider.

      No matter what level of maturity a product may reach, if it's a "freebie", the corporate world will simply frown upon it. It's just too much of a contradiction to their business model: it's almost like expecting the oil producers to give an honest judgment on, say, solar energy cars. And it's not about "malice" either -- they are not "evil", they simply have a blind spot for everything "free".

      The sad thing however, is that the hardware vendors, incapable of making unbiased, merit-based evaluations of various operating systems, are the ones who decide which OS gets approved in the end...

      --
      Intellectual Property: an immaterial non-entity, most fiercely contended by those with no proper intellect to speak of.
    16. Re:So... by GooberToo · · Score: 2, Insightful

      And ultimately people forget that Android is really Linux + a framework. Once you understand Android = Linux + framework, its easy to see your point is 100% accurate. There is no technical merit here. It's all about cross promotion and marketing. In short, the article is nothing but a marketing fluff piece meant to convince the simple minded that Android doesn't have technical merit.

      Make no mistake about it, Microsoft is very scared of Android. Android is Google and Microsoft has been very mindful who is pushing it. In several cases some hardware manufacturers have publicly stated they are very excited about their Android offering. Shortly afterwards Microsoft announces a hardware/software deal with manufacturer. A month or two later said hardware manufacturer suddenly announces they have brokered a new deal to create MS-based phones and their Android offering may never see the market. Hardly surprising - yet more anti-competitive behavior from MS.

      No bones about it, Microsoft is up to their old tricks of paying for editorials, paying for reviews, back door meetings to prevent footholds of their competitors, and working hard to price its competitors out of the market. In short, since the beginning of the year, just about any and all articles which proclaim MS' OS in the phone, smart phone, netbook, smartbook markets are far more likely than not, marketing fluff pieces - paid for either directly or indirectly by MS or a MS cross promotion, back room deal.

      The fact that Apple, MS and Blackberry are all running scared of Android is very telling.

    17. Re:So... by PopeRatzo · · Score: 1

      No, wait, Windows CE is 13 years old. It's had a little more time to design the window manager for different screen sizes.

      And Linux is 18 years old. What's your point?

      So now the longevity of an operating system is an unfair advantage? We should give extra credit to operating systems for being new, even when they're (currently) inferior in many ways? It's not like the Android folks haven't been pushing their OS for devices up to and including netbooks.

      If you're a hardware manufacturer, your customers are going to judge your products based upon how well it works for them. They're not going to handicap operating systems like golf scores based on age.

      Yes, Microsoft plays hardball with hardware manufacturers. But whatever effect Microsoft's pressure is going to have on those manufacturers is not going to be enough if their customers are insisting on a different OS if it was clearly better. Windows CE devices have been doing pretty well in the marketplace. Short of Apple licensing their OS, it's going to take some clear improvements to get them to switch to a new OS and away from WinCE.

      You and I are going to try out Android, no doubt. We see important ways that WinCE is insufficient, and we're willing to support something new under the right circumstances. Most consumers aren't like that, however, especially when it comes to something that's as important to them as their phone/netbook/PDA. Android may well be the prominent OS for those devices in a little while, but for now you can't fault NVIDIA for saying "not yet".

      --
      You are welcome on my lawn.
    18. Re:So... by hey! · · Score: 2, Informative

      I'm not sure that Windows CE does suck.

      It's important to remember that Windows CE is like J2ME, except that it is a family of operating systems instead of a family of platforms. It has various manifestations and configurations, the familiar PDA or smartphone versions are just instances of this. I have issues with Windows Mobile, which lacks certain features it ought to have given its ambition. I have more issues with the SmartPhone Edition, because MS and the manufacturers kiss carrier ass and so make the devices a PITA to use.

      However, nothing I've seen indicates to me that the underlying platform, the actual Windows CE part of the products, sucks. I heard from people programming with the native SDK complain that certain aspects of the API are braindead (I dont' remember which; it might be memory management). That's probably a genuine piece of suckiness, but not one that matters any longer since you don't have to program applications in C++ against the SDK any longer.

      For a NetBook type device, my concern would be the configuration limitations MS would put on it to keep from cannibalizing its own Windows product line. But of course that's the kiss of death. You have to cannibalize your own product line sooner or later.

      --
      Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
    19. Re:So... by sexconker · · Score: 1

      As much as I hate Apple, I don't think Apple is afraid of Android. It's basically everyone vs the iPhone at this point.

      People will pay in blood and organs for Apple products, if that's the price Steve sets (and with his health issues it might not be too far off).

    20. Re:So... by ShieldW0lf · · Score: 1

      Yadda yadda... nVidia likes Windows for the same reason they like binary drivers. Their motivation has never been difficult to ascertain.

      --
      -1 Uncomfortable Truth
    21. Re:So... by dunkelfalke · · Score: 1

      Or maybe your device just sucks. HTC had some lag in their development (between Universal and Diamond) when they released crappy underpowered devices with premature Windows Mobile versions. That is the reason, why HTC Himalaya - their second Windows Mobile device - is capable of running Windows Mobile 6.5 and is faster at that than many of their more modern devices, although the Himalaya came out in early 2005.

      Yes, Windows Mobile reacts somewhat slow, but that is the price for real multitasking. It is also possible, that you've got some CPU-time consuming apps or services working in the background.

      --
      "It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
    22. Re:So... by GooberToo · · Score: 1

      You're probably right in the case of Apple, "running scared" is a bit strong. Nonetheless, new features in 3.0 are a direct result of Android's features and capabilities. If Android were not a concern they certainly would not be taking feature pointers from Android.

      So running scared? Probably not. A cautious, watchful, critical eye? Absolutely! Regardless the point remains, the entire industry is watching Android. And in the case of MS, they absolutely have declared war on Android and they are running scared.

    23. Re:So... by jrumney · · Score: 1

      You can just as easily turn this around by comparing Linux on ARM based netbooks with Windows Mobile with its inflexible UI and limited display resolution.

    24. Re:So... by jrumney · · Score: 1

      Writing this is hurting me. I really, really hate Windows CE (or Windows Mobile or whatever they call it these days.)

      It is Windows CE they are talking about here, the default shell is Windows Explorer from the days before IE integration. Windows Mobile is Microsoft's equivalent of Android - a limited inflexible UI designed for smartphones that sits on top of a flexible OS (Linux in the case of Android). The statement from Nvidia is pure FUD, comparing apples and oranges, I wonder how much they were paid to say it.

    25. Re:So... by skaet · · Score: 1

      No bones about it, Microsoft is up to their old tricks of paying for editorials, paying for reviews, back door meetings to prevent footholds of their competitors, and working hard to price its competitors out of the market. In short, since the beginning of the year, just about any and all articles which proclaim MS' OS in the phone, smart phone, netbook, smartbook markets are far more likely than not, marketing fluff pieces - paid for either directly or indirectly by MS or a MS cross promotion, back room deal.

      Slashdot needs a "-1 Citation Needed" option.

      --
      There is no knowledge that is not power.
    26. Re:So... by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Maemo has closed source components.

      Moblin is intel-specific (and doesn't even necessarily run right on anything but a netbook; I put it on an all-intel-based dell laptop and the results were mediocre.)

      Windows CE is total shit, yes, even on ARM. I have an iPaq H2215 (ARM4i) and an HTC Fuze (ARM7) and both run Windows CE of various versions. I also have a WebDT DT366 running it, but I'm working on getting Angstrom linux working on that. I only got the Fuze because Android works on the touch pro already (same hardware, more or less.)

      If Windows CE is the answer, it must have been a seriously stupid question... Like "what's the crashiest embedded operating system you can think of?" I love how much my phone crashes :/

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    27. Re:So... by drinkypoo · · Score: 2, Informative

      I'm not sure that Windows CE does suck.

      No, really. It sucks.

      nothing I've seen indicates to me that the underlying platform, the actual Windows CE part of the products, sucks.

      Nothing I've seen indicates to me that there are any redeeming features of Windows CE.

      For a NetBook type device, my concern would be the configuration limitations MS would put on it to keep from cannibalizing its own Windows product line. But of course that's the kiss of death. You have to cannibalize your own product line sooner or later.

      They don't have to do that, because Windows CE is not ANY kind of competition for Windows NT. It's simply not capable of doing what NT does, which is to say, stay running while running multiple applications.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    28. Re:So... by chdig · · Score: 2, Informative

      Slashdot needs a "-1 Citation Needed" option.

      How about a /. article on the MS paying bloggers off:
      http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/06/28/0428236

      "I'm thinking of hitting the OEMs harder than in the past with anti-Linux. ... they should do a delicate dance," Kempin wrote to Ballmer http://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/03/19/microsoft_killed_dell_linux_states/

      Mostly, though, you'll find that most reports of Microsoft paying off journalists/bloggers/whoever are on sites like this one: http://boycottnovell.com/2009/04/25/microsoft-censorship-on-the-surface/

      ...

      "Backroom" deals are named that way for a reason -- they're very hard to prove, and thus unlikely to be reported in reputable publications that require absolute proof. Regardless, Microsoft is known for throwing its monopolistic weight around to its advantage, and being suspicious of such articles is likely not a bad thing.

    29. Re:So... by fwarren · · Score: 1

      Not suck? Seriously...

      What does not suck about it. It was designed for something with a screen resolution of 640x300. Rewritten from the ground up with an API that was to resemble the Win32 API. With stupid limits like no current directory.

      Microsoft then decides that it wants to each Palm's lunch. So now we change it to run on 320x240 devices and drop the whole mouse API. We also borrow some API stuff from the Win32/98 side of the family. Some API stuff from the WinNT side of the family.

      Then Microsoft decides it wants to be a smart phone vendor. So they add the mouse API back in. But create a NEW one. Why not use the one that would make things MORE compatible with the Win32 code base?

      Now Microsoft finds that it MUST do everything it can to try and be an iPhone wannabe. So now it sucks at the mini-handheld HPC stuff. it sucks at being a Palm Replacement, it sucks at being a mobile phone (ask anyone who has had to reboot their phone to be able to take a call. WTF), it sucks at being an iPhone and now they want it to suck at being 1024x600 netbook.

      Beware, the stink of death is on this thing. There is a reason it is called WinCE.

      --
      vi + /etc over regedit any day of the week.
    30. Re:So... by bhtooefr · · Score: 1

      Nitpick: That's StrongARM (ARMv4i) and ARM11 (ARMv6.)

      Anyway, yeah, the best bet probably is Ubuntu for these things, not WinCE.

    31. Re:So... by bhtooefr · · Score: 1

      Keep in mind that Windows Mobile and Windows CE are two different products.

      To put it another way... think of (insert Linux distro running kernel 2.4 with a bunch of shit backported from 2.6 here) and Linux.

      The Windows Mobile that your phone runs is BASED on Windows CE. (FWIW, that's Windows CE 5.2, not the current 6.0.) It's got quite a lot of UI and even some bits of API, IIRC, different from plain Windows CE.

    32. Re:So... by skaet · · Score: 1

      "Backroom" deals are named that way for a reason -- they're very hard to prove, and thus unlikely to be reported in reputable publications that require absolute proof. Regardless, Microsoft is known for throwing its monopolistic weight around to its advantage, and being suspicious of such articles is likely not a bad thing.

      Naturally, I agree completely. However, one article is not proof of "any and all articles since the beginning of the year" as the GP claimed. It has no doubt happened several times this year which we will probably never know about, but to dismiss every pro-Microsoft article out-of-hand just because they say Android isn't technically mature enough yet is either naive or unfairly biased.

      --
      There is no knowledge that is not power.
    33. Re:So... by hitmark · · Score: 2, Interesting

      There is always mer, the community offshot...

      its being applied to a increasing number of devices outside of the nokia tablets these days (like say two similar products from china, the smartq5 and smartq7).

      --
      comment first, facts later. http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScience/RelativityofWrong.htm
    34. Re:So... by suckmysav · · Score: 1

      "It has no doubt happened several times this year which we will probably never know about, but to dismiss every pro-Microsoft article out-of-hand just because they say Android isn't technically mature enough yet is either naive or unfairly biased."

      Not true. Considering that Microsoft have proven themselves to be fluent and prolific liars over the years then any prudent person would rightly suspect any future articles and claims regarding the greatness of their products as being equally likely to be disingenuous or exaggerated.

      --
      "You can't fight in here, this is the war room!"
    35. Re:So... by GooberToo · · Score: 1

      Not to mention they have a very long history of doing exactly the the things I describe dating all the way back to the OS/2 days. And its well documented at this point - with various tidbits coming out here and there over the years. To be absolutely clear, this is MS' standard operating procedures. Microsoft is first and foremost a marketing company and they prey on the nativity and ignorance of those who refuse to see what's right in front of their face.

      Anyone who believes otherwise is terribly naive or unfairly biased.

    36. Re:So... by GooberToo · · Score: 1

      Slashdot needs a "-1 Moderator is too lazy to use a search engine".

      Or the ever popular, "-1 Moderator is a hypocrite because while he demands citations, he himself does not bookmark everything he has ever read in his life - including well publicized news stories and documentaries."

    37. Re:So... by skaet · · Score: 1

      Oh snap, you got me!

      I admit now that I've never read anything negative about Microsoft in my entire life. I blindly use Microsoft products trusting they know what's best for me as a mindless consumer of all things expunged from the brightly shinng, fresh-scented arsehole of a godless mega-corporation.

      You've just outed me to the entire world. I am shamed and humiliated. I will now cry in the corner while cutting myself...

      --
      There is no knowledge that is not power.
    38. Re:So... by skaet · · Score: 1

      I understand they have a proven track record for this kind of behaviour - it doesn't mean I do or don't take this article as the word of God Himself - but does that mean every blogger and/or reputable news source since the start of the year has been "paid for either directly or indirectly by MS or a MS cross promotion, back room deal."

      This was the point the grand-grand-whatever parent was making and it's that blatant falsification of "fact" that really pisses me off. Yes, they more than certainly paid some manufacturers and publications to give them good publicity in recent history (let's not exclude Apple or nVidia or Intel from doing the same thing), but there is currently no evidence to support it in this case. Until you or I or the original claimant can provide it then by all means, but for now it's pure anecdotal speculation.

      --
      There is no knowledge that is not power.
    39. Re:So... by bhtooefr · · Score: 1

      Real definition of smartbook: Microsoft wouldn't port Windows 7 to ARM, so we'll run a smartphone OS on an ARM-based netbook, and call it a smartbook.

    40. Re:So... by TrancePhreak · · Score: 1

      It's very easy porting GDI apps to WinCE, can any other platform say that?

      --

      -]Phreak Out[-
    41. Re:So... by V!NCENT · · Score: 1

      Simple. nVidia doesn't have a driver. nVidia is not ready for the arm. Period. Nothing to see here. Move along...

      --
      Here be signatures
    42. Re:So... by Hal_Porter · · Score: 1

      Windows Mobile 6.1 (based on Windows CE 5.2) runs OK on my Sony Ericsson X1. I think on Snapdragon or similar it WinMo would be very snappy indeed. There's even a version of Windows CE, 6.0, that doesn't use the ARM's fast context switch extension and thus allows a 2GB per process address space rather than 32MB.

      http://www.windowsfordevices.com/articles/AT9457847627.html

      Still I don't really see people running Office on it, but for Windows Mobile type application, e.g. the excellent Pleco Chinese to English dictionary it works very well indeed. It's sort of an odd concept to implement Win32 (which is really an API designed for big iron servers) on an phone but at least it allows easy ports of Windows applications. Though the user interface needs to be simplified drastically to run on a small screen (many devices are still 320x200) and installing stupid task bar applets is out of the question. Still in terms of libraries it's quite compatible with desktop Windows - you can install .Net, ATL or MFC for example.

      --
      echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
    43. Re:So... by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Though the user interface needs to be simplified drastically to run on a small screen (many devices are still 320x200) and installing stupid task bar applets is out of the question.

      Actually, stupid task bar applets are the norm. Until Windows Mobile 6 you needed one just to quit applications without having to use the memory control panel (WM6 has a task manager.) And I have to run a background app just to make the phone smart enough to turn the display back on when I take it away from my ear. VGA displays are becoming more common, and WindowsCE draws the "OK" gadgets with the same number of pixels whether you're on a VGA or QVGA display, making it nigh-impossible to hit them with a finger. Windows CE is a sad joke at every level.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    44. Re:So... by Xabraxas · · Score: 2, Informative

      Windows Mobile certainly does suck. My girlfriend manages a small cell phone store and the don't carry a single Windows phone. They will order you one if you really want it but not before warning you how much the OS sucks. They have a service center so they deal directly with phone issues and Windows has proven to be too much of a hassle. People constantly complain that the system is slow as hell and crashes often and there is nothing the service techs can do about it because it's the shitty OS, not a physical problem with the phone. I know one of her techs and he's a Windows fanboy and he can't even stand Windows Mobile.

      --
      Time makes more converts than reason
    45. Re:So... by wild_berry · · Score: 1

      People will pay in blood and organs for Apple products, if that's the price Steve sets

      In fairness, Steve's already after the BRAINSSS! BRAAAINSSSS!!!

    46. Re:So... by Locutus · · Score: 1

      that's all fine and dandy but there is an elephant in the room. Did you know that earlier this year, the largest mobile phone conference was held and reporters had to pry vendors to talk about Android while they were all willing to talk about Microsofts Windows Mobile due out in 2010? Some of the press was thinking this was quite strange and now we find out that almost 2 dozen Android based phones are due to hit the market _this_ year.
       

      The elephant in the room is the fact that Microsoft has lost over $15 billion, yes BILLION over the past 13 years playing these marketing games. I would not doubt that Nvidia has a deal with Microsoft which provides Nvidia with some good profit as long as they yank the Microsoft chain and talk about Windows. And did you see Asus, the company who put Linux on a tiny laptop and started this market, apologize for Qualcomm showing an Asus ARM device running Linux? And wasn't that Microsoft on stage with them during the apology? Money talks and that's all Microsoft's got so I will question the validity of Nvidia's platform choice. As others have said, Android is just one distro of GNU/Linux and there are many more that have been on the market for years and run on ARM. But Nvidia only talks of Android and they talk of Windows CE. Fishy and likely part of Microsoft's marketing methods. IMO
       

      LoB
       

      --
      "Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
    47. Re:So... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yadda yadda... Do you idiots ever have anything substantial to say?
      Thought not.

    48. Re:So... by GooberToo · · Score: 1

      Talk about timely.

      http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/09/06/20/0250205/The-Truth-Behind-the-Death-of-Linux-On-the-Netbook

      Swoosh! ...but does that mean every blogger and/or reputable news source since the start of the year has been "paid for either directly or indirectly by MS or a MS cross promotion, back room deal."

      Brings into question reading comprehension skills. Especially since I said, "In short, since the beginning of the year, just about any and all articles which proclaim MS' OS in the phone, smart phone, netbook, smartbook markets are far more likely than not, marketing fluff pieces - paid for either directly or indirectly by MS or a MS cross promotion, back room deal." In other words, contrary to your asserted absolutes, which of course paint a horribly flawed statement, in reality I simply stated the betting man wins far, far more often than not but agreeing with my statement. And all that ignores the wave effect whereby one ignorant author reads a planted story and then creates his own, no bac kroom deal required, which offers the original article are confirmation of his own. That of course does not make it true, rather it just makes the pile of crap bigger.

      In short, there is a huge difference between the highly probable, but far from absolute, I stated and the false characterization of 100% absolutes you present. The first is accurate and a fairly safe bet while your statement is, of course, wrong.

    49. Re:So... by skaet · · Score: 1

      Ha! Let it rest man. I know what I said and this new article still doesn't prove anything that you claimed. It's just another example for the pile of crap but of the thousands - perhaps hundreds of thousands? - of MS articles since the beginning of the year, how many do you suppose were actually paid for either directly or indirectly? Not "all of them" I'll bet. It's this hyperbole that makes people like you no better than the fear-mongering mass media. It's a dirty, despicable tactic which I despise.

      Oh, nice to see that you hold grudges too. It's been 3 days, let it go.

      --
      There is no knowledge that is not power.
    50. Re:So... by GooberToo · · Score: 1

      Ha! Let it rest man.

      I see, you can reply with trash but I can't reply with supporting information. Nice.

      many do you suppose were actually paid for either directly or indirectly?

      Wow...yet more serious reading comprehension issues. How many? The majority was pretty clear. Serious reading comprehension issues there.

      It's this hyperbole that makes people like you no better than the fear-mongering mass media

      Now that's hyperbole! Making a very well educated estimate is far away not fear mongering; and I even followed up with a link to an independent article which validates my entire post. Your posts, on the other hand, has been nothing but hyperbole and fan-boyism. There is a huge difference. In fact, your posts are actually well into troll territory.

      It's this hyperbole that makes people like you no better than the fear-mongering mass media. It's a dirty, despicable tactic which I despise.Oh, nice to see that you hold grudges too. It's been 3 days, let it go.

      Replying is now holding a grudge? Holy crap you're delusional. According to you, everyone that replies to anyone on Slashdot is holding a grudge?!?! You're either flat out delusional or one seriously dumb troll.

      Easiest way to summarize your post is to say, "Yes you're right but I can't possibly admit it in public. I'll just continue with my unsubstantiated hyperbole and simply troll." After all, an entire article which supports the entire point of my post can't possibly validate anything I said...of course not.

      Let me guess, you're fingers are literally in your ears as you read this. Lol.

      Nuff said.

    51. Re:So... by skaet · · Score: 1

      Now you're just providing me with free entertainment. I couldn't get value this good from a money tree! You've got some issues, I suggest you post more to get it out of your system. Better yet, keep trying to justify the supposed validity of your arguements to me for my own private amusement, and I promise to keep baiting you with 4-sentence replies!

      --
      There is no knowledge that is not power.
    52. Re:So... by carlmenezes · · Score: 1

      This is good. Really good. Because this will drive more people towards AMD's video cards. This will also make those who are contributing to getting AMD's video cards working well in Linux redouble their efforts. This is essentially the beginning of the end for NVIDIA. Yes, it is a good business decision for them in the short term, but a VERY bad one for them in the long term and somebody high up will be paying the price a few years down the line because it was their call. So I say again, buy AMD and make the AMD drivers better than the binaries that NVIDIA is shipping. Take away the reason for anyone who is using Linux to buy NVIDIA. Keep competition alive and support companies that support open source. Whether NVIDIA sees it or not, Linux's mind share is going to increase by an order of magnitude over the next couple of years simply because of smart phones. More people are also going to be running it as their desktop, in particular the mum and dad types who just want to browse the internet on cheap hardware and not worry about viruses. Again, the reason I say this is good is that this is an opportunity for us, the open source community to show companies who are watching from the sidelines, what a difference supporting open source can make. Use your coding skills. Contribute. Help AMD and others who support Linux and open source. We can make a huge difference to a company's fortunes. Flaming NVIDIA is not going to help. Contributing to make sure the competition's products work so well that there is no need for NVIDIA's products is.

      --
      Find a job you like and you will never work a day in your life.
  3. Corrupted opinion? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Isn't this NVIDIA opinion somehow influenced by having Microsoft as customer for their Tegra chips going to upcoming Zune HD?

  4. More business for ATI by tyrr · · Score: 1, Troll

    If NVidia does not want a piece of Android business, it is NVidia's loss.
    And AMD/ATI gain.
    My money is on the Linux community figuring out how to incorporate NVidia support into Android with or without NVidia's corporate blessing. Heck, a few of NVidia engineers belong to Linux community too.

    1. Re:More business for ATI by xlotlu · · Score: 2, Informative

      If NVidia does not want a piece of Android business, it is NVidia's loss.

      And AMD/ATI gain.

      Modded interesting? Interestingly offtopic?

      This is an ARM story. AMD doesn't do ARM, and while ATI does produce embedded graphics chips, I've never heard of them being paired with handheld devices.

    2. Re:More business for ATI by Cornelius+the+Great · · Score: 1

      AMD/ATI sold its mobile graphics to Qualcomm, so they're no longer competing in the mobile graphics market. Hence, Tegra's only [worthy] competitor at the moment is Qualcomm's Snapdragon platform.

      --
      Sigs are for losers
    3. Re:More business for ATI by tyrr · · Score: 1

      AMD owns ATI. Thus, it is technically AMD/ATI.
      Have you ever hear of NVidia (besides the Tegra we have yet to see) being paired with hand-held devices?
      It is coming. New batteries, more efficient chips, more powerful cellphones. Everyone who's someone will be in that market

    4. Re:More business for ATI by tyrr · · Score: 1

      Ah, that's very unfortunate for AMD/ATI. ATI exists the mobile graphics market right at the moment when it starts heating up.
      Does the sale preclude ATI from developing new mobile graphics platform in the near future?

    5. Re:More business for ATI by dfghjk · · Score: 2, Interesting

      There's no such thing as a piece of the Android business. Android is a means to an end, not the end itself.

    6. Re:More business for ATI by sexconker · · Score: 1

      Like how they got Nvidia support into Linux, right?

      Oh wait.

    7. Re:More business for ATI by caladine · · Score: 2, Informative

      It's my understanding that Qualcomm purchase the engineers, equipment, and all the IP from ATI's handheld division. The purchase of the IP would seem to preclude them from developing anything new for the mobile market in the near term.

      Citation

    8. Re:More business for ATI by hairyfeet · · Score: 1

      Uhhh...pardon my ignorance, but does ATI even HAVE anything that competes with Tegra in the smartphone/MID space? Hell I thought I had learned about all the AMD/ATI products since converting from Intel/Nvidia, but I sure haven't heard of anything AMD has for the Tegra space. last I heard it was just Nvidia VS Intel, and of course we all know that Intel sucks for graphics.

      So if you wouldn't mind, Citation Please?

      --
      ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
    9. Re:More business for ATI by limaxray · · Score: 1

      What about the TI OMAP3 platform that uses a GPU from Imagination Technologies/PowerVR? Or what about Freescale's i.MX515 platform? Not to mention both of these devices currently use the ARM Cortex A-8, while Tegra is still using the ARM11. Oh, and the best part is these devices are on the market now.

      But yeah, there is a lot of competition in the high performance, low power market and NVidia is just the newest entrant. Frankly, as an embedded developer who is currently evaluating such a solution, there is nothing I've heard about Tegra that particularly peaks my interest. Sure NVidia is a big name in the consumer computer market, but that doesn't mean that translates to the embedded world. I'm much more interested in what is coming from TI and Freescale, and they both have excellent OSS support.

    10. Re:More business for ATI by toleraen · · Score: 1

      I might be reading your comment wrong, mistaking handheld with netbook, smartbook, etc, but ATI regularly pairs embedded graphics chips with the ARM platform, particularly their Imageon line.

    11. Re:More business for ATI by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They just sold the mobile 3D business unit to Qualcomm at the beginning of this year. Previously, they were using AMD's mobile graphics device cores in
      the prototype Snapdragon devices they were showing. While AMD does gain quite a bit from this, it's not QUITE the gain the gp poster thinks of it, nor,
      apparently, are you as clued in on things as you'd like for people to believe. :-D

    12. Re:More business for ATI by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's my understanding that Qualcomm purchase the engineers

      They were enslaved?

  5. CE for Tegra by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I've heard that the new Zune HD will utilize Nvidia's Tegra platform, so maybe this is their way of paying back the favor.

    1. Re:CE for Tegra by Frosty+Piss · · Score: 1

      I've heard that the new Zune HD will utilize Nvidia's Tegra platform, so maybe this is their way of paying back the favor.

      Are Zune sales that good? How much of a favor could this be? Are people actually buying Zunes? I've never seen one in the wild in actual use, though I've seen non-working dummies glued to the display at Wal-Mart... Is that redundent? Zune == Non-working Dummies?

      --
      If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
    2. Re:CE for Tegra by suckmysav · · Score: 1

      "Are Zune sales that good? "

      Hey, as long as nVidia gets a contract to sell X million units to Microsoft they couldn't care less about how well Zune sells.

      --
      "You can't fight in here, this is the war room!"
  6. Android = no native code support by moon3 · · Score: -1, Troll

    I have to reiterate this again and again. This might be unrelated to the story, but that is the problem that is keeping us from switching to Android.

    I mean 20+ years of experience and all perfectly working C/C++ code and libraries have to be thrown out of window ? Cmon Google. Java is a nice toy, but unfit for production, get real.

    Apple and Microsoft gave us native code with full support, native code comes first on their platforms so we are able to get maximum from the given hardware, lots of people will never downgrade to Java, sorry.

    1. Re:Android = no native code support by cuban321 · · Score: 1

      I mean 20+ years of experience and all perfectly working C/C++ code and libraries have to be thrown out of window ? Cmon Google. Java is a nice toy, but unfit for production, get real.

      Someone has never heard of JNI.

    2. Re:Android = no native code support by Sonic+McTails · · Score: 1

      You do know that you can use C/C++ code right? JNI is fully supported you know. At most you'd have to rewrite the GUI code in Java and you need to do that with most mobile devices anyway (and here's a hint, Windows CE is different enough from mainstream Windows that it usually requires significant reworking unless your app uses a subset of the MFC libraries or a subset of .NET).

      --
      This signature was left intentionally blank.
    3. Re:Android = no native code support by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Two ends of spectrum: maximum performance vs hardware independence.

      Android targets developers that choose to write their code once and expect it to run on each new device without more work on their part.
      Windows CE will target those that need to squeeze everything they can from the hardware.

    4. Re:Android = no native code support by tyrr · · Score: 1

      You are talking pure nonsense.
      First, for many devices it is not about speed, it is about security. Java provides a very robust security framework to run untrusted code. If you were to make a similar security framework for C/C++, you would end up with Java.
      Second, if Java runs too slow for you - buy a better CPU.
      Third, I doubt you realize how many productions systems are running Java. My department alone is running a multi-million dollar platform all on Java.
      Last, you actually can run C/C++ code on Android. You can run ARM assembly, C-Sharp, and Python too. But don't tell anyone.

    5. Re:Android = no native code support by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I would go even further in that there are many useful programs written in a variety of languages like C, python, perl, lua, etc. Years ago there was a lot of hype about a Pascal computer that even had hardware support for the language. It wound up in the the dustbin of history and I predict that a Java based single language computer will fare no better. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

    6. Re:Android = no native code support by chrb · · Score: 4, Insightful

      As Wikipedia says, native code runs under Android fine. The Chrome web browser runs on Android. Chrome is not written in Java.

      What you might mean is that you can't run native code on some specific mobile phone type device without hacks, and that you can't upload native code to the App Store. That much is true. In the first case, some manufacturers like to lock down their devices - the iphone is also pretty much locked down. In the second, Google want platform independence. But Android itself can clearly run native code - most of the software that it ships with is written in C. And you can distribute and install whatever Java code you want on any Android device, which is better than Apple's "you only load what we want you to load on a phone" rules.

    7. Re:Android = no native code support by 0xdeadbeef · · Score: 1

      I have to reiterate this again and again.

      Hmm... redundant loops. Perhaps the problem isn't the language, but your code?

    8. Re:Android = no native code support by demachina · · Score: 2, Insightful

      "You do know that you can use C/C++ code right? JNI is fully supported you know."

      You do know Google doesn't really officially support native code apps and there are no defined native mode API's to access the things you might want to access in native mode like graphics and audio. There are interfaces there but they are internal, not published and are "use at your own risk". If you use them chances are relatively high your native code will break the first time Google puts out a new version of Android.

      I think the grandparent meant to say iPhone supports native code as a first class citizen while Google doesn't. You certainly can do some kinds of native mode apps that don't interact much with the hardware and OS, or do so only through clunky JNI.

      Java is great for a lot of things, for ease of development, portability and improved security, but it is something of a limiting factor for applications that need maximum performance or to get closer to the metal.

      Not sure if its intentional or not but in areas like media players it gives Google a degree of exclusivity in app development since they can use native code and their internal API's whenever they want, while that is a relatively dangerous thing to do for third party app developers.

      --
      @de_machina
    9. Re:Android = no native code support by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      My department alone is running a multi-million dollar platform all on Java.

      And it would just be a million dollar platform using C/C++ instead. Face it, Java will forever be bloated and slow.

    10. Re:Android = no native code support by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Java is a nice toy, but unfit for production, get real.

      Troll. Troll!

      Java is used in production in many places. There is no functional thing that c++ can do that java cant. Any many would say that java has better libraries and lower costs.

    11. Re:Android = no native code support by thePowerOfGrayskull · · Score: 1

      Java is a nice toy, but unfit for production, get real.

      Might help to do a bit of research before making posts like this one. You realize that Blackberry has been an all-java platform for years now, and nobody is complaining about performance? Even on their new systems, which directly compete with the iPhone.

      The problem here isn't with the Java platform, it's in the fact that Android is a custom implementation that is not standards compliant. This, in turn, means that the tens of thousands (or more?) of J2ME applications that have been developed over the years are useless on this platform. By choosing not to support it, Google has greater control over the platform - but they also compete with the "real" JME platform for mindshare, while providing no measurable advantage other than marketing.

    12. Re:Android = no native code support by moon3 · · Score: 1

      Native code is not officially supported. The Android-SDK gave me Java last time I tried.

      The trick of native code is that you do not need to buy expensive hardware to run you application at decent speed. You can run your server even on ARM Cortex while Java needs some expensive hardware to be even considered. Cost saving, green technology, etc. that is what native code enables. While Java is designed to sell pricey hardware from day one.

    13. Re:Android = no native code support by TheRaven64 · · Score: 1

      If you were to make a similar security framework for C/C++, you would end up with Java.

      No you wouldn't; if you were to start with C, you would design something very simple that sat in kernel space and validated system calls according to a policy before allowing them to proceed. Fortunately, it turns out all modern UNIX-like systems come with something that can do exactly this (Windows NT does too, but it has such a horrible UI no one uses it properly).

      The only way any program, irrespective of language, is able to influence any part of the system outside its own memory space is via system calls. You don't need to run your software in a VM to restrict the system calls it can access.

      --
      I am TheRaven on Soylent News
    14. Re:Android = no native code support by mhall119 · · Score: 1

      I mean 20+ years of experience and all perfectly working C/C++ code and libraries have to be thrown out of window ? Cmon Google. Java is a nice toy, but unfit for production, get real.

      Canonical got Android apps running on Ubuntu on x86, without recompiling or emulation, can you do that with C/C++? JVMs are now very fast, JIT compilation and run-time optimization lets them match or beat native code for long running processes. Since the JVM is always running in Android, you don't keep feeling the startup cost, but you do keep benefiting from the optimizations. Java has been a standard for mobile application development long before Google got into the game.

      --
      http://www.mhall119.com
    15. Re:Android = no native code support by ahsile · · Score: 1

      Let's just say that I'm currently working on an application for my employer that targets mobile devices (Win CE/Mobile) and tablet pcs (XP/Vista) at the same time. Even using .NET and the Compact .NET framework we have to do a TON of refactoring for GUIs. Heck, there's even basic classes/methods that you would expect to be available on the mobile version but aren't there. It ends up being a lot of code being ifdef'd (#if...) for each version.

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    16. Re:Android = no native code support by i.of.the.storm · · Score: 1

      JNI is kind of a pain, but it's interesting that they allow it anyway. It seems like it bypasses their whole security platform idea with having programs run in a VM. Are there C headers/libraries for all the hardware you would want to access like graphics chip, accelerometers, cameras, etc? And I think it's a good thing that at the least you have to redo the GUI for a mobile app, because the desktop application paradigms don't transfer well to a small screen.

      --
      All your base are belong to Wii.
    17. Re:Android = no native code support by tyrr · · Score: 1

      Native code is not officially supported. The Android-SDK gave me Java last time I tried.

      Crosscompile your application for ARM and push it on your Android phone with adb.

      The trick of native code is that you do not need to buy expensive hardware to run you application at decent speed. You can run your server even on ARM Cortex while Java needs some expensive hardware to be even considered. Cost saving, green technology, etc. that is what native code enables. While Java is designed to sell pricey hardware from day one.

      The trick with mobile devices is that users want to run hundreds of thousands of untrusted programs from application markets. Native code leads to viruses, trojan horses, keyloggers and all kinds of nasty things. Users have to have a protection mechanism. Java with its multilayer security is perfect for mobile applications.

      If you are talking about servers, I have a newsflash for you. The majority of servers hardly use even 50% of their processing capacity on average. Java overhead at this stage of CPU development is negligible. Green movement will benefit more from saving the resources spent on development and maintenance of native code.

    18. Re:Android = no native code support by moon3 · · Score: 0, Troll

      Chrome is not written in Java

      Thank you for this sir.
      Google gives you Java (for App Store), but their own applications run native code? Google enjoys the power of native code and you are left with Java, so you are a second rate Java developer from day 1 on Android ? Google is more insulting to developers that Microsoft or Apple ever were.

      Windows CE runs native, the portability point is pretty invalid. Also on iPhone I have proper GCC/G++ compilers, I do not have to rewrite everything to some other language. Google should do the same as Apple and give us GCC, Java should be optional not mandatory.

      And you can distribute and install whatever Java code you want
      OK, some people do not have a time to rewrite their applications to some interpreted language.. Windows CE and iPhone are perfectly fine platforms regarding this, they run native code no problem and you can deploy that code in the App Store.

    19. Re:Android = no native code support by tyrr · · Score: 1

      There is nothing simple about solving the system call validation problem. You actually end up writing a VM.

      You are also forgetting about the problem of arbitrary memory pointers. You don't have to break into the privileged kernel mode in order to break security. All you have to do is to read or write what you are not allowed to access.

    20. Re:Android = no native code support by mR.bRiGhTsId3 · · Score: 1

      I find JNI a pain, but generally have had good experiences with p/invoke. Thus, I was fascinated when I came across J/Invoke which seems to work almost as well.

    21. Re:Android = no native code support by Bill,+Shooter+of+Bul · · Score: 1

      I was going to moderate your post, but I couldn't decide which way to mod it. I should have modded it up because you were right in complaining that android doesn't make use of existing libraries,c using a lot of code to be rewritten. But, I also wanted to mod it down for bashing Java unnecessarily. So I just commented instead. Its really just an innocent bystander, that really is fit for production and used heavily by a number of developers on platforms big and small. The walled garden of andriod is the really problem the fact that the grass is made out of Java doesn't change that fact.

      --
      Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
    22. Re:Android = no native code support by causality · · Score: 1

      The trick with mobile devices is that users want to run hundreds of thousands of untrusted programs from application markets. Native code leads to viruses, trojan horses, keyloggers and all kinds of nasty things. Users have to have a protection mechanism. Java with its multilayer security is perfect for mobile applications.

      Most of these discussions/arguments about Java are strictly concerning performance, like whether or not Java is bloated and slow. Your post there is one of the first I've seen that neatly answers the question of "why Java?" If it is as you say, then that's a highly desirable feature. That's especially when you consider the volume of personal information that's usually contained on a mobile phone, which I'd imagine would make it an attractive target for malware.

      If you are talking about servers, I have a newsflash for you. The majority of servers hardly use even 50% of their processing capacity on average. Java overhead at this stage of CPU development is negligible. Green movement will benefit more from saving the resources spent on development and maintenance of native code.

      My understanding is that in most cases, a server is going to max out its disk I/O or its bandwidth before its CPU(s). That seems especially true to me for a Web server, since Javascript and other techniques delegate much of the processing to the clients.

      I did have one question for you. In this post below, TheRaven64 stated:

      The only way any program, irrespective of language, is able to influence any part of the system outside its own memory space is via system calls. You don't need to run your software in a VM to restrict the system calls it can access.

      I don't know much about Java but this got me curious. What does Java offer here that would be difficult (or impractical/impossible) to achieve with using syscall restrictions and other devices to sandbox the apps? With virtual memory and appropriate syscall restrictions that sounds like it should work too, and would make it easier to run native code, yet I don't hear of devices that use such an approach. Is it that both methods are equally viable, only with Java someone has already created an implementation that is useful for mobile phones so why reinvent the wheel? Or is Java's approach inherently superior in some way?

      --
      It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
    23. Re:Android = no native code support by Tweenk · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Google gives you Java (for App Store), but their own applications run native code?

      Yes, because they want everything in the app store to be forward compatible: in future Android might run on chips that are not ARM, so native code would break, and though it would be the developers' fault it would still make their app store look bad.

      Windows CE runs native, the portability point is pretty invalid.

      Most of the native apps run on ARM chips only, and won't work e.g. on MIPS based devices (also supported by Windows CE). The portable apps use .NET Compact Framework, so the situation is more or less equivalent to Java.

      on iPhone I have proper GCC/G++ compilers

      Which you can't use without jailbreaking, so your argument is instantly moot.

      --
      Those who would give up liberty to obtain working drivers, deserve neither liberty nor working drivers.
    24. Re:Android = no native code support by dna_(c)(tm)(r) · · Score: 1

      but it is something of a limiting factor for applications that need maximum performance or to get closer to the metal.

      FUD. Java ME runs on processors embeded in credit cards for at least a decade. And no, that's not the execution time of the program. It (ME) gets compiled just as C/C++ would, in that case. Android is a different thing of course...

    25. Re:Android = no native code support by Tetsujin · · Score: 1

      Google gives you Java (for App Store), but their own applications run native code?

      Yes, because they want everything in the app store to be forward compatible: in future Android might run on chips that are not ARM, so native code would break, and though it would be the developers' fault it would still make their app store look bad.

      That's great for Google and all - but it doesn't do much for me, you know?

      As a user I want people to be able to port existing code pretty easily, and to be able to write new code that fully utilizes the power of the machine. From my perspective as a user, there's no advantage to the phone running a VM. From my perspective as a developer, the fact that the phone runs a VM for all third-party software is actually pretty distasteful. This is an embedded platform we're talking about... It hasn't got a ton of on-board storage, and wasted processor cycles mean wasted battery, too.

      --
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    26. Re:Android = no native code support by i.of.the.storm · · Score: 1

      That looks pretty cool. I guess part of the problem for me before was that I didn't really have any C experience the last time I tried JNI. I was just trying to compile a small DLL to read an analog sensor from Java where someone else had written the code, and it was just a huge mess. At least now I have more experience with C so I could have figured it out more easily, but the fact remains that it's still a kludgy situation.

      --
      All your base are belong to Wii.
    27. Re:Android = no native code support by tyrr · · Score: 1

      Most of these discussions/arguments about Java are strictly concerning performance, like whether or not Java is bloated and slow. Your post there is one of the first I've seen that neatly answers the question of "why Java?" If it is as you say, then that's a highly desirable feature. That's especially when you consider the volume of personal information that's usually contained on a mobile phone, which I'd imagine would make it an attractive target for malware.

      For better or worth, software development is nothing like video games. Performance, the topic of obsession for video gamers, is oftentimes an afterthought in industrial software development. Security, reliability, maintainability, computability, clarity receive higher priority almost each and every time. In order to understand this, of course, you have to spend a few too many years in software development. The truth about performance is rarely taught in CS university course, and almost never understood by CS students. I too was a fresh CS grad over a decade ago (I actually remember the time when Slashdot was popular) and despised, if not hated, Java. I adored C, optimized parts of the code in assembly, and though I knew everything there is to know. Boy was I silly. I was forced by my employer to deal with Java parts in a huge mixed codebase in 2000. I accepted Java in 2003 when it finally started producing decent benchmarks on the brand new Linux test equipment. Since then, I worked on many diverse problems, broadened my software architecture experience, and came to appreciate Java's design. I don't think I can design a better platform myself. I know that James Gosling is a freaking generous because I remember when I though he was a fool. Software design should never focus on fixed performance cost factors. Moore's law will marginalize fixed performance factors in a matter of years no matter how high in absolute value these fixed factors are.

      But don't take my word for it. Listen to my elder colleague Charles E. Leiserson from MIT - Why study algorithms and performance?

      I don't know much about Java but this got me curious. What does Java offer here that would be difficult (or impractical/impossible) to achieve with using syscall restrictions and other devices to sandbox the apps? With virtual memory and appropriate syscall restrictions that sounds like it should work too, and would make it easier to run native code, yet I don't hear of devices that use such an approach. Is it that both methods are equally viable, only with Java someone has already created an implementation that is useful for mobile phones so why reinvent the wheel? Or is Java's approach inherently superior in some way?

      Unfortunately, writing a program that would validate system calls is much much easier said than done. It takes no time what so ever to say it. If you actually start writing a program like that, you will quickly realized that this will be The most complicated problem of your life. Take a look at the NSA SELinux codebase. SELinux actually implements an extremely limited functionality to validate system calls. SELinux configuration cannot be controlled from the user space, so it is useless in any environment where you actually want to leave some security decisions to users. Also remember, if you create a workaround to give users some control over SELinux configuration, nothing will stop a malicious program run by a user from using the workaround you created without the user's knowledge. You need at least 3-tier architecture to implement a usable security. Moreover, you will have to analyze sequences of system calls in bundles and not just do an analysis call by call. Solving problem after problem, you will end up writing a virtual machine in pretty much the same way it is written for Java. It took more than 10 years for Java developers to implement their virtual machine solution - they started around 1992 and the most functio

    28. Re:Android = no native code support by spitzak · · Score: 1

      Actually arbitrary pointers are not a problem, if in fact you can reliably prevent any system calls that the program should not do.

      I agree with you that detecting whether the system calls are allowed is a problem. Describing it as a "VM" is probably wrong (I suspect you are confusing it with the rather delicate way you have to do this on Windows as opposed to the LD_PRELOAD on Linux). However once the calls are trapped there would have to be an extrodinarily complex AI system to actually figure out if they are really what that program should do.

      For instance some program that can update your web bookmarks could probably also insert or modify them all to spam addresses, I think it will be hard for the call detector to prevent that!

    29. Re:Android = no native code support by mR.bRiGhTsId3 · · Score: 1

      The reason I hate JNI is all the boilerplate code you seem to have to write. Its almost like you are marshalling types in the C JNI layer again after the JVM already marshalled the types into the C code. I like P/Invoke since it seems to sidestep that for the most part. My JNI pain came from trying to get strings in and out of the JVM, whereas p/invoke makes it a breeze and my tinkering with J/Invoke has been similar.

    30. Re:Android = no native code support by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Oh, no, if the apps weren't in Java they wouldn't be portable. Unlike say Debian's 25113 packages -- the vast majority of which are not Java or .NET-based -- which run just fine on ARM and MIPS and, well, pretty much anything else you can think of. If Google wants to make sure apps are portable, they should tell the devs to not be stupid, not force them to use Java or .NET. (Personally I think using managed languages like Java or .NET (or Python or pretty much anything except C/C++) is in general a great idea because it helps avoid certain classes of bugs, but really, the devs should be allowed to use whatever language they want.)

    31. Re:Android = no native code support by tepples · · Score: 1

      Canonical got Android apps running on Ubuntu on x86, without recompiling or emulation, can you do that with C/C++?

      Technically, you can't even run Android apps on an Android phone without emulation. The Java virtual machine is an emulator, as is the Dalvik virtual machine that Android uses.

    32. Re:Android = no native code support by i.of.the.storm · · Score: 1

      Yeah, too much boilerplate is my main complaint with JNI. Never used P/Invoke or much .Net at all though.

      --
      All your base are belong to Wii.
    33. Re:Android = no native code support by iluvcapra · · Score: 1

      on iPhone I have proper GCC/G++ compilers Which you can't use without jailbreaking, so your argument is instantly moot.

      What are you talking about? Apple's iPhone SDK ships gcc/g++. C++ and C are both supported languages on iPhone OS X.

      --
      Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
    34. Re:Android = no native code support by TheRaven64 · · Score: 1

      There is nothing simple about solving the system call validation problem.

      It's not trivial, but it's far from difficult. Fair scheduling on SMT systems, for example, is a much harder problem for OS designers. System call validation is incredibly simple in comparison.

      You actually end up writing a VM.

      Not at all. SELinux, for example, is not a VM. Neither is systrace or virt. When you issue a system call, you perform an interrupt or a special instruction and the kernel takes over. The kernel then runs a privileged operation, for example accessing a file on disk, on behalf of the process in question. It is up to the kernel to decide the policy for this.

      On all UNIX systems, for example, the kernel does not allow processes to open arbitrary files or bind to ports under number 1024 unless it is marked as privileged (i.e. running with UID 0). More modern UNIX-like systems and Windows NT allow much finer granularity, either validating the arguments to system calls (not easy to do in a way that isn't open to race conditions), or associating fine-grained permissions to all kernel objects (sockets, files, and so on) and granting or revoking them on a per-process basis. You only 'end up writing a VM' if you consider every modern OS kernel to be a VM (not entirely an invalid point of view, but not true in the sense that the JVM is a VM).

      All the JVM does is intercept these at a higher level and do things like refuse to issue a system call for some subset of operations, for example opening a file that is outside a scratch directory, or opening a socket connected to any host other than a specific whitelisted one. All of these restrictions can be implemented for arbitrary processes on most modern operating systems (*BSD, Linux, Solaris, Windows NT, Symbian, and so on). You don't need a VM.

      You are also forgetting about the problem of arbitrary memory pointers

      No I'm not; they are irrelevant. All a program can do with an arbitrary pointer is modify or damage itself.

      You don't have to break into the privileged kernel mode in order to break security

      You are confusing two issues. One is arbitrary code execution, the other is privilege escalation. Java does nothing to stop arbitrary code execution. Various classes in the JRE allow you to generate code at run time so it's possible to use an application vulnerability to execute arbitrary code inside a Java application. The lack of pointers means that some classes of exploit are not possible but that's largely irrelevant because other entire categories are and you only need one exploitable hole to render a system insecure..

      All you have to do is to read or write what you are not allowed to access.

      You seem to be totally unaware of the fact that every relatively modern processor (e.g. every Intel chip since the 80386) has supported and every relatively recent operating system has implemented protected memory. Every arbitrary pointer that a userspace process has is a pointer in a virtual address space. These are either mapped to physical pages or they are unmapped. If they are mapped to physical pages, then the process has some set of permissions to access them. The only way of changing these permissions is via a system call (and then the kernel may or may not permit the change). If you attempt to dereference a pointer to a mapped page, you get access to that memory, but you can't do anything malicious to it (it's memory that you either allocated via mmap() or malloc(), or it's kernel memory that you have read-only access to in order to make some system call-like library functions faster).

      If you try to access some memory that is not mapped, then the CPU issues an interrupt. The OS then handles this by either delivering a segmentation violation signal, or by killing the process.

      There are exploits that depend on accessing arbitrary pointers,

      --
      I am TheRaven on Soylent News
    35. Re:Android = no native code support by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Google does support them, see Doom for android for an example. It even supports C/C++ within its web browser. See

          http://google-code-updates.blogspot.com/2008/12/native-client-technology-for-running.html

      > or do so only through clunky JNI

      In what way is JNI "clunky"? And what do you mean with "unsupported api". C/C++ code has full access to the official API. See prboom for android for an example.

      > Not sure if its intentional or not but in areas like media players it gives Google a degree of
      > exclusivity

      But I am sure that you have no idea what you are talking about!

    36. Re:Android = no native code support by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well whoopdy shit. You get support for 2 languages for the iphone. That's great if you can come up with an app that Apple doesn't deem: Distasteful, Offensive, or in competition with their own offerings. Their discretion is pretty arbitrary and i'd rather be tied to one language yet still have to power to offer my apps than have 2 languages and no guarantee that Apple isn't going to take down my app and put a clone of mine up a month later.

      You know why C and C++ is fine for the iphone? The iPhone's OS runs only on the iphone, there is no need to worry about the code running on another architecture. As another poster pointed out that debian does a fine job with C code ports but if you are running an app store how many architecture binaries are you going to offer?

      As for criticism of Java...I find most people on here who "hate" java are people who have never coded in their life or picked up C in 21 days and wants to be elitist about how much they can optimize "Hello World". Java ain't the java of 10 years ago, and between Servlets, Android, and GWT, to say the least, Java is a real powerhouse. Java's reputation is worse than a man who raped a child while yelling "nigger!" 10 years ago. Even people would forget about him but here in 2009 people still spew bullshit about java.

    37. Re:Android = no native code support by demachina · · Score: 1

      Look on the Google developer forums every time a developer has asked about direct access to the Surface API from native code. Google consistently tells you to not use the API, its going to change, your app will break... If you want to do an application that needs to do fast, efficient blits, like media players its relatively hard to do in Android unless they've fixed it recently.

      In fact you can't access it without modifying the mydroid source, your C++ class has to be friend class to the isurface class. The only two classes and apps that are friended to it are Androids own media player and camera apps.

      Its nice Google is supporting native code browser plugins but they pretty much have to do that to support things like Flash plugins but they still aren't as friendly to native mode apps as Apple is.

      --
      @de_machina
    38. Re:Android = no native code support by Nyder · · Score: 1

      Word, my Sega Dreamcast runs WindowsCE, so I don't want my backwards capabilities to be hurt.

      It has a modem, i'm sure i can use it as a cell phone.

      --
      Be seeing you...
  7. hilarious by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    This is hilarious... Android will be as popular as the Linux desktop. If you subtract the developers that roughly an install base of 3 end users.

    haha.

  8. poor graphics support? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    i'm sure several users have had similar problems... they should google it.

  9. Drivers by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    From TFA:
    "The world soundly rejected the first netbooks that came out with Linux," he said. "Printers didn't work, and devices didn't get recognized. The whole thing was a mess."

    I'm sure all printers come with WinCE drivers these days. Or maybe Nvidia knows how to install Vista drivers on CE?

  10. While I haven't ever used Android by FlyingBishop · · Score: 1

    I've never found any Google products I have used to be inferior to their Microsoft counterparts.

    I trust Nvidia to a point, but suspect they're just protecting their own interests, since their job would be a lot easier if they didn't have to worry about writing drivers for non-x86 architectures.

    1. Re:While I haven't ever used Android by mr_mischief · · Score: 1

      The ARM is non-x86 whether it runs Linux or WinCE.

    2. Re:While I haven't ever used Android by psychokitten · · Score: 1

      While Android may not be nearly as mature as Windows Mobile - from my own experience it's vastly inferior to Microsoft's product It has potential, but it still has a ways to go. Granted, my own experience may be influenced by the fact that HTC decided to make the G1 a fairly sub-par platform for Android, giving it next to no storage and leaving it very little ram to run apps after Android sucks up the majority of it - but the same hardware running WinMo would be able to do so much more.

    3. Re:While I haven't ever used Android by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Uh?
      Of course not

  11. Bingo by copponex · · Score: 0, Troll

    Nvidia is also trying to get someone in their corner for the upcoming fight against Intel during their licensing and patent wars. Good news for VIA and anyone else not stuck in the battle of monopolies.

    1. Re:Bingo by thsths · · Score: 1

      > Good news for VIA

      There is no good news for VIA. The main problem with VIA is VIA - most of the chips a full of bugs and generally suck. Anyone can have a bad day, but consistently bad quality is not something that the market will tolerate indefinitely.

    2. Re:Bingo by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes, just ask Microsoft.

  12. Part Of The NVidia Zune HD 'Agreement' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This is standard operating procedure for Microsoft contractees. Happened just this last month with Asus where as soon as Microsoft negotiated a new deal with Asus, Asus out of the blue started spouting anti-Linux FUD.

    The Zune HD contract with NVidia obviously has the same type of garbage built in.

    1. Re:Part Of The NVidia Zune HD 'Agreement' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

      No, it just had to be FUD right, it didn't have anything to do with the return rates for the Linux-based eeePC machines, did it. Or the fact that Linux actually performed worse than Windows on the same equipment, and quite frankly is a nightmare for vendor support.

      Face it, customers didn't want the poorly setup/supported Linux eeePCs. Choosing Mandriva as the OS didn't help matters either.

      P.S. - Nobody wants to spend more time searching for obscure CLI-only solutions to their OS problems, than actually using their machine to Just Get Things Done (TM).

    2. Re:Part Of The NVidia Zune HD 'Agreement' by Machtyn · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Wasn't the ASUS thing proven to be some blogger's attempt to befoul ASUS? Why yes, yes it was. "just a quick whois reveals that the domain was registered by some guy with a hotmail address using godaddy as a registrar"

    3. Re:Part Of The NVidia Zune HD 'Agreement' by Vexorian · · Score: 1

      No , it wasn't? It was ASUS' uk page for the new eee's specs itself that linked to it... (Ok, I feel dumb pointing this out as the very same link you posted contains a +5 informative post saying exactly the same thing)

      --

      Copyright infringement is "piracy" in the same way DRM is "consumer rape"
    4. Re:Part Of The NVidia Zune HD 'Agreement' by Jesus_666 · · Score: 2, Informative

      The one who fell for asus.co.uk being an Asus website? It isn't. Every single page but the offending one redirects to uk.asus.com (Asus' actual UK page) while the offending one displays a product presentation plus the FUD link. Also, there are inconsistencies regarding the domain registration. (Oh, look. I also got a +5, Informative in that thread for pointing this out.)

      --
      USE HOT GRITS WITH STATUE OF NATALIE PORTMAN (NAKED AND PETRIFIED)
    5. Re:Part Of The NVidia Zune HD 'Agreement' by cheesybagel · · Score: 1

      I still remember when ASUS sold AMD motherboards in plain white boxes so Intel wouldn't be all pissy.

  13. ARM hostile to Linux? by chrb · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I was at a conference in 2002 where the chairman of ARM, Sir Robin Saxby, gave a keynote talk on ARM. In the Q&A session afterwards one of the attendees asked what Mr. Saxby thought of Linux - he replied that it was a toy operating system that would never amount to anything, and that open source was a useless strategy for developing software and he didn't see any place for it in the business world. The hall erupted with various PhD students and postgrads raising their hands, and after three people all said basically the same thing - that they use Linux and think open source is great - the chair had to say no more Linux questions. But after hearing what the guy at the top had to say, it would never surprise me to hear that ARM might be hostile to Linux and open source, even when it's running on their own chipsets.

    1. Re:ARM hostile to Linux? by jedidiah · · Score: 1

      That was a pretty rich comment given the state of Linux in 2002.

      I would expect that nvidia would have an easier time porting their driver to Linux ARM than WinCE.

      --
      A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
    2. Re:ARM hostile to Linux? by diegocgteleline.es · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Well, back in 2002 he was not the only one. He has probably changed their opinion now that Linux is crucial for their survival.

    3. Re:ARM hostile to Linux? by IonHand · · Score: 1

      I think it's time to come out with an open instruction set architecture and kill these pathetic IP companies.

    4. Re:ARM hostile to Linux? by TheRaven64 · · Score: 1

      SPARC is an open instruction set and is already supported by Linux. The T2 is open source; why not download it, create a better design, and give the design to ARM licensees like TI, Qualcomm and Samsung for their next-generation SoCs to use. It must be easy, right? After all, 'pathetic IP companies' can design CPUs that power pretty much all mobile phones and handheld computers.

      Let me know when I can download your code, or buy a SoC based on it.

      --
      I am TheRaven on Soylent News
    5. Re:ARM hostile to Linux? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I guess in 2002 Robin Saxby didn't expect that Risc Os could become an open source OS too. It is now and it may run on netbook hardware in the near future.

      https://www.riscosopen.org/forum/forums/5/topics/166?page=1

      Ernst

    6. Re:ARM hostile to Linux? by AceofSpades19 · · Score: 1

      The sad thing is that I know people who are in IT departments that think the same thing about linux

    7. Re:ARM hostile to Linux? by Chris+Burke · · Score: 2, Funny

      Well, back in 2002 he was not the only one. He has probably changed their opinion now that Linux is crucial for their survival.

      Maybe, or maybe he still hates it but is forced to accept it. I mean, I need oxygen to survive but I still hate that piece of shit element.

      --

      The enemies of Democracy are
    8. Re:ARM hostile to Linux? by rbanffy · · Score: 1

      In 2002 they could be even be betting the company on the Risc PC/RiscOS duo...

      --
      http://www.dieblinkenlights.com
    9. Re:ARM hostile to Linux? by mejogid · · Score: 2, Insightful

      now that Linux is crucial for their survival.

      While I'd agree that linux has started to make an impact on mobile devices, thanks primarily to its non /GNU implementation in Android, it's clearly not the only thing keeping ARM alive (apologies for the wikipedia link, the sources seem to check out). While their profit/unit may be low, they've got £50 million net income, 1,500 employees and and have shipped 10 billion devices including 98% of phones. Linux may be a growing market, but suggesting it's keeping them afloat is ludicrous.

    10. Re:ARM hostile to Linux? by IonHand · · Score: 1

      Pathetic might not have been the best word. Arrogant would have been more appropriate. And as we both know, the barrier to compete in this market is very high so I advice you to wank off instead of waiting for me to inform you of my code release.

    11. Re:ARM hostile to Linux? by bhtooefr · · Score: 1

      Hardly. In 2002, RISC OS was a tiny, tiny part of their marketshare. Acorn folded in 1998. That left a few A7000+ clones and then at the end of 2002 the Iyonix, which I don't think moved 50,000 units. Oh, and some Pace set top boxes, but still...

    12. Re:ARM hostile to Linux? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      In the Q&A session afterwards one of the attendees asked what Mr. Saxby thought of Linux - he replied that it was a toy operating system that would never amount to anything, and that open source was a useless strategy for developing software and he didn't see any place for it in the business world.

      When I was working at ARM on a processor (around 2007), we were paying and giving technical details to codesourcery, to add gcc support for the processor; many of the engineering tools were run on linux, and ARM's development software could run as Eclipse add-ons. There's no shortage of Linux support at ARM at the moment.

      That said, when push comes to shove ARM is an IP company. Their business centres around charging people for processor designs, both upfront and per processor produced. So even given their use of and support for Linux, if someone asked them "why not open source your products and make money by charging for support, customization and improvements" they would probably reply "we don't think that would make as much money as our current closed-source licensing model".

    13. Re:ARM hostile to Linux? by TheRaven64 · · Score: 1

      The barrier isn't that high. To compete with Intel, you need to have fabs, but competing with ARM is more like competing with Microsoft than Intel. They produce IP cores - as I'm sure you are aware from your comment - and designing an IP core is no more difficult than designing a complex piece of software. I'm sure companies like TI that produce SoCs based on ARM IP cores would be more than happy to use a design that didn't require them to pay the (very large) license fee to ARM. ARM is a very small company; the original ARM chips were designed by two people. Their modern designs are more complex, but certainly not beyond the skills of a smallish team of motivated individuals.

      You don't even need to get SoC manufacturers to make them. Getting a run of a few tens of thousands of chips is cheap, and if you can persuade projects like OpenPandora and OpenMoko to use your chips instead of ARM SoCs then you can easily do a large enough run to get the costs down.

      --
      I am TheRaven on Soylent News
    14. Re:ARM hostile to Linux? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Crucial? How do you figure?
      ARM deals largely in the embedded space, Linux is a minor player at best in the embedded space.
      It's the opposite, really, ARM has become crucial for Linux, which desperately needs some sort of gimmick on a gimmick (ARM netbooks) since the last gimmick (netbooks) failed quite miserably.

    15. Re:ARM hostile to Linux? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I mean, I need oxygen to survive but I still hate that piece of shit element.

      Damn you Joseph Priestley!

  14. Not surprised by rbanffy · · Score: 2, Funny

    It would be either that or not having Nvidia support on Windows 7 SP 1...

    --
    http://www.dieblinkenlights.com
  15. Who needs Android? by GPLHost-Thomas · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Really, the early success of netbooks loaded with Ubuntu showed clearly that there is no real need for Android. Now, there's going to be netbooks with ARM. GREAT, this is the time to demonstrate (if only it was needed) that Linux is portable, and that distributions like Debian can run perfectly on ARM chips. There WILL be some players in the industry that will understand it, sooner or later. I knew there will be a time where DFSG free OS would start becoming popular just because of the fact it can fit any hardware. It's great if it's demonstrated by using them on cheaper netbooks.

    1. Re:Who needs Android? by fnj · · Score: 1

      You, sir, are about the only insightful commenter on this entire thread. Whether or not Android blows the opportunity in front of it, Linux is totally on top of this.

    2. Re:Who needs Android? by Dragonslicer · · Score: 1

      I think you may have missed the point of Android, which was to run on mobile phones, where your input and output hardware is quite a bit different than on most, if not all, portable computers. Sure, you could run Debian on the hardware in an HTC phone, but that isn't the hard part. The bulk of the work would be in the UI programs, and most of the programs that are part of Gnome or KDE wouldn't work too well with the phone's hardware. You'd end up needing to rewrite most of the user applications anyway.

    3. Re:Who needs Android? by LWATCDR · · Score: 1

      Android has some real advantages over just Linux in this space.
      From a technical point of view it doesn't use X. X is a bit big and trades performance for other virtues that are not an advantage on a smallish embedded device.
      Also Android applications are CPU agnostic. They will run on any CPU you port Android too.
      The big advantage of Android is that it has an App store.
      No Yum, apt-get, and Synaptic are NOT a replacement for an App store.

      You can not sell your software through Synaptic, you can not see reviews or ratings. CNR is at best a poor version of an App store.

      An App store give more control to the author of the application than repositories do. With repositories you have to wait for the Distro to decide to include your app, update your app, and they me even patch your app. You could take the time and setup your own repository but what a PAIN that is and do you want the author to worry about packaging and running a repository or writing code?
      Also you can not sell your code through a repository.
      Yes there is a lot of great FOSS but FOSS has yet to produce great software that fills every need.
      With the iPhone app store there is a large selection of software a lot of it free and even more really cheap. Yes there is a lot of junk but take a look at any repository and look at how many really bad FOSS programs there are.
      Or go to Sourceforge and Freshmeat and see how many barely working projects you find.
      Android offers a viable market place where FOSS and closed source both thrive.

      --
      See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
    4. Re:Who needs Android? by GPLHost-Thomas · · Score: 1

      The post above is really stupid. How can you dare to write that "FOSS has yet to produce great software that fills every need"? This is just bullshit. I use my laptop every day using Debian, and it has ALL of what I need, from beginning to end. And YES, I do want to use a DISTRIBUTION, with all what it means: packaging, bug tracking, package quality checks, security review and updates. I never asked the author to do the packaging work, most do not and ever will. Have a look at the maintainer list in Debian, and see that it has nothing to do with the "upstream" list.
      There is ZERO, (read me, I insist) absolutely ZERO advantage of an app store over a package repository. You are just making assumption over what you can SEE RIGHT NOW, and not even trying to imagine what would happen with a real open standard (not a fake open standard with a proprietary Android store hosted on a private network...).

    5. Re:Who needs Android? by Xtifr · · Score: 1

      No Yum, apt-get, and Synaptic are NOT a replacement for an App store.

      Indeed, as someone who uses both on a daily basis, I have to say that apt-get and synaptic are vastly superior to the utter mess that is Android Market. About 75% of the apps I download from the Market actually work--apparently this has something to do with something called "cupcake", but nowhere does it explain what a cupcake is or why it would affect my phone. The reviews are nice, except that so many of them are posted by people who are obviously complete imbeciles; I half-trust the game reviews[*], but aside from that there seems to be no correlation (positive or negative) between an app's rating and its actual qualities[**]

      As a developer, I suppose I can see something to some of your arguments about the advantages of Market to a developer, but as a user, I think Aptitude kicks ass!

      [*] with notable exceptions: the reviews for "Zombie, Run", for example, show a widespread ignorance about what the game is and how it's supposed to work. Granted, a video game that must be played outdoors is pretty unusual, but there are a truly appalling number of reviews posted by people who obviously couldn't figure out that it has to be played outdoors despite the fact that the very first thing it says is, "you must be outdoors with a clear view of the sky to play this game".

      [**] Normally, I tend to see people giving an app a bad review because they're idiots, but sometimes it's the opposite, as with the small handful of virus scanners (!) that are available. Yes, there are actually companies charging money for Linux virus scanners.

    6. Re:Who needs Android? by Bert64 · · Score: 1

      X is not the big performance hit it was in the days when workstations had 4mb of ram and isa videocards, and you could run a stripped down version on a small device which removed the network transparency and other such featured.

      Open source applications are also CPU agnostic, they can be and usually are compiled for all different kinds of CPU.

      The app store is basically a copy of the repositories like apt which Linux has had for years, they could do with a better interface and some promotion so that users know they are actually there, but it's the same functionality.

      The ability of authors to update their apps in an app store can easily be replicated to a distro repository, and third party repositories are easy to set up... Maemo (nokia's tablet platform) seems to handle it quite well, you can click on a link in the browser and it will add a repository then install the package for you.

      Repositories can also handle closed source apps, tho obviously this is discouraged because of all the disadvantages of not having the source available.

      --
      http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
    7. Re:Who needs Android? by spitzak · · Score: 1

      Yes there is a lot of great FOSS but FOSS has yet to produce great software that fills every need.

      You really need to get out more if you think it is impossible to run non-FOSS software on Linux. That is a totally ignorant statement, and one of the oldest pieces of FUD out there.

    8. Re:Who needs Android? by LWATCDR · · Score: 1

      Really?
      Okay then show me the proffional level FOSS CAD system that supports importing Solidworks, IGES, and will create STL?
      Show me a FOSS Digital Video Editing system as good as Sony Vegas?
      Show me a FLOSS Flight Simulator that is as good as FSX or X-Plane.
      Woopie you find that Debian does everything you need. Guess what sparky there are people that find Win 98 does everything they need as well.

      --
      See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
    9. Re:Who needs Android? by LWATCDR · · Score: 1

      Oh you can but it is really hard to market software for Linux.
      You will see very few inexpensive end user style software for Linux. Now heavy duty server style software is available.
      The thing here is that It is really hard to market closed source packages and it is hard to find them.
      An app store would make that easier. I never said that you couldn't run closed source. I just said that there isn't a healthy closed source Linux application community.

      --
      See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
    10. Re:Who needs Android? by LWATCDR · · Score: 1

      "you could run a stripped down version on a small device which removed the network transparency and other such featured."
      Then it really isn't X is it?

      "Open source applications are also CPU agnostic, they can be and usually are compiled for all different kinds of CPU."
      Yea but 90%+ of Linux users don't compile software they install binaries and you really wouldn't want to compile apps on a smartbook.

      "The app store is basically a copy of the repositories like apt which Linux has had for years, they could do with a better interface and some promotion so that users know they are actually there, but it's the same functionality."
      No it really isn't It doesn't handle selling software. Hence the name store.
      "The ability of authors to update their apps in an app store can easily be replicated to a distro repository, "
      But it isn't.
      "and third party repositories are easy to set up"
      Yea sure it is but I don't know that I want to write a program set up a repository and then give it away. That is a lot of work. I have written FOSS and contributed to FOSS but the rest of all that is a hassle.
      Also setting up a third party repository is easy for me as a user but it is not trivial for the classic "Aunt Tillie" user.
      "Repositories can also handle closed source apps, tho obviously this is discouraged"

      So repositories are just like an app store except.
      There user interface isn't that good.
      They doesn't handle actually selling software.
      They are not set up for the developers to control the release cycle of their own software. Well not yet.
      And they could have commercial software but they discourage that.
      So yea the repositories are just like an App Store.
      Android's run anywhere nature is nice but not a must have feature.
      Android's lighter, simpler, and hopefully higher preforming video system is also nice but again X might work.
      The App store is the real advantage. That is what Linux really needs.
      Now yes any App store really needs to include some of the great features of the current repositories. It must include the update and resolving dependencies features that we have now with the ability to sell software, post reviews, and allow the authors to update their software.

      --
      See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
    11. Re:Who needs Android? by bhtooefr · · Score: 1

      Except it's the other way around. The various "smartbook" chip makers (Qualcomm, Freescale, and TI) are pushing Android on these "smartbooks."

      Want to know what a smartbook is? Hardware-wise, it's a netbook with an ARM CPU.

      What the GP was saying was that running regular Linux would make more sense.

    12. Re:Who needs Android? by GPLHost-Thomas · · Score: 1

      All the above are VERY specialized applications. It's all but for everyone. So many people don't even know what it is about, or even saw this kind of application. Also, do you see them running on a mobile device? Not relevant at all... Thomas

    13. Re:Who needs Android? by LWATCDR · · Score: 1

      And it is a very clear response to your statment.
      "The post above is really stupid. How can you dare to write that "FOSS has yet to produce great software that fills every need"? This is just bullshit."
      Yes they are specialized applications. I wouldn't call them very specialized since you can buy Sony Vegas and Adobe Premier at just about every Best Buy and Office Max. I also wouldn't call 3D cad all that specialized since you can also buy TurboCAD just about everywhere and AutoCAD/Solidworks is taught at every community college.
      FSX and X-Plane? Go to Best Buy and they are on the self and there are magazines dedicated to them. Not exactly exotic stuff.
      Now you want to limit it to just software for mobile devices even though we where talking about netbooks?
      Okay how about turn by turn GPS navigation?
      Yes you wouldn't use a netbook to run SolidWorks but you sure could use to run the eparts viewer in the field. As they get faster and faster I could see people using them to run a video editor in a pinch for standard def video.
      And FSX? Games? Yea nobody would ever use a netbook to play a flight simulator. That is why there isn't one for the iPhone... Oh wait there are several versions of X-Plane for the iPhone....

      I stand by my statment and I have backed it up several examples. FOSS has failed to provide high quality programs that fill every need. As long as that statment is true then Linux needs closed source software if it too be as useful as Windows. OS/X still lags in some areas as well like CAD when compared to Windows. Last time I looked ProE was available for Linux which is great. I just wish SolidWorks was as well. Also TurboCad 3d would be nice for a low end solution.

      --
      See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
    14. Re:Who needs Android? by GPLHost-Thomas · · Score: 1

      Wow! What an argument ... If it's a Best Buy, then...
      Never the less, I, like many I suppose, will never have the use of a CAD software. However, there is still qcad available NOW in Lenny: "With QCad 2 you can easily construct and change drawings with ISO-texts and many other features and save them as DXF-files. These DXF-files are the interface to many CAD-systems such as AutoCADR and many others.". I never used it, so I can't tell you if it's any good, but the description seems pretty solid. There's also kino and pitivi for movie edition.
      Now about GPS navigation system, the issue here is the copyright of the navigable maps. These are pretty expensive, and unless somebody decide to invest millions to release them for free, this is not going to change. However, the software itself can be free, it is still useless.
      Now, frankly, who cares about stupid games? Not me at least, I have other stuffs to do...

    15. Re:Who needs Android? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Technically correct, but (remaining anonymous) I remember when someone first explained http to me back in the dark ages. I said that I thought that it was interesting, but what did it really provide the ftp didn't? I could already visit a site, look for information and download what I needed. All http added (especially in the early days) was a slightly nicer view.

      How is that different from Android/Linux today?

    16. Re:Who needs Android? by LWATCDR · · Score: 1

      If it is at Best Buy then it sure isn't highly specialized.
      Qcad is only for 2D and frankly it is pretty bad.
      Kino and pitivi are also just not good enough yet. At least they do seem to be improving.
      So if you don't use then it isn't important?
      Wow it must be nice the the universe is centered on you. So far your statements have done nothing but prove my argument.
      Let's go through it step by step so you can under stand.
      I made the statment that FOSS has failed to proved quality software for every need.
      You disagreed with that statment and said that it was bullshit.
      I gave examples of server types of software that FOSS has yet provide really good competitors.
      You then claimed that the types of software I used for examples where "highly specialized".
      Where I then I showed that they where for sale at one of the most common software stores on the planet.
      Where you simply dismiss that and state that you don't need that software so it doesn't matter.
      You then throw out some basic software that isn't really even close to good enough. Oh and then throw out that you don't care about games?
      Do you not see that nothing you said really carries any proof with it and your dismissals of my statment are well I don't use that software.

      --
      See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
    17. Re:Who needs Android? by GPLHost-Thomas · · Score: 1

      Tsss... Why would something important FOR YOU be the rule for everyone, and then I'm the one that is wrong? Sorry man, I have a different view on it, even if you don't like it.
      I have stopped using windows completely few years ago, and I DON'T MISS A SINGLE PIECE OF SOFTWARE. And you know what? I'm not the only one in this case. So, FOSS is not good FOR YOU that need advanced CAD, movie editions and games. I really don't think that the majority of users have these needs. If you don't understand my point, be it, move on...
      Plus you miss the point of the thread: it's about PORTABLE devices. Are you really willing to say that CAD, movie edition and games are mandatory to have a good portable device platform? If yes, then that's really bullshit. Especially that I don't think there is Adobe premier or any kind of CAD app for Android or WindowsCE, or even any other embedded OS. Sure, there are plenty of stupid silly games that have nothing to do with the one on the big platforms, but WHO CARES? Certainly not the big majority.

    18. Re:Who needs Android? by LWATCDR · · Score: 1

      Wow the level of self delusion is really high. I don't use any digital video editors but I know a number of people that do. I do use CAD but I don't really play a lot of games but a lot of people do. It is you that is under the illusion that your needs fit everybody else not I. What you don't get is that you are the small minority. Just about everybody has one or two programs that they must use that right now only run under Windows or maybe Mac OS/X.
      It could be iTunes so they can update their iPod, or TurboTax to do their taxes. or QuickBooks to run their small business, or Cad program, or a game they really like, or the software that Plays Blu-Ray disks, or PhotoShop, or even Sony Vegas to edit their movies.
      While this thread is about mobile devices the question was what does Android have that Linux doesn't. The answer is a way to sell software. The ability to offer a viable market place for software developers will increase their interest in a system. Apple proved that with the iTunes Apps Store.
      If you increase the total number of programs available you will give the end user more choices. I also believe that is what Linux is lacking in general.
      If you want more people to use Linux then there really needs to be a way to sell software. Frankly if their was a real App Store you could even sell GPL software. Yes selling software is completely within the GPL. When you buy the software you could have the option of getting just the binary, binary+source, or just source.
      That would really help with producing a viable business model for FOSS. Of course I would say leave it open to FOSS and Closed source and let the market decide.
      But if you want to limit it to just the mobile segment which I think is dumb. We are not talking about a cell phone here but a small ARM based notebook. However if you insist I will simply show the evidence. Apple's iPhone went from a zero software base to a large and diverse software base in what? Two years or so? The majority of end users are happy. There is a large selction of both free and pay software and for the most part the developers seem pretty happy. Not everybody is but most seem to be happy with the outcome. Now Palm, Microsoft, Google, RIM, and Nokia all must think it is a good idea since they are all now doing the same thing.

      --
      See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
    19. Re:Who needs Android? by GPLHost-Thomas · · Score: 1

      WHAT??? I can't believe what I just read. SELL GPL SOFTWARE? Are you nuts?
      Your iPod thing is just a dumb argument. People that buy an iPod later needs to use a stupid iPod software because in the first place, they decided to use a proprietary system that can't even show the files when you plug-in a USB wire. It's their call, and there's no way we'll ever be able to convince these guys to move to Free software: they like their choice of using proprietary stuff.
      Now, you are again swearing with your proprietary software names. I can as well: gnu-cash, k3b, vlc, gimp. Does it make any difference? No, as you don't want to see the evidence: the alternative exist, you just don't like it.
      Now what you think people like in the "app stores" is just the ability to actually install any kind of app without too much issues (few clicks, done). NOT buying them. This is a non-sense.
      Can we MOVE ON to another topic, as it's obvious that we wont ever agree?

    20. Re:Who needs Android? by LWATCDR · · Score: 1

      Yes you can sell GPL software. Well not sell it but charge to distribute it. Close enough since Microsoft doesn't sell Windows but a license to use it.
      http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/selling.html
      Right from GNU.
      And no alternatives don't exists for every proprietary package. GIMP is great it is a good alternative to Photoshop Elements. It doesn't have many features that proffesionals need so it isn't a replacement for Photoshop. GNU-Cash doesn't replace QuickBooks for sure but it isn't bad compared to Quicken. k3b and vlc are very good. I tend to use Gnome myself so I am not a big k3b user.
      You just keep going off on tangents and just don't get it that you where wrong when you said that my orginal statment was bullshit. It isn't up for debate since I have proven as sure as 1+1 is 2. And please before you go off saying what you can and can not do with the GPL at least read it. FOSS doesn't always mean Free as in Beer. Another example of a company that charges to distrubute GPL software is RedHat. You may not have heard about them. They are this little Linux company in North Carolina.

      --
      See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
    21. Re:Who needs Android? by GPLHost-Thomas · · Score: 1

      That is exactly one of the reasons that make me hate RedHat. What they do is NOT Free as freedom, as they charge for the software itself, and not for distributing it. This is the very reason why CentOS exists. Read the DFSG and you might understand why so many insist on full freedom, not just open source. Read the 3 free tests (dissident, desert island, tentacle of evil) that every single application in Debian has to pass to get in.
      Now you DID pretend that there was no alternative. This is plain wrong. Now you are changing your mind, saying that the alternative are LESS good (in every single area mentioned). That's a hell of a difference. For most, the alternatives are enough, and this is my very point. I never pretended that GIMP is better than Photoshop, in fact, I believe the opposite. But I, at the same time, believe that the vast majority don't need at all a full photoshop, and that GIMP is enough (and only to take this example, of course I think about it in general). This is why I said that unless you have professional needs, you don't need the software you mentioned.
      But most importantly, all these FREE software are available NOW, on all platforms, including ARM. And this is why I wrote: who needs Android, when we have all apps available NOW? Who needs to wait even one month or one year more that people build very limited apps when we have all this available for all processors? Also, why would I change my habits, and have different software on my phone, netbook, and workstation when it can all be the SAME software? I don't want to spend my time searching for unknown apps... That is counter productive. I want the one that I'm already used to, working everywhere. That is: pidgin, open office, firefox, thunderbird, etc. No need to reinvent everything.
      Also, having all my life stored on google servers, thanks ... but no thanks. I don't trust big corps, I don't use Facebook, Gmail, Hotmail and all this. And you know what? I wish that there was some alternatives for chat networks, because I hate the fact that everybody uses MSN / Yahoo / Gtalk / etc.
      If you don't mind all what I said above, don't care for your freedom and privacy, trust big corps, or paying for apps that are already in the public domain, then go for your silly choice. NEVER, I will make that one, I had enough of it already, forced by other users like you.

    22. Re:Who needs Android? by LWATCDR · · Score: 1

      An application that isn't good enough isn't an alternative.
      GIMP is great for a lot of people. I think GIMP may someday actually be as good or maybe even better than Photoshop since it keeps improving all the time. But right now if you are a professional doing print work GIMP just isn't good enough. It isn't an alternative because it can not do what they need it to do.
      For 3D CAD there is no alternative that will work. So no there is no alternative in that category. Video editing is also on that currently lacks software that is good enough. I know people that produce Linux video podcasts that pull their hair out because they have to keep an Windows partion still because of a lack of good enough FOSS video software.
      You see I do support Linux and FOSS but I am practical. I would much rather see somebody running Linux, Firefox, GIMP, VLC, Evolution and QuickBook.
      Than that same person running Windows Vista, IE, Photoshop Elements, Window MediaPlayer, Outlook, and QuickBooks.
      Hey if you do don't want to use Facebook or Google that if your little problem. I have no problem with Facebook because I simply keep my private life seperate from my public one. I don't worry about big companies keeping my private life private because I do that myself.
      Oh and GPL programs are NOT in the Public Domain.
      Silly silly person.

      --
      See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
    23. Re:Who needs Android? by GPLHost-Thomas · · Score: 1

      That is IT! Finally, even if you don't want to admit it, you do agree, you have just admit it. You talked about PROFESSIONAL usage of Photoshop, CAD, etc. Reality, is that you have to be a SPECIALIST to have these needs, and for the most majority of users, you don't.

    24. Re:Who needs Android? by cheesybagel · · Score: 1
      This is a talk about mobile devices. No one in their right mind will do CAD in one of those and you will not find one for your iPhone or Windows Mobile device either.

      Most people I know in the media business have been switching to MacOS X for quite some time. There are exceptions, like the movie industry, where they use Linux quite a lot. This is why you see 3D modeling software such as Autodesk Maya on Linux, while LightWave is being ported. On the OSS front there is Blender, which despite its interface has gained quite a following. For 2D image editing there is the GIMP. You do not need CMYK support to do video or web work. But we are talking niches here. Either of those are niche products most people will not use. What I find interesting is that I have been keeping a count of the number of applications I install on Windows and found the list of OSS applications keeps increasing, while the list of closed source applications keeps decreasing. Firefox, WinSCP, 7-zip, Putty, TeX, TortoiseSVN, X-Chat, Vim, DOSBox (because Microsoft cannot even emulate their own OS properly), OpenOffice.org, Media Player Classic are just some examples. FWIW I mostly run Windows for playing games. Yes, I use Windows as a glorified video console.

    25. Re:Who needs Android? by LWATCDR · · Score: 1

      But that is the point.
      The problem is almost everybody has ONE application that must use that only runs on Windows.
      Almost all the FOSS software will run on Windows so people stay on Windows.
      That One program may be something you need for work, a hobby, to do your Taxes, or in your case games.
      With out a healthy closed source community to fill those needs then Linux can not replace Windows for a very very very large number of people.

      --
      See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
    26. Re:Who needs Android? by LWATCDR · · Score: 1

      Ahh now I under stand.
      English isn't your first language.
      That is why you don't understand the word EVERY.
      As in the statment that FOSS has failed to produce good solutions for EVERY need.
      EVERY means all inclusive.

      What you don't get is just about everybody has the need for at least one Professional level program. It maybe something as common as QuickBooks which GNUCash isn't a replacement for.
      Or even TurboTax to do your taxes.
      As long as there is one program that you MUST have windows to run you must have Windows.
      And until there is an easy way for the developers of those programs to sell them on Linux then a very large or even the majority of people can not use Linux as their primary OS.
      Here is one last good example.
      My wife Has both Linux and Windows on her Desktop. She mainly uses Windows because she has Photoshop Elements.
      She likes GIMP much better than Elements but there are some actions that she has to use that only work in Elements.
      So it is easier for her to install GIMP under Windows and then switch back and forth between the two programs.
      Now if Elements was available for Linux she wouldn't have to do that as often.
      THAT is why most people can not go Windows only. Because they have one or two must have programs that only run under Windows and the FOSS community has yet to create programs that work as well or because of the popularity of the application there are tools that only work with that application.
      If you give developers an easy way to sell software for Linux than we increase our options.
      YOU DON"T HAVE TO BUY DIDDLY so it takes NOTHING AWAY FROM YOU. But it gives people more options.
      Your a great example of what is wrong with many Linux zealots. It is your way or the highway and you are sure you can not possibly be wrong.
      An App store is a great way to increase the number of developers for a platform. The Apple iPhone Apps store is a great example. That platform has gone from having almost no software to what? Tens or hundreds of thousands of applications in what two or three years?

      --
      See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
    27. Re:Who needs Android? by GPLHost-Thomas · · Score: 1

      I had enough of this, I'm not replying. BTW, your signature should warned me that you deserve a godwin point for each of your post...

  16. YOyu FAIL IT by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    knows fhor sure what

  17. Why is this surprising? by somenickname · · Score: 2, Interesting

    A company that only begrudgingly supports linux with a massive binary blob and no real support thinks that it may be easier to support a platform where that kind of treatment is considered the norm. This does not surprise me. I have a lot of respect for the nvidia linux engineers and they seem like knowledgeable and good guys but, I would imagine that management has tied their hands and this is a political rather than an engineering decision.

    1. Re:Why is this surprising? by djeaux · · Score: 1

      I would imagine that ... this is a political rather than an engineering decision.

      I would imagine you are correct. Just based on the years I spent in management, I'd say about 85-90% of corporate decisions are based on "politics" or "marketing." Engineering only gets a small slice of the remaining 10-15%...

      --
      "Obviously, I'm not an IBM computer any more than I'm an ashtray" (Bob Dylan)
    2. Re:Why is this surprising? by not+already+in+use · · Score: 0, Troll

      You linux folk should be grateful for the fact that they release a driver at all. It's not like they get any return for creating a driver that allows a handful of people to run a hardware accelerated compiz desktops. Until linux becomes a viable platform for the desktop (which it never will be, because of flawed ideologies), be thankful for any corporate *desktop* support you get.

      --
      Similes are like metaphors
    3. Re:Why is this surprising? by not+already+in+use · · Score: 1

      Drawing a parallel, American car companies spend far more money on marketing than R&D. Japanese car companies are the opposite. Look how that turned out.

      That being said, Windows CE is rock solid, has a familiar API, and if extremely mature. There is no reason to believe that this isn't a solid engineering decision, albeit a not-so-popular decision here on slashdot.

      --
      Similes are like metaphors
    4. Re:Why is this surprising? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "no real support" ? whatever do you mean, there is infinitely better support and drivers from nvidia than from intel or ati.
      ATI's driver doesn't compile on latest kernels without voodoo, Intel's hasn't worked properly for over 8 months, check out freedesktop's bugtracker, see for yourself, all those hard crashes when switching VTs and suspending/resuming, running GL apps..

    5. Re:Why is this surprising? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      but they are free as in beer.. don't you know the church of linux frowns upon free beer.. you heretic!

    6. Re:Why is this surprising? by Tetsujin · · Score: 1

      You linux folk should be grateful for the fact that they release a driver at all. It's not like they get any return for creating a driver that allows a handful of people to run a hardware accelerated compiz desktops.

      "Troll", huh? I don't know. I actually think this is a pretty reasonable perspective. NVidia must have had their reasons for releasing drivers for Linux - honestly, though, I don't know what those reasons would be.

      Until linux becomes a viable platform for the desktop (which it never will be, because of flawed ideologies), be thankful for any corporate *desktop* support you get.

      This part, though... ho hum. Any time somebody talks about "Linux on the desktop" my brain shuts down. It's just such a boring issue. I don't care. I don't care if "grandma" can't figure Linux out. Linux is on my desktop (and laptop) and I quite enjoy it.

      Damned if I know what flawed ideologies you refer to... but I am curious.

      --
      Bow-ties are cool.
    7. Re:Why is this surprising? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Damned if I know what flawed ideologies you refer to... but I am curious.

      After 17 years of happily using Linux, I've finally realized that to these folks "the desktop" means "access to wallets" in the same way that TV, radio, and the printed page once did. There is zero recognition that Linux has already been satisfying its core audience (technical people who use computers as tools) since its very earliest days. Of course, Linux as a whole has no idealogy; it is simply produced and expanded by a mass of people serving their own personal goals.

      I think he's one of those born-again Capitalists who always "get to the bottom line" and find it heretical to have any goals that are not the shortest path to establishing or growing mass-market consumer sales volume. They cannot comprehend that Linux is driven by user goals rather than "content producer" or industrial goals, and the idea that user goals might go beyond mindless consumption is also frightening to their ilk.

      Linux has supported my entire career since I did my small part to help get affordable, accelerated 2D graphics working on my own computer scientist's and software developer's workstation. I have always been paid to create OSS-licensed software, and I can only hope that others in my application domains find it as useful as I've found all the Linux stuff that has been graciously provided to me by others who felt the need to create this wonderful technologist's platform.

    8. Re:Why is this surprising? by not+already+in+use · · Score: 1

      There is zero recognition that Linux has already been satisfying its core audience

      I recognize this entirely. But very few Linux users seem satisfied. They do, however, feel entitled to the IP of companies who have invested untold millions in R&D, chastising anyone who would dare release a blob. Which, as I pointed out, they should be grateful for considering what little, if any, return they're getting.

      I've finally realized that to these folks "the desktop" means "access to wallets" in the same way that TV, radio, and the printed page once did.

      Wrong again. After 10 years of using Linux, I've learned that the GPL means "whats yours is mine and what's mine is mine," in a corporate context at least. You want some company to GPL their code. Then, in order for said company to use GPL'd code, they'd have to change their entire business model, for a far less profitable one, the process alone costing millions. The irony, of course, is that the community claims that open sourcing code allows the community to do the porting itself. Which of course is bullshit. They get the open source code, and then cry and complain that the company isn't putting forth an effort to port it *FOR* them. Best example to date being Chrome.

      I think he's one of those born-again Capitalists who always "get to the bottom line" and find it heretical to have any goals that are not the shortest path to establishing or growing mass-market consumer sales volume.

      Wrong once again. I'm not the one talking down to a company who invested time and money to release a driver for my platform of choice, because they released a binary only and care to protect their IP. I'm not the one advocating the "you're either with us or against us" mentality. The point I'm making, is that some companies want to make money. Some want to protect their IP. YOU are flawed in thinking there is something wrong with that.

      --
      Similes are like metaphors
    9. Re:Why is this surprising? by not+already+in+use · · Score: 1

      I responded to the child of your post, if interested.

      --
      Similes are like metaphors
    10. Re:Why is this surprising? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      As someone who's worked at NVIDIA, you're probably correct. NVIDIA is a company, not a person, and their decisions don't reflect any sort of "attitude" for or against Linux; they do what makes business sense. Most of the engineers are good guys who are concerned only with making a decent product that people will want to buy, and they complain about Windows just as much as we do :) Plenty of them use linux themselves, and hell, down the hall someone had a poster up (from a redhat conference I think) of the whole linux 0.1 source.

      Also, I wouldn't say they support Linux only "begrudgingly", as most of their non-gamer market uses linux (hello, render farms). It makes up a substantial slice of their market. I guess though that any 'attitude' they do have is warranted by the fact that the loudest linux users are the ones with complaints. (They actually post all the good mail they get from linux users, saying "See, not all of them are rude.")

    11. Re:Why is this surprising? by Quantumstate · · Score: 1

      I think the market share would be large enough to make it worth the time. Putting Linux use at 1% that is still a pretty large section of the market and Linux users will be the kind of people who will know to look elsewhere. Also the extra work needed probably isn't that large since they already have to write drivers for Apple which is a *nix system.

  18. dirty pirate by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    you stole that quote from george satayana you dirty fucking pirate

    suck my cock

  19. Non-sense quote about device support by Joseph+Lam · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Mike Rayfield:

    "The world soundly rejected the first netbooks that came out with Linux," he said. "Printers didn't work, and devices didn't get recognized. The whole thing was a mess."

    And how is Windows CE/Mobile any better in that regard? I would think it's even worse.

    1. Re:Non-sense quote about device support by SaDan · · Score: 1

      Someone needs to remind nVidia of the IBM Workpad z50

      http://www.hpcfactor.com/reviews/hardware/ibm/workpad-z50/

    2. Re:Non-sense quote about device support by LWATCDR · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Actually it could be worse.
      How many people will buy a printer that "works with windows" only to have it fail on a WINCE netbook?
      Hey Windows is Windows.

      --
      See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
    3. Re:Non-sense quote about device support by dunkelfalke · · Score: 1

      CE 6 comes with a lot of drivers. The fact that it was offered for a lot of time for lots of very different devices helps.

      --
      "It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
    4. Re:Non-sense quote about device support by shutdown+-p+now · · Score: 1

      Actually, I'm looking at the specs of that thing now, and thinking that it would be a wonderful netbook today if kept to the same form-factor, but upgrading the hardware (CPU, RAM and display). If only because it has TrackPoint.

    5. Re:Non-sense quote about device support by SaDan · · Score: 1

      I have one, and the only thing it really lacks is resolution on the LCD. It's snappy in WinCE, and can boot and run NetBSD and Linux (although NetBSD supports more of the hardware and runs faster).

      I need to get some more RAM and storage for the device, as well as a WiFi card, and I'll be set.

  20. Of Course by bertoelcon · · Score: 2, Insightful

    The Zune HD that has been said to have a version of Win CE as the OS.

    --
    Anything can be found funny, from a certain point of view.
    1. Re:Of Course by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Like it would use Mac OSX or OpenBSD instead?

  21. A bunch of FUD? by xlotlu · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Maybe I don't get it, but this looks like a concerted FUD campaign against Android. I don't know much about the Android internals, but isn't graphics hardware acceleration handled in the DRM part of the Linux kernel? What does this have to do with Android?

    Presumably Android would have to implement the rest of DRI (if they don't use the existing Linux infrastructure / didn't do so already), and next their equivalent of a X.org video driver. But what's the big deal?

    Also, all video and graphics rendering in Android is done today by the operating system's Java code, a technique he says is too slow for HD video.

    "There's no hardware acceleration. It's all software," Rayfield said.

    So, huh? Because it's Java it can't use hardware acceleration?

    Other major problems include the fact that the Android icons are too large, and apparently it's gonna take one year to make them small... Well, that makes a lotta sense.

    It would make more sense if nVidia said "We're already having a hard time with binary blobs for those lousy x86 linux geeks. Now they want to do that for ARM too, and even worse, for something that doesn't use the X.org architecture. I say we better get together again next year."

    1. Re:A bunch of FUD? by not+already+in+use · · Score: 1

      >Because it's Java it can't use hardware acceleration? If they really are bound to java, they're at google's mercy for hardware accelerated bindings.

      Windows CE supports drivers much the way desktop windows does, so there is flexibility and familiarity there. I used to own an HTC Fuze running Windows Mobile 6.5, which had an ATI chip and drivers for hardware acceleration. It is already being done.

      --
      Similes are like metaphors
    2. Re:A bunch of FUD? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Presumably Android would have to implement the rest of DRI (if they don't use the existing Linux infrastructure / didn't do so already), and next their equivalent of a X.org video driver. But what's the big deal?

      It's an OS designed to run a phone, that's the big deal.Think of it. X11, DRI, hardware acceleration... On a phone. Why? If somebody else wants to fork it into a netbook OS, that's their prerogative, and nothing stops them from doing it themselves, but why on earth is it so bloody hard to grasp that it's meant to run on a phone, and that phones and laptops have different requirements?

       

      So, huh? Because it's Java it can't use hardware acceleration?

      Uh, no. It's only pointing out that there's no hardware acceleration, only software acceleration (and it happens to be written in Java), which is too slow for HD video - again, because it's meant to run on a phone. You don't really need hardware accelerated video on a phone.

       

      Other major problems include the fact that the Android icons are too large, and apparently it's gonna take one year to make them small... Well, that makes a lotta sense.

      Sure it does. It's just another thing that just begs for the question, why in the blue hell would you boot an OS designed to run on a phone, on a netbook? It makes absolutely no sense! A netbook isn't a phone, there are vastly different requirements that need to be met, for different functionality, and completely different design and implementation requirements, both in terms of UI and the OS itself,

      WinCE is already tooled and designed for use on embedded and real time systems (not to be mistaken for Windows Mobile, which is tooled and designed for mobile devices like phones, expressly), and it's still a fairly silly choice for a netbook, too, given that a netbook is neither an embedded, nor a real-time device, but it's nowhere near as absurd as using an OS designed for use on a phone.

       

      Now they want to do that for ARM too, and even worse, for something that doesn't use the X.org architecture. I say we better get together again next year."

      They don't really use the X11 architecture on x86 Linux, either, in fairness, I'm not certain weather they still do this, but they used to replace huge chunks of the X11 graphics layer with their own code, which was commonly used to explain why the proprietary Nvidia drivers performed so well.

      It really has nothing to do with blobs (their Windows and OS X drivers are blobs, too, after all), it has to do with Android just not having the infrastructure for that sort of thing (by design!), it's one thing to re-write certain chunks of the graphics subsystem on x86 Linux, it's another thing entirely to implement the graphics infrastructure as a whole - that shouldn't be left up to Nvidia.

      Side bar, what's up with Slashdot ignoring line breaks?

    3. Re:A bunch of FUD? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I don't understand why he said this. There IS hardware acceleration! There are 3d opengl games on the platform already!

  22. corruption and collusion by speedtux · · Score: 4, Interesting

    After twenty years of Microsoft corrupting the industry and colluding with other companies to place their products, how can anybody take such statements seriously? Nvidia has strong ties to Microsoft, and when Microsoft tells them to jump, they simply ask "how high".

    Personally, I think Android is not a very good choice for netbooks; Ubuntu Netbook edition is a much better choice. But Windows CE wouldn't even make my list of a usable netbook operating system.

    1. Re:corruption and collusion by GodfatherofSoul · · Score: 1

      That's not a fair comment. The problem with WinCE isn't that it's a terrible OS, it's that it wasn't designed from the ground up to be a mobile OS (or at least scalable). I've been developing for WinCE for about 3 years now, and the problem's I see are more 1.) M$'s crappy documentation and support for any of it's esoteric APIs, 2.) It's just not an efficient OS. , and 3.) the asinine decision to use a desktop UI model on a screen 2 x 3 inches square. It's a no brainer for a CEO to go with the devil he knows rather than hoping that Google will get its act together before he plans on going production.

      --
      I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
    2. Re:corruption and collusion by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Nvidia has strong ties to Microsoft, and when Microsoft tells them to jump, they simply ask 'how high'."

      Ha! If they were actually true I would have had drivers for Windows Vista launch that were not crap.

    3. Re:corruption and collusion by Dragonslicer · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Personally, I think Android is not a very good choice for netbooks; Ubuntu Netbook edition is a much better choice.

      It's disturbing how many people still don't realize that software that's designed for a specific purpose is better at that purpose than software that was designed for some other purpose.

    4. Re:corruption and collusion by gemada · · Score: 2, Insightful

      WinCE isn't even a good OS for phones...unless you enjoy rebooting your phone twice a day. And try suppporting activesync for desktops for a while and see how soon you want to send all WinCE devices to the bottom of the sea.

    5. Re:corruption and collusion by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I dunno, maybe they are saying one thing, and doing another?

      NVIDIA can't afford to lose the love of Microsoft right now, so maybe, just maybe, they are saying that WinCE is the "best thing evar", while working to build support for Andriod (or whatever). It is clear that Microsoft is not doing a very good job supporting the mobile device ecosystem, but that doesn't mean that NVIDIA can walk away from the desktop market and publicly embrace non-Microsoft offerings in the mobile market.

    6. Re:corruption and collusion by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well, although the boundaries are kind of fluid. UNIX and Linux originally ran on limited hardware with 800x600 screens. Gnome, of course, wasn't designed for that.

      Windows CE was designed for PDAs and embedded systems. It was lousy at PDAs, demonstrating that even if a company throws a ton of money at developing something for a specific purpose, they can still deliver a dud.

      Android was designed for phones and seems pretty good there, although there is still a lot of work to be done. I reserve judgment on whether Google can make it usable on netbooks.

    7. Re:corruption and collusion by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Just because Android is developed by google doesnt mean it will be good. It is designed for some other reason as Dragonslicer said.

      Try to be realistic.... not a fanboy!

  23. Wrong way around? by FrankDrebin · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Nvidia is busy optimizing its multimedia-savvy Tegra system-on-chip for Windows CE.

    Apparently someone doesn't appreciate the difference between hardware and software.

    --
    Anybody want a peanut?
    1. Re:Wrong way around? by TheRaven64 · · Score: 3, Informative

      Optimising hardware for software is not new, especially in the mobile market place. Most ARM cores, for example, have some specialised instructions to make it easier to implement a JVM (including things like bounds-tested array accessors). A lot also have special instructions in their DSPs aimed at making things like MPEG or H.264 decoding (or even encoding) fast. A GPU is basically a CPU specially targeted towards implementing something like OpenGL or Direct3D.

      That said, optimising a SoC for an OS is a bit weird. You're meant to optimise for the applications, not the OS. If the OS needs the hardware optimised for it, and does much more than keeping out of the way of the apps (and making sure that the apps keep out of each others' way) then the OS is probably fundamentally broken.

      --
      I am TheRaven on Soylent News
    2. Re:Wrong way around? by FrankDrebin · · Score: 1

      Those ARM extensions you cite are implementations of operations specified by machine standards (JVM) or for well-known CPU-bound algorithms (multiply-accumulate for DSP). By their nature those specifications lead to optimized hardware as evidenced by x86/PPC extensions like SSE2/Altivec. Heck, the ARM's RISC instruction set itself is riddled with cool features like predicated execution to avoid pipeline starvation and the barrel-shifter.

      In sharp contrast, however, an OS like WinCE makes specifications squarely pointed at software applications (okay, drivers too). Apples and oranges.

      --
      Anybody want a peanut?
    3. Re:Wrong way around? by unruh · · Score: 1

      You're meant to optimise for the applications, not the OS. If the OS needs the hardware optimised for it, and does much more than keeping out of the way of the apps (and making sure that the apps keep out of each others' way) then the OS is probably fundamentally broken.

      Many CPUs for the embedded market are optimized for running an RTOS -- fast context switches, super fast interrupts etc.

      It does make sense to optimize the CPU for a specific kind of OS.

  24. Why the summary doesn't mention Java? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "Windows CE also has a "low memory footprint and a good collection of apps,"

    Native Linux can be stripped down to be really low on resources, and has multiple times the apps WinCE can count on. Problem solved.

    "For instance, Android screen icons that fit on smartphone screens (usually 4-inches and under) are oversized on a smartbook's 8- or 9-inch screen, he said."

    This is of course bullshit told to hide something else, or do we really believe multigazillion dollar companies choose their platform according to icons sizes?
    Anyway, native Linux already counts on lots of small footprint and themable (ie customizable sizes) interfaces. See some projects at maemo.org for an example of native Linux apps running on ARM hardware. Problem solved.

    "Also, all video and graphics rendering in Android is done today by the operating system's Java code, a technique he says is too slow for HD video." "There's no hardware acceleration. It's all software," Rayfield said.

    Native linux offers video acceleration. Problem solved.

    "The world soundly rejected the first netbooks that came out with Linux," he said. "Printers didn't work, and devices didn't get recognized. The whole thing was a mess."

    Well, I have sold a good number of Linux netbooks to a number of non technical people, and all of them asked to install XP after some months citing various difficulties, therefore I can confirm this to be at least in part true. Eventually it turned out all those Linux netbooks recognized their devices, printers, USB stuff and whatnot, but the amount of work required for whatever task the user was doing was "bigger" than on XP, where bigger meant push 4 buttons instead of 3 or open a shell and fire a couple commands instead of pushing a button.
    It's not about being stabler or whatnot: Linux is good for technical people who enjoy chatting with the shell, while Windows users are lazy people who want to minimize the work on the computer to spend their time on other stuff. From this POV Linux wasn't, isn't and will never become a good operating system for the masses without losing its identity by becoming too Windows like.
    For the rest of us, and back to the topic, Native Linux *can* be set up in order to recognize a plethora of peripherals.

    The conclusion? All but one, not even a whole one, of these problems would simply not exist if Java wasn't used. Many of us raised some warnings about that, but Java dev^H^H^Hfanboys who love their language because it's the only one they know dismissed the argument. Thankyou very much.

    For those who still didn't wet their toes with Java, stay well away of that crap.

    1. Re:Why the summary doesn't mention Java? by thePowerOfGrayskull · · Score: 1

      The conclusion? All but one, not even a whole one, of these problems would simply not exist if Java wasn't used. Many of us raised some warnings about that, but Java dev^H^H^Hfanboys who love their language because it's the only one they know dismissed the argument. Thankyou very much.

      Erm... you make a very persuasive argument for a conclusion that reads like "the nvidia rep doesn't know what he's talking about, and I've demonstrated that". But the argument at hand has nothing to do with this conclusion... what can you give in support of "The problem is Java"?

    2. Re:Why the summary doesn't mention Java? by Homer1946 · · Score: 1

      Linux is good for technical people who enjoy chatting with the shell, while Windows users are lazy people who want to minimize the work on the computer to spend their time on other stuff.

      Even though I am someone who hates Windows I have to challenge this. You are saying that if Windows users want to do things other than work on their computer, then they are lazy? I supposed someone who wants to work on research curing cancer instead of spending more time getting their computer to work is lazy.

      Damn, I hate lazy people.

    3. Re:Why the summary doesn't mention Java? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The NVidia rep told that Android is resource hungry, doesn't offer hardware acceleration, doesn't offer a customizable interface and has problems with peripherals.
      So I simply pointed out that since Android is basically Linux plus Java and Linux can be stripped down to be low on resources, supports video acceleration and most peripherals (maybe not as many as XP does, but surely it crushes CE badly on that field), therefore the problem must be Java, which - surprise - is a resource hog and doesn't like direct hardware access.
      I'm not saying by removing Java one would solve all Linux problems on the Android platform, still I'm damn sure the most technical ones would magically disappear.

    4. Re:Why the summary doesn't mention Java? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I apologize for choosing the wrong terms; english is not my native language and I didn't want to be offensive to anyone.
      What I wanted to point out is that the typical Windows user, compared to the typical Linux one (hence huge generalizations here), often doesn't enjoy messing with the computer as the Linux one does. The PC for a windows user is nothing more than a tool to get a result in the shortest possible time, while being at the computer for most linux users is often THE result they want to achieve.
      Even when the computer is used to do some job-related stuff, most Linux users (most, not all) still enjoy spending an evening to code a bash script to do something, while most Windows users simply look for the right app to do the job as fast as possible.
      Of course this is due to the two kinds of users being rather different on the technical side; if you take a Joe User who just installed his first Ubuntu and a skilled Windows programmer you get exactly opposite results, but today Linux users are statistically more technically oriented than Windows ones. In other words they enjoy more messing with stuff that doesn't work, while Windows users hate it, therefore they tend to be seen as "lazy" (on the technical side).

    5. Re:Why the summary doesn't mention Java? by thePowerOfGrayskull · · Score: 1

      therefore the problem must be Java, which - surprise - is a resource hog and doesn't like direct hardware access....

      Ah, ok - that was the link that I wasn't inferring. Thing is, Java isn't nearly as much of a resource hog as people tend to think -- and even less so in the embedded space. It can be stripped down to be pretty damned light - and allow direct hardware acceleration. For the former, cf. any blackberry made in the last four or five years. For the latter - reference M3D API.

      The only problem with Java here is that they (for some reason) chose not to implement standard mobile java -- instead branching off into a completely custom JVM and set of supporting libraries. THis ensures both that apps made for Android can only be run on Android; and that the vast library of existing J2ME apps won't run on Android. Really bad move.

    6. Re:Why the summary doesn't mention Java? by Homer1946 · · Score: 1

      Thank you for the clarification. I do not disagree with your point.

  25. Win CE by zorro-z · · Score: 1

    Only Microsoft would think of releasing a product whose more-or-less-official abbreviation means to grimace in pain.

    More seriously, if WinCE genuinely has a smaller footprint + is more stable than Android, that says something really bad about Android.

    --
    -Z
  26. Wait a minute by Pecisk · · Score: 3, Interesting

    1) Poor UI - what he is talking about? Windows CE is a mess. Yes, Windows Mobile 5 was kinda Teletubies land as Windows XP, but still, it's a huge mess stiched together
    2) Doesn't support devices larger than smartphones? Ohh boy, yes, it doesn't, because it doesn't aim for it!

    Sounds like Microsoft partner trashing competitor. Propably there are technical reasons why Nvidia have chosen Windows CE, but these doesn't sound like valid one.

    --
    user@ubuntubox:~$ stfu This server is going down for shutdown NOW!
    1. Re:Wait a minute by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I had an HP Jornada 820, made around 10 years ago, which was apparently what Microsoft thinks is a Netbook. It had an ARM processor and worked fine, but I ended up abandoning it because it had no https and no pptp. There were several machines like that, in fact, NEC made some with MIPS processors. You can get these machines used for a song.

      With WinCE you need to go look for a version of code compiled for your processor architecture. Generally, you can't find one, because nobody compiles for all the architectures.

      If the machine had been running Linux, I'd have it still today.

    2. Re:Wait a minute by H0p313ss · · Score: 1

      1) Poor UI - what he is talking about? Windows CE is a mess.

      It's all relative... I've been playing with Android on my Freerunner and while kind of sexy for a handheld technically it's not going to win any UI design awards.

      In fact I'd say that for non-technical users (the majority of the market) it's got major usability issues.

      --
      XML is a known as a key material required to create SMD: Software of Mass Destruction
    3. Re:Wait a minute by nxtw · · Score: 3, Informative

      Poor UI - what he is talking about? Windows CE is a mess. Yes, Windows Mobile 5 was kinda Teletubies land as Windows XP, but still, it's a huge mess stiched together

      Although Windows Mobile is based on Windows CE, they are not the same thing. Windows Mobile is a specific set of applications on top of Windows CE with a single (visible) application - a PDA or phone. Windows CE itself can be used with a keyboard and mouse and has the ability to act as a standard desktop system (with multiple windows visible, a method to switch between windows, etc.)

    4. Re:Wait a minute by CannonballHead · · Score: 1

      but still, it's a huge mess stiched together

      As opposed to which OS? :)

  27. Makes sense. by rickb928 · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    I'm guessing nVidia isn't really into the ARM market.

    --
    deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
  28. Optmizing hardware for Windows? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Does any one find this sentence scary: "Nvidia is busy optimizing its multimedia-savvy Tegra system-on-chip for Windows CE."?

    Why are we now optimizing hardware for software? Hardware should be designed to be as accurate and effective as possible. Let the OS optimize itself for the hardware. It is much more difficult to redesign hardware than software (hence the hard- and soft- prefixes). Hopefully, this is just a poorly worded sentence and we are not headed towards Winvidia.

    1. Re:Optmizing hardware for Windows? by CAIMLAS · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Exactly what I was thinking. That is so incredibly ass-backwards - in terms of complexity, man hours, and cost, I don't know what to say. There is a REASON we don't do everything in silicon: it's cheaper, by far, to do it in software. You optimize your OS for the hardware, not vice versa.

      --
      ~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
  29. Yawn... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Dipshit, you're juvenile little tirade isn't impressing anyone.

  30. as an embedded developer using ARM, SH4, MIPS, etc by glebovitz · · Score: 2

    I ask, NVIDIA who?

  31. Then I won't buy NVidia's offering... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ...or that of anybody else who goes with Windows CE.

  32. NVIDIA doesn't like Linux in general on TEGRA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I work for a very large computer manufacture who is coming out with an ARM based PC. We looked at Marvell, Freescale, and NVIDIA. NVIDIA was the only one who has no support for Linux and because of this was marked off right away. Besides there lack of support for Linux there ARM CPU is pretty weak compared to Marvell and Freescale, there only advantage is the GPU. But because of the lack of Linux support we crossed them off right away. There really only hurting themselves.

    1. Re:NVIDIA doesn't like Linux in general on TEGRA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I work for a very large computer manufacture who is coming out with an ARM based PC. We looked at Marvell, Freescale, and NVIDIA. NVIDIA was the only one who has no support for Linux and because of this was marked off right away. Besides their lack of support for Linux their ARM CPU is pretty weak compared to Marvell and Freescale, their only advantage is the GPU. But because of the lack of Linux support we crossed them off right away. They're really only hurting themselves.

      There, fixed that for you... please tell me you aren't a native English speaker.

    2. Re:NVIDIA doesn't like Linux in general on TEGRA by Bert64 · · Score: 1

      He works for a computer manufacturer (note the r, you forgot to correct that), his native language is probably some dialect of chinese.

      --
      http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
  33. The real issue .... by taniwha · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Android doesn't use X - nVidia have drivers for X and for Windows - but not for Android - so no one's choosing nVidia hardware for Android - so nVidia's discouraging people from using Android ....

    Just wait, if they're smart a year from now they'll have Android drivers and wont have a problem with it

    1. Re:The real issue .... by malevolentjelly · · Score: 1

      Android doesn't use X - nVidia have drivers for X and for Windows - but not for Android - so no one's choosing nVidia hardware for Android - so nVidia's discouraging people from using Android ....

      It's not a big deal to write accelerated framebuffer drivers for a firm like Nvidia. Besides, X is not an enabler in this case but a massive hurdle to anyone trying to provide advanced graphics functionality on a linux-based platform, so to Nvidia, the lack of X on Android would actually be a plus. It's not such a big deal that they would license a Microsoft platform instead of using a "free" Google platform, either way. It might have more to do with the greater integration of technology like DirectX into the Windows Mobile platform as opposed to a lot of graphical (GL?) tricks in Android. Windows Mobile is a pretty mature system at this point vs. Android, so perhaps they believe they can squeeze more polish out of the system-- as well as customization and branding. If Nvidia is trying to push Tegra for mobile gaming, I would say Windows Mobile has a much brighter future for that then Android, given Linux's track record with libraries that support game development in general.

      Perhaps that was redundant, though, given the content of the article..

    2. Re:The real issue .... by bhtooefr · · Score: 1

      The other thing is, Tegra is a LOT more GPU-dependent than any other ARM SoC - it's got a CPU that runs at somewhere in the ballpark of 1/6 to 1/4 the speed (and I don't mean clock, I mean performance) of everyone else's Cortex and Snapdragon-based SoCs, IIRC.

  34. not about the hardware by chrwei · · Score: 1

    This is about software and the user interface being useful on a device of the target size and purpose. Android's target is smartphones not things that resemble the offspring of a PDA and ultra-portable laptop and the UI simple doesn't scale to anything bigger than a phone. WinCE's target has always been embedded systems, which do actually resemble these little PC-like devices, especially in the core hardware.

    And just for the record, Windows CE and Windows Mobile are not the same. WM is based on the CE core, but they are no more the same than WinXP and the first gen x86 based XBox are.

    --
    - Disclaimer: Information in this post deemed reliable but not guaranteed.
  35. Scientific computing and CUDA by jellybear · · Score: 1

    NVIDIA are trying to promote CUDA for scientific computing. They should be more careful about antagonizing academics and PhD's.

  36. Re:as an embedded developer using ARM, SH4, MIPS, by xlotlu · · Score: 1

    They have this nifty little SoC called Tegra, announced about 1 year and a half ago, which still has to prove it's not vapourware.

  37. So you propose a "fuck the future" plan by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    A "here and now" business sense makes a pretty bleak future. Eventually software built on a "here and now" business sense will be a big patch-ball of tape and you'll be looking at OSS again. Why avoid it? Don't use proprietary solutions, whether they be WinCE or Android or whatever. Invest your efforts into protecting yourself with compatibility and refinement of the software you use by building on OSS. It reduces the initial investment and provides a good base to build on, and whatever you build will be well defined, adaptable, and compatible in future scenarios.

  38. Hard trolling post ! by T1B0 · · Score: 1

    This post show preferences for both windows over linux and microsoft over google ... Hell of a starving Troll !

  39. ATI driver won't compile without voodoo?? by Tetsujin · · Score: 1

    "no real support" ? whatever do you mean, there is infinitely better support and drivers from nvidia than from intel or ati.
    ATI's driver doesn't compile on latest kernels without voodoo

    Aw, hell... Why do I need an old 3dFX card installed just to get my ATI card working??

    --
    Bow-ties are cool.
  40. Microsoft gives companies a lot of reasons ... by Jerry · · Score: 1

    not to use Linux or Mac.

    If they do they'll get their "Air Supply cut off"... their per/unit price will jump significantly, making them uncompetitive with their competitors ...

    I could go on but space is limited. Microsoft is full of dirty tricks. Just ask James Plamondon and his "Technical Evangelists (TE):
    http://platformevangelism.spaces.live.com/default.aspx
    http://platformevangelism.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!37F174267DC274C!155.entry
    http://www.groklaw.net/pdf/Comes-3096.pdf

    Or the training materials he used, which taught the "Slog" and the "Stuffed Panel":
    http://www.groklaw.net/articlebasic.php?story=20071023002351958

    And financial dirty tricks:
    http://www.billparish.com/msftfraudfacts.html

    Here is a summary of a LOT of Microsoft's dirty tricks, and the reasons why so many "independent" corporations behave as wholly owned subsidiaries of Microsoft:
    http://www.grokdoc.net/index.php/Dirty_Tricks_history

    So, ya, it is no surprise when NVIDIA knucles under to Microsoft, otherwise their video chips would suddenly fail to work as well as those from other video chip vendors, just the way DRDOS "failed" to work as well as MSDOS when users tried to install Win3, which was one of the first of an unending examples of how a copy without ethics operates. An people were surprised that Capitalism exhibited a "flaw" in the current economic crisis?

    --

    Running with Linux for over 20 years!

  41. Why? by Bert64 · · Score: 1

    I never saw the point of using Android or WinCE for netbooks...
    Android because it's new and designed for phones, and would be rather crippled for a laptop.

    CE seems to sell to people who think it's the same as desktop windows, only it's not and those users who bought it thinking that will end up seriously disappointed... You end up with a very limited set of often crippled apps. The only sensible choice for ARM based netbooks, is a decent linux distribution (not the crippled versions that shipped on x86 netbooks), so you have a full selection of software available in an easy to use repository (if you do the repository well people will lap it up, see the iphone app store)... Getting extra apps onto the eee version of xandros was painful, make it easy like apple has and people will love it.

    --
    http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
  42. Big deal...... by Dega704 · · Score: 0, Troll

    In other news Nvidia executives praised windows vista as "the bestest OS ever!" and inconspicuously stuffed away protruding wads of cash in their pockets while a winking Steve Ballmer gave them a thumbs-up from the corner of the room.

    1. Re:Big deal...... by Dega704 · · Score: 1

      FYI I was being satirical in case that wasn't already blatantly obvious.

  43. A cautious, watchful, critical eye? Absolutely by Hucko · · Score: 1

    But that would be a standard business practice; you watch your competitors, old or new.

    For some it is a laugh; for others it is frustrating because they are doing the same as you only cheaper.

    --
    Semi-automatic amateur armchair Australian philosopher; conjecture ready at any moment...
    1. Re:A cautious, watchful, critical eye? Absolutely by GooberToo · · Score: 1

      But that would be a standard business practice; you watch your competitors, old or new.

      You're absolutely right. But there is a big difference between watching and following. In this case, Apple has clearly demonstrated they are no longer the technology leader here. After all, Google is responsible for squarely setting their technology goals (hardware and software) for some time to come. So running scared? No. Falling in line. Yes. Yielding the technology-leader reigns? Absolutely - at least for the next year or so, if not more.

      Few of the highly anticipated 3.0 features are not as a direct result of Android. The new iPhone's hardware is even a direct play from the G1. So running scared? No. Scared and cautious with a watchful eye...absolutely.

  44. My god by Vexorian · · Score: 1

    Does anybody know an actual person that has a) used windows CE and b) did not hate it with all her heart?

    --

    Copyright infringement is "piracy" in the same way DRM is "consumer rape"
    1. Re:My god by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I am a 'him' and do not use Win CE. But I do hate it with all 'her' heart. Hell, yea I do.

    2. Re:My god by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      WinCE and the lack of software available for it killed the PDA market. My grandmother, strangely, was a PDA enthusiast, and after going through several of these devices over the years, ditched them for some sort of 5x10x2 four-pound monster of a mobile device, that has a touchscreen and runs Vista Business.

      WinCE was unfortunate. ActiveSync more so. The reason that PDAs were useless devices had nothing to do with their capabilities; there's little that the iphone/ARM netbooks can do now that could not have been done then.

  45. WindowsCE design decisions by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I have a PDA running under Windows Mobile 2003SE, corresponding to WinCE v4.2 or so, i.e., should be quite mature. Some of the design decisions of that OS are just mind boggling (not sure if they still apply to later versions).

    Try to come up with the most absurd solutions to the following two questions (try be really creative to find the most bizarre solution) and see if you can beat the actual way it is in WinCE:

    Q: How to implement Help files?

    A: Help files are uncompressed HTML files located in the main system directory \Windows together with system .exe and .dll files. Images appearing in these help file are uncompressed bitmap files, likewise located in \Windows. Extra bonus points for giving these bitmap image files generic names so that they override other programs' help images of the same name for a funny effect.

    Q: How to close a running program?

    A: You can't. (Well, actually you could kill it using the task manager which requires 4 or 5 clicks, WinCE-compliant programs are not allowed to have a close button). The OS may automatically decide based on current use of resources to close a running program at any time.

  46. Problems with JNI by tepples · · Score: 1

    I mean 20+ years of experience and all perfectly working C/C++ code and libraries have to be thrown out of window ? Cmon Google. Java is a nice toy, but unfit for production, get real.

    Someone has never heard of JNI.

    Relying on JNI (or P/Invoke in the .NET framework) has a few problems:

    • Your program that uses JNI won't run on a machine with a different instruction set or a different operating system.
    • JNI is often not available in environments that rely on the JVM's sandbox for security. Your program that uses JNI won't run as an applet or a MIDlet without being signed with a certificate that student and hobbyist developers often cannot afford. Some virtual machines to which the Java language compiles, such as the Dalvik VM used in Android, don't even have JNI.
    • Sun, through its "100% Pure Java" certification program, has been trying to deprecate the use of JNI in applications since nearly the day that Java came out.
    1. Re:Problems with JNI by suckmysav · · Score: 1

      "Your program that uses JNI won't run on a machine with a different instruction set or a different operating system."

      Ummm, doesn't that also apply to C/C++?

      just askin'

      --
      "You can't fight in here, this is the war room!"
    2. Re:Problems with JNI by tepples · · Score: 1

      Ummm, doesn't [ISA/OS specificity] also apply to C/C++?

      Yes, in most cases. That's why Sun, Google, and other maintainers of these virtual machines discourage the use of C++ code wherever possible. On the other hand, Microsoft tried to solve the problem with C++/CLI, a compiler for an allegedly useful subset of C++ to .NET bytecode.

  47. Compare to FreeBSD jails by tepples · · Score: 1

    I agree with you that detecting whether the system calls are allowed is a problem. Describing it as a "VM" is probably wrong

    There exist steps between "method X is a VM" vs. "method X is not a VM". For example, FreeBSD's jail mechanism just traps system calls, but people end up calling it a lightweight VM.

    For instance some program that can update your web bookmarks could probably also insert or modify them all to spam addresses, I think it will be hard for the call detector to prevent that!

    The idea is to grant privileges on your bookmarks only to specific applications.

  48. It's all about the VM. by recharged95 · · Score: 2, Interesting
    • Palm OS crashes--take battery out and in.
    • WinCE crashes--take battery out and in.
    • iPhone OS crashes--Press power button for 5 seconds.
    • Symbian OS crashes--Press power button for 5 seconds or take battery out.
    • Web OS crashes-- ??? (but looks like no different than above)

    Android OS crashes--??? Haven't seen it crash yet (since Dec 2008). Apps have crashed, or the phone needs a reboot due to lack of force close, but the phone recovers nicely on app crashes. Apps crashing on any of the above devices usually result in an OS crash as well.

    .

    There's a reason why VM's make sense. Especially when you're mobile. Nvidia is shooting themselves in the foot on this one.

    1. Re:It's all about the VM. by EponymousCustard · · Score: 1

      you forgot the iphone crash that doesn't respond to the power button 5 seconds trick.

  49. What they meant to say by stanjam · · Score: 1

    "Given that Microsoft has offered us discounted product, and has threatened to raise the prices we pay for MS products as well as threatened us with IP infringement suits if we do not comply...we have decided that Windows is 'Oh so great" and nothing could possibly compare with Windows on any platform. We know most of you technically minded people will probably trash the problematic Windows OS in 15 minutes and replace it with a more stable, more flexible, and more powerful, free OS, but that is our story, and Microsoft is making us stick to it."

    --
    Open Source: Eroding the Digital Divide
  50. Indeed by cyclomedia · · Score: 1

    We need to get ahead of the game by stopping thinking that the mobile, netbook, laptop and desktop are different devices in different boxes. Linux needs to stop bloating and apps need to be able to run in 640x480 NOW without having to edit a config file to allow you to drag an app off the top of the screen to get to its button at the bottom of the screen. If you really needed to have a minimum res of 800x600 then consider that the Amiga could have a desktop area larger than the monitor display area in the early 90s; moving your mouse to the edge of the screen would scroll you around the desktop, how hard would it be to allow that whilst still keeping the taskbar fixed?.

    The HTC Universal (google it) blurs the phone, pda and laptop lines tremendously. It's a phone with built in wifi, ~128MB RAM, an SD card slot an ~500MHz ARM processor a 640x480 touch screen and a full qwerty keyboard. It's got practically the same specs of one of my top-of-the-line development machines from the 90s.

    Currently it runs Windows Mobile 6.1. Android boots but doesnt accept any input, it just sits there. What would be great would be a super abstraction layer - hell it could just be a simple config file. Denoting addresses and types of inputs - so the d-pad could be instantly mapped to control the mouse pointer, so the keyboard's keys could be recognised and the phones extra buttons mapped to anything you like, and the wifi capability has a hex code pointing to it, as well as the GSM/G3/IR/Bluetooth capabilities. That way instead of having to massively rejig and recompile the OS to fit every device, and massively reconfigure it I could just stick the "slim" version on my smart phone and all the hacking i'd need to do to get it to work would be one config file that i could probably download from someone, or tick a box on the website when i download the OS's installer. The config file could a bit like the one that quake engines' use - in fact you could have a run-on-first boot applet that allowed you to press any button on your device and map it to anything just like quake too, move-mouse-left: (press button) 0x34 and even set up predictive texting for phonepad devices, or map keys (like function keys) to key combinations*.

    So the finer points of each device would need proper C coding to get them to work (e.g. the HTC has a keyboard back light) but you could get close to actualy being able to use the darned thing and reduce a lot of pain in the process.

    * this one's a particualr bug bear for me, someone ported UAE to Windows mobile but only allowed you to map the mouse and joystick... i had no way to map the function keys and so no way to load/save games in Bloodwych, which otherwise ran beautifully, big shame!

    --
    If you don't risk failure you don't risk success.
  51. If Android is not good.. by FithisUX · · Score: 1

    why not try QNX which is a commercial offering? This is very suspicious. Sounds like the most closed useless thing ever. I go for N270/GMA950. Possibly if VIA really helps openchrome I have no problem to give it a try. Moreover the whole thing smells like early adopters saga. First version would be totally experimental, save for the calculator and notepad (I can suggest vi).

  52. "Rock-solid"? by Money+for+Nothin' · · Score: 1

    Tell that to my AT&T Fuze running WinMo 6.1, which spontaneously reboots at least once/day, and from which I send about 20 application exception reports to MSFT each week. Oh gee, "cprog.exe" or "device.exe" died again? Let me send that to Redmond and hope they have a project manager who gives a damn!

    "Rock solid" my ass. I've had 3 WinMo phones; my next phone will be either an iPhone or Android-based. Windows Mobile is a steaming heap of shit. ...not that I would expect an executive of any non-trivially-sized firm to actually know anything about technology...

    --

    Is Capitalism Good for the Poor?
  53. AFAIK you CAN upload native code into the app stor by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Doom for example uses a native JNI library.

    In fact you can port any C/C++ application over to a android device like stock Tmobile G1, see this tutorial: http://davanum.wordpress.com/2007/12/09/android-invoke-jni-based-methods-bridging-cc-and-java/

    I have just installed doom on my Tmobile G1 from the android app store, and it works well. No hacks necessary.

  54. You missed the point. by hey! · · Score: 1

    Windows Mobile is not the same as Windows CE. Windows CE is the infrastructure underneath Windows Mobile. You can't extrapolate between Windows Mobile features, devices, and most importantly *vendor support* to Windows CE.

    --
    Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  55. Android == Native code support!! by BlackCreek · · Score: 1

    Google just announced a Native Code Development Kit for Android:

    http://android-developers.blogspot.com/2009/06/introducing-android-15-ndk-release-1.html