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Ubuntu Powered Tablet Spotted!
dkd903 writes "The year 2010 had been all buzz with tablets and a similar trend is expected during the year 2011 too. We have already seen a lot of Android powered tablets. But how does a tablet powered by Ubuntu sound? A Chinese manufacturer TENQ has launched a tablet called P07. The device is said to be running Ubuntu 10.10 Netbook Edition and the boot time reported to be almost instant."
Surely 2011 will be the Year of the Linux Tablet now?
... TFA is already /.ed.
Tired of Political Trolls? Opt Out!
I guess the server's uptime is about the same as the tablet's boot-time once the /. crowd "spotted" the product.
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:h8oRGG22slsJ:gadgetizor.com/the-tablet-season-brings-a-new-ubuntu-powered-tablet/6304/+http://gadgetizor.com/the-tablet-season-brings-a-new-ubuntu-powered-tablet/6304/&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a
Google has a cached version: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:h8oRGG22slsJ:gadgetizor.com/the-tablet-season-brings-a-new-ubuntu-powered-tablet/6304/+http://gadgetizor.com/the-tablet-season-brings-a-new-ubuntu-powered-tablet/6304/&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a
...does it run Linu..oh wait.
Palm trees and 8
http://www.gizchina.com/2010/12/23/exclusive-leaked-images-reveal-ubuntu-powered-tablet/
Yeah, I guess it's natural for the tablet to come after the phone. Perhaps 2012 will be the year of the Linux 3d holographic projection augmented reality mobile device.
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
Perhaps Linux will be ready for the desktop when we have flying cars?
I was promised flying cars by the year 2000. We have received no flying cars and I don't believe we're any closer to them as we were when they were originally imagined. The same promise is made of Linux every year I'm sure it's in the same boat(car).
Seems there is more info at gizchina http://www.gizchina.com/2010/12/28/ubuntu-tablet-details-surface/
Flexible bare-metal recovery for Linux/UNIX
Uh, what? This is based in Ubuntu Netbook Remix, with big buttons and multi-touch support. This is not the desktop edition.
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
Netbook edition wasn't designed for a big screen... it was designed for Netbooks.
I dunno, when I saw it originally I thought they designed it specifically for touchscreens - http://www.ubuntugeek.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/ubuntu_netbook_remix_beta.jpg
Looks to be allright for a tablet.
It's right there on the website at the top...
FORBIDDEN!
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
GO to ebay, search Tablet PC. Pick one.
Download Ubuntu 10.10
Install Ubuntu 10.10 on the tablet.
Magical poof happens with a bright brown genie appearing and angels singing.... you have a ubuntu tablet! Something that nobody ever though of....
Granted, Tablet PC's have been around for decades, and running Linux on them has been happening for decades.... Ignore that.
Fujitsu stylistic works great, plus I can use a stylus so I can use it as a writing tablet. Too bad there is not a OS replacement for MSFT One Note.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
1995: Year of the Linux server has arrived!
Linux people: Come on, year of the Linux desktop any time now!
2000: Year of the Linux wireless router has arrived!
Linux people: Come on, year of the Linux desktop any time now!
2008: Year of the open-source browser has arrived!
Linux people: Come on, year of the Linux desktop any time now!
2009: Year of the Linux smartphone has arrived!
Linux people: Come on, year of the Linux desktop any time now!
2011: Year of the Linux tablet and cloud desktop has arrived!
Linux people: Come on, year of the Linux desktop any time now!
2043: Year of the Linux mind-machine interface, interplanetary spaceship and household robot. The Windows source code has been wikileaked six times, and it is statistically impossible for Microsoft suing someone giving away their own fork of Windows to get a jury of people all 12 of which are willing to enforce copyright law, so Windows is de facto open source.
Linux people: No, all that is insignificant! Windows is still winning on the desktop! Come on, year of the Linux desktop already!
The index page of the website seems to be working fine, its just the articles that are down. This means that while you won't be able to read all of TFA, you can read three sentences and see a photo.
the iPad is cool not because it can read email but the app store. all kinds of apps that do things that were unimagined a few years ago.
i'm looking at an ipad next year because there are apps for kids that even out the cost between buying crap like leapfrog. there are apps to get kids to learn to read
the form factor is the cool part. you can buy board game apps so your house is not a mess and you can take your games everywhere you go. you can lay an ipad flat on a table and play monopoly like with the board game version.
any product that just tries to be a lite version of a netbook will fail
boot time reported to be almost instant.
"Boot time"? On a tablet? Is this thing following the failed Windows Tablet paradigm rather than the iOS/Android model?
#DeleteChrome
There will never be a "year of linux desktop" same as how there was never a "year of firefox web browser". You'll know it has happened when everyone has it.
TFS: The device is said to be running Ubuntu 10.10 Netbook Edition and the boot time reported to be almost instant.
The question is whether it will crash instantly after a kernel update (due to a GRUB issue). This will instantly please all users.
CC.
TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
If it were ubuntu the snooty reply would be "It has been on MY tablet since 2004!"
Seven Days with Ubuntu Unity
Were you promised flying cars last year?
Or were you promised them 50-60 years ago?
I'm pretty sure your analogy sucks.
Sharp introduced an Ubuntu tablet 6 months ago, as part of their `Netwalker' line.
I think Always Innovating was supporting Ubuntu on their tablets before that.
Maybe there are others, also; still, each new one is nice to see.
-rozzin.
It will be the year of the Linux desktop when Duke Nukem Forever comes out. On Linux. With a chance to win a flying car for every copy you buy.
Seven Days with Ubuntu Unity
not too mention they are actually decent travel visual media consumption devices.
I don't currently own an iPad or similar, but i did get a chance to play around with one over the holidays, and it was actually nice for sitting in the "back of the bus" and watching a movie with headphones.
nicer screen than most built in vehicle dvd systems, bigger than using my cellphone.
and my kid thought it was nice to play simple little games on when he was bored.
No more pollution, no more hunger, and no more wars.
The Ubuntu-powered Tablet shows off the first real-world application of Ubuntu power, which is the world's first free-as-in-beer AND free-as-in-freedom power source. No longer will we rely on arcane power storage devices such as Lithium-Polymer batteries, or dangerous power generation methods like coal-fired generators.
I, for one, welcome our new Ubuntu Overlords!
Do daemons dream of electric sleep()?
Forbidden by the powers that be...
You don't have permission to access /index.php on this server.
Additionally, a 403 Forbidden error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request.
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
The article has apparently been slashdotted, so I can only guess how it's been implemented.
Please bear with me, I have to take a run-up to this.
I've used the Galaxy tablet, an iPad, and a tablet running Windows 7.
The iPad is very stable intuitive and usable. The Android tablet works much the same as the iPad with the additional features of a higher degree of customization, widgets, flash, and so forth.
The Windows 7 tablet sucks.
The main reason the Windows 7 tablet sucks is that the GUI doesn't seem to like living on a tablet. Too many operations assume keyboard and two button mouse, and tablet support consists of clumsy work-arounds to simulate a two button mouse on a tablet, when what is sorely needed is a new, mouseless paradigm, as the iPad and Android already have.
An additional problem I'm having with the Win7 tablet is that the virtual keyboard is not accurate enough to type in yer damned password. I have to resort to a physical keyboard to log into the damned thing. Part of the problem is probably hardware, but it does not help that the keys do not light up or do anything to indicate what key it thinks you've pressed, and you can't see what you're typing. If this really was designed to be a touch interface, instead of something cobbled together to have a presence in the tablet market, it'd work better than that.
Parenthetically, Microsoft already has a killer touch interface in Surface, so at least some people in Redmond know how a touch GUI is supposed to work. Given that, it totally baffles me that they'd try to push off this Windows 7 kludge as a serious contender in the tablet marketplace. I mean, what the hell?
Which brings us to Ubuntu. I've used past versions, and am very impressed. It's a tight little OS with a fast, well integrated, and at times amusing GUI. (I still get a kick out of shaking the rubber windows.) I think putting Ubuntu on a tablet is a very exciting idea.
But
Ubuntu out of the box is just as mousey as Winders. If all they're going to do is paste on work-around gestures to simulate a multi-button mouse and throw up a virtual keyboard, I'm not interested. I've already been down that road, and don't want to go through that frustration again. If that's what they're planning to offer, I'll stick with Android.
However, if Ubuntu produces a really truly designed-from-ground-up-to-be-mouseless interface, and it works well, then I'm all over that.
This is going to be interesting. Apple did the transition correctly to touch devices -- they came up with a brand new set of GUI rules instead of trying to reuse the paradigms in OSX. Android was designed from the start to be a touch interface. Winders has flubbed it so far, for their consumer devices at least. It'll be fascinating to see what Ubuntu does.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
Grub2 that ubuntu/mint use works very well I usually keep my kernels latest release and have never had problems with Grub2. I've had lots of problems however with Alsa/PulseAudio doing kernel updates. I use Grub2 for booting 4/os and its awesome when I install a new distro don't install the new distro's Grub/Lilo. Boot to Mint go to terminal type "update grub2" works every time.
Also with a tablet I doubt you would even see the boot loader on the screen. How many people will install 2 os on a tablet? Why give people boot options when it is completely unnecessary.
Imagine starting up your new Mac/Win machine and it gives you an option to boot into OSX/Win7 respectively wouldn't you just be thinking WTF is wrong with the people that made this thing? It would actually look kind of amateurish if there was a visible Grub2 during boot.
I've got Ubuntu 10.10 on my Thinkpad X200 Tablet. It works pretty well, but not everything works perfectly. I've had every version of Ubuntu on it since 9.04, and some of the earlier ones actually seemed to work a little better. There are still a few kinks, though. Thankfully, sites like ThinkWiki exist to help with some of the problems.
I'm still having a few issues, though, such as the fingerprint scanner not working or when rotating the screen, the touch sensor doesn't translate its coordinates properly (so left-right becomes up-down when the screen is rotated 90 degrees). The mute button doesn't work properly either, but other than that it runs pretty well.
I'm pretty sure your reading comprehension and math sucks, not so much with my statement.
"by the year 2000" would be less than 2000 so yes it could be 1999 or 1940, and since I at no point said 2009 or 2010 then I'm entirely lost where you got "last year" from.
Well watching a video while traveling is nice, but how do you handle that - do you hold the iPad in your hands for the duration of the whole movie? That's the sort of application where I can't imagine giving up my netbook - even balancing this on my knees (if there is no fold-out table) seems more comfortable than that.
undoing bad mod.
Really that many people recompile their kernel amazing. I think your being optimistic about the number of geeky enough people.
So when you used both the phrases 'obligatory' and 'sorry, it had to be done', you chose to ignore two big clues that it wasn't going to be funny?
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
Yup. I was thinking the same thing, but I'm out of mod points. I wanted to grab a tablet PC, put a desktop or screensaver with a single image from Ubuntu, and take a picture of it. That'll learn everybody.
Why don't tablet makers that want to use a full desktop OS think about using it with Synergy (on sourceforge)???
It's a perfect complement.
If the tablet is running Win7 or x86 Linux, then when it's docked next to my monitor, it fires up synergy and the mouse and keyboard control it just like an extra screen. When I pull it off the cradle, Synergy shuts down, and now it's a distinct computer. If running Ubuntu, it can still run Windows apps via Wine (critical for how I want to use a tablet).
I don't know why these companies don't see this option!!!
Don't steal. The government hates competition.
The year of the Linux desktop could have been 2009 around the time of netbooks. However OEM's mucked it up by picking less than stellar variants of Linux and customers appeared only too happy to desert when Microsoft finally got their act together.
As a result, Linux netbook sales tanked and it's almost impossible to buy one in a major retail outlet these days as customers aren't interested.
I don't believe Linux will ever have such a good chance again and, personally, I blame this on the OEM's who could have escaped the grasp of Microsoft but, in their haste, failed to ensure that the customer experience was a good one.
Avantslash - View Slashdot cleanly on your mobile phone.
Yep. And that should happen next year.
God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
2011: Year of the Linux Tablet
Analogous to "Year of the linux desktop every year, next year!"
Sorry, it had to be done.
Two words Galaxy Tab 2010 was the year of the Linux Tablet!?
I think you meant was "Year of the Windows Tablet"
Sorry had to tell the truth
I disagree on a couple of points. Please bear with me while I set this up.
I carry a Droid X, and use Logmein Ignition to log into my main workstation to do the few operations I can't yet do on the phone itself. The only thing I really need is a slightly bigger screen. So yeah, the screen is too small.
My company issues ipads, and I find them very stable and usable. I've *never* thought "damn I need a keyboard for this" because the onscreen keyboard does what I need it to do. (And I'm a fast typist.) I've also never thought "damn, I need a bigger screen" because the screen is big enough and the GUI is designed so that things pop up when you need them and go away when you don't need them anymore.
The Samsung galaxy tablet has at least as good (in my opinion better) interface as the ipad, and it *will* fit in your pocket. It has significantly more screen real-estate than my Droid X but is almost as portable. Similar to the ipad, the virtual keyboard is good enough that I've not seriously considered getting an external keyboard for it.
So on issue 1, "it's too big or too small", it depends partly on what you're trying to do, but in general the best computer is the one you have with you, and I'm more likely to be carrying a 7 inch Android tablet than I will be lugging an ipad. And if I really needed the real estate of the ipad, I'd be tempted to lug a netbook instead, and have things like USB, external video, SDRAM slots, flash support, etc etc.
I think you see where this is going. Both iOS and Android have good enough virtual keyboard support (not just the keyboard itself, but positioning, operation, how it's called up and dismissed and stuff like that) that "where the heck is the keyboard" is pretty much a non-issue.
Now what of Ubuntu?
If Ubuntu is implemented on tablets of the size, weight, complexity and cost of laptop computers, with half-assed touch support that wasn't properly thought through, you *will* be in a position saying "this is too big for this job, too small for that one, too heavy to carry around in one hand, and where the heck is the keyboard??" To which I'd add the possibility that "Right click on this thing is a right pain in the ass". ...and the product will be a failure.
Want to see how to do it wrong? Look at current Windows 7 tablet support. Instead of coming up with a touch paradigm that works well, Microsoft has chosen to fake it by leveraging their existing Accessibility tools. It's a total fail -- clunky and annoying to use, with a half-assed keyboard and kludgy mouse gestures that make you wish you had a real keyboard and mouse, too big (to make room for the task bar, tray, start button, walking menus, lack of virtual desktop) to have any kind of portability advantage, too small to be a serious PC. Windows 7 tablet support is everything you were complaining about.
To be a serious contender, Ubuntu needs to be a *lot* better than that. But Apple and Google have demonstrated that it can be done.
I can tell you from experience that I can do probably 70% of the work I need to do on the iPad, and with Ignition I can get to my real PC and do the rest.
Hell, I can do about 50% of my work from my Droid X, and (with some difficulty) still log into my PC from the phone to do the stuff I can't do locally. If either the iPad or the Droid had USB support, I could leave my laptop at home on business trips.
Having used both, I estimate that I can do any part of my workflow on the 7" Galaxy tablet that I could do on the 9.7" iPad screen, and I'm more likely to have the smaller form factor on me.
And so, an Ubuntu tablet with USB host support, SD card reader, and a decent, usable GUI in a 7" form factor would be a godsend. It should also have an HDMI out like the Droid X so I can do presentations without having to lug a laptop.
In summary, the whole point of this exercise is to be able to do most of your work without having to lug around a backpack. Current hig
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
And here some up to date screenshots
This is a good example, I guess, of how two people can look at the same thing and see two different things.
Consider this screen from that page: http://s0n1c2122.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/ubuntu_netbook_10-10.png
I can hardly read the icon text on my full-sized notebook at full resolution; the default font is unusable, and the white-on-beige color scheme just makes it worse. The toolbar icons are too small for me to reliably press just one, and my fingers, although pudgy, are not unusually so.
Am I part of the core demographic for Swedish Fish?
I would say there was a "Year of Firefox web browser" and it was 2005. From NetApplication's quarterly numbers it went from 3.66% in 2004 Q4 to 9.00% in 2005 Q4. Of course it did hit 1.0 in november 2004 so it's not surprising it jumped, but really they did manage to make the 1.0 push matter.
Linux has never had a year with 150% growth or even anything close to it. At least on the web browsing desktop it's been very stable at around 1% for years now, some data even suggests it's regressing a bit after the netbook wave that Microsoft quite effectively killed and even that only got the numbers up to 1.1-1.2%. Of course you shouldn't expect people to switch OS as easily as they'd install an alternate browser, but at this rate it's never happening.
Firefox has barely been keeping its market share this year with Chrome taking all the growth, even though Chromium is open source Chrome isn't. It's highly questionable how much Oracle will continue to push and support the OSS solutions they took over from Sun. I'm sure Linux and OSS will continue its success on servers, cell phones and supercomputers but on the desktop I'd say it's highly on the defensive, not the offensive at the moment.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Squeeze theorem?
The year of Firefox was missed because Chrome burst on the scene, and honestly Firefox had long lost the lead in innovation. The situation is similar with Desktop Linux.
Linux on the desktop has missed it's chance, the PC desktop is no longer the bleeding edge of development (at least as far as media and community buzz is concerned) in the face of new platforms. Hardware gets faster but it isn't really needed. Windows 7 and Linux run pretty fast. I haven't updated my hardware since 2008 and would see no benefit. SSDs have come of age, so I picked one up. I essientially experience no delay for anything. I see little point in sinking my yearly $1500 into hardware update, and little advantage in speed brought in software updates. (All the lag from a bloated Windows install was due to disk footprint and usage - lots of random reads over a big install footprint. Linux would do the same if you really went nuts with it. This is totally gone with a SSD, your Windows install remains as fast as the day it was new)
People are less interested in their desktop computing experience and keeping it up to date. With less interest, any radical change in the way people do computing is going to be harder.
To me, Linux has missed it's chance. All these years we battled with crappy Windows XP and Vista, when it would have been nice to hand a live CD to someone and solve all their computer problems. Installing Linux would most often give you a new set of exciting and deliberately difficult problems to solve, which was great, if (to use an analogy) you'd prefer a tough rubix cube to having sex. Getting the best out of Linux as a desktop took time and effort, because it came pre-broken to some extent, it was fun for some torture for others who were no doubt looking to escape toture. Now you can have 100% functional Ubuntu in 20 minutes, when back in the day that was luck of the draw. It's actually rather boring having nothing to fix to be honest. But for many people, tinkering is not the point of technology, technology is a tool not a toy.
It's kind of like that now, you take a oldish computer, boot Ubuntu live, install, a few commands and it's a revived fully capable useful and fast machine. It's a free download and burn away, and there's tons of software available for free.
So why isn't it taking off? What's the problem? Well, we needed that about five years ago. Back then you were lucky if you could pull this off with linux, and then you'd have to do without flash, or properly working graphics drivers.
I had an epiphany when I wiped a old machine I'd installed Ubuntu 6.06 on and fogotten about, with Ubuntu 10.10. It was MUCH faster, and booted in 40 seconds to the desktop rather than more than a minute.
Problem is, Windows 7 was a leap ahead, I remember seeing Cannonical rush to make Ubuntu take less than a minute and a half to boot as soon as Windows 7 Beta's started showing massively improved boot performance.
Why couldn't that have been done sooner?
Why did it take until 2006 for compiz to go 1.0, when windows Vista? We saw 3D desktop effects demo'd by Microsoft in early longhorn in August 2003.
Theres not many more lines of code in a 2010 linux distro than a 2006, so why does it all run so much faster now on 2006 hardware? It's all been re-written ten times over in the process, re-written only to be incrementally better.
I guess there are lots of problems that can't be solved at a programmers desk, and decisions that can only be made from data gathered in a lab. Microsoft and Apple spend millions, billions even on R&D, labs, on UI studies etc for good reason.
Linux more than ever needs truly excellent UI design. Or it's just too late.
Android on the other hand is linux done really well.
After logging in slashdot still does not take you back to the page you were on. It's been that way for 20 years.
i'm fine with chasing the desktop dream, it gives purpose. As long as linux keeps dominating on new platforms as they arrive. It'll be quite the situation when the desktop becomes obsolete (somehow ) . so keep trying to catch the wind ,linux. Lord knows it keeps you motivated.
Like I hadn't seen enough "Ubuntu conquers the World!" news this month. I was pretty much saturated with that already after perusing the magazines at the local Borders and saw almost nothing but magazines containing DVDs of the newest Ubuntu distribution or some beta copy of it. I doubt I would have been surprised to find one stuck in the latest Tiger Beat or Cosmo.
Heh. Alpha user? Just kidding. (I guess I've spent way too much time at P00>>> prompts in recent months.)
Surely you meant "instantaneous". (Sorry 'bout that.)
CUR ALLOC 20195.....5804M
Yes, but does it play Angry Birds?
-Mark
Dovie'andi se tovya sagain.
I agree with you. You should write a book. Really.
Perhaps there is a case with a hook.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
I blame this on the OEM's who could have escaped the grasp of Microsoft but, in their haste, failed to ensure that the customer experience was a good one.
On the OEM side, the urgent need is to build a rapidly sale-able product. Microsoft is a good way to sell product for an OEM. Brands like Dell and HP sell lots of boxes with Windows on them. OEM's know this and tailor product accordingly. End users know Microsoft's Windows and are comfortable with it. Add to that the strong likelihood there are Marketing dollars committed by Microsoft to help sell the device.
If an OEM takes a huge chance and has an alternative OS, the business climate inside an OEM is as obsessed with capturing as much value as possible, so building their own distro seems like the best choice. Weird, but true. Look at the OEM that shipped Linux to Walmart. Their own distro.
What about Ubuntu? They can't possibly make a viable deal with an OEM. No money, no market penetration. Very little money in end-user sales like Ubuntu's so they will scrape along until the patriarch is tired of funding the project and fires most employees to get it breaking even.
It takes quite a bit to line up a deal where an OEM is shipping Linux. Especially with Microsoft discouraging the presence of Linux distro-equipped end-user devices like notebooks, tablets, phones, etc.
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
I believe the Kno's underlying OS is Ubuntu 9.10 - (it's a single or dual screen 14.1" tablet intended for students, which allows annotations/notes/etc. - see here: http://www.kno.com/the-kno/specs (altho a Web Kit layer runs everything and the user doesn't have direct access to Ubuntu)).
Uhhhh...it sounds like about half the stuff on your tablets does not work but "other than that" it runs pretty well? It is THIS, this "it is free so you should put up with it" attitude that keeps FLOSS from taking off on mainstream PC devices like netbook/nettops, laptops, desktops, etc.
Another perfect example: Remember how everyone was touting when Dell started selling Ubuntu on select netbooks? Ever look at one? Notice anything....funny...about them? Like the fact that Dell removes ALL Canonical repos and has to run their own? Why is that? Is it because Dell is pushing crapware on them like on the Windows boxes? Nope, it is due to the fact that even with such a limited amount of hardware to support Canonical can't be bothered to do actual QA before release and if you use the regular repos it breaks the Ethernet and sound! Oh joy, oh happy day!
Now damn it, I KNOW good quality FOSS software CAN be done. Hell Jobs took BSD and built an empire with it that has even surpassed MSFT in market cap so it CAN be done! But it will NOT ever be done with this "oh well, it kinda sorta works" attitude. If Apple pushed out an update that broke half the Macs don't you think people would have a fit? If MSFT broke half the new Dells out there? Hell yes, heads would roll! So why this "shit sandwich" attitude? It is like someone saying "Free meal!" and when you sit down they hand you a shit sandwich and say "hey it's free, you've no right to complain" well bullshit, we have EVERY right!
As a retailer I WANT to be able to sell Linux boxes, and not just "hey lets put it on the shitty hardware" boxes like what Walmart tried, but actual good quality machines! I WANT to have nice Ubuntu boxes right beside the Windows ones, and know that for at least 5 years after I sold it that it will keep running, even after updating! But right now frankly I can't. I can't because there is no hardware ABI, every damned upgrade which at 6 months is ridiculous, breaks two things while fixing one. I can't because I can't even expect it to go a full year without "update foo broke my driver" bullshit thanks to lousy QA, it is just a mess!
So while I wish these Chinese luck, I'll think they'll find out the same thing I and every other retailer I've talked to found out, that Linux ends up costing MORE money than Windows. How could that be? Simple figure in the returns when updates break crap, which by law then have to be sold as used, usually at a loss, figure in the amount of time required to fix all those breaks, and it quickly becomes MORE expensive than simply slapping an OEM Windows Home license and calling it a day. I'm sure I'll get hate for saying the emperor has no clothes, but he is wearing his birthday suit and his willie is waving in the breeze.
The average Joe, the ones you HAVE TO sell to to gain critical mass, ain't messing with CLI, ain't gonna deal with "update foo broke my drivers" or trawl forums for fixes. If a box leaves the store working it needs to STAY working as long as the user follows basic best practices. That simply isn't the case with Linux, as by following best practices the user will BREAK the machine by updating! So I have the choice of either pulling a Dell and repackaging everything and running my own repo (too expensive), turning off updates and leaving the machine vulnerable (unacceptable), fixing every update fuckup for life for free (too expensive) or just slapping a Windows License and an AV and AntiMal and calling it a day. Which do you think in the end I'm gonna choose?
So please don't settle for this "it kinda sorta works" shit sandwich mentality, demand real progress! Demand either a stable ABI, or if Linux guys hate those so much, even though Solaris, BSD, Windows, hell just about every OS other than Linux, has had them for over a decade? Fine, tell us of another way to INSURE that drivers continue working across releases and DO THAT. None of this "let the kernel devs" handle it BS, If a driver works now it should work five years from now AS IS PERIOD. Make it easy, make it reliable, and guys like me will be happy to sell your product and display it proudly on our shelves. Hell you think we spend all that extra money in Windows licenses because we LIKE to add that to our final cost?
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Maybe, but that would start to swing as the bus moves, and it wouldn't let you adjust the viewing angle - given the iPad's reflecting display, I don't see how that would be satisfactory. Anyway - quite obviously some kind of case/attachment could be build to give you a satisfactory viewing experience, I'm just curious how people actually use it.
I'm just curious how people actually use it.
A guy I work with keeps his iPad right below the screen of his work computer. I uses it to browse the web. Our IT policies pretty much say you can be sacked on the spot for browsing a non-work web site on work equipment. Its a safe way to go because there is a separate project where people are developing for the iPad in the same office.
Other than that I find tablets and phones are great for displaying content such as plans and maps when flat on a table. Its a good replacement for a rolled up map or similar.
Its definitely a bit awkward for reading. Not as good as a netbook. There is a case which combines an external keyboard with a prop for the tablet. Sort of turns it into a laptop.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
You seem to fail to realize that the only reason why Asus put Linux on their first eee pcs was as a way to bargain Microsoft into giving them cheap Windows XP licenses. It was never about trying to increase the adoption of Linux or even caring about Linux at all. This is why you found Windows XP driver CDs being shipped with the original Linux-only eee pcs.
I tried to say the same thing the other day, but in my blind rage at having an updated but now broken webcam on my Ubuntu eeepc, I think my statements came off as a bit rage-like and biased. That said... thank you for the sentiment.
Someone flopped a steamer in the gene pool.
You make some good points, but in all honesty Jobs did not "take BSD and build an empire with it". It's a common misconception that OS X is based entirely on BSD code, when in truth it makes use of a lot of open source from a variety of projects, and crucially it contains a great deal of closed source code (including tons from Next). Otherwise, I fully agree with what you're saying.
The simple fact is, designing a solid, working desktop requires clout and very good people working outside of the code on things like design and marketing. Not going to happen in the purely open source world. A hybrid approach like Apple's does seem to work well though.
When I tried to access the sight, I was "Forbidden" - 403 error LOL :-D
The year of the Linux desktop could have been 2009 around the time of netbooks. However OEM's mucked it up by picking less than stellar variants of Linux and customers appeared only too happy to desert when Microsoft finally got their act together
The Linux netbook was a bottom feeder.
The Atom netbook running XP had far more credible hardware specs - a bigger screen, a better keyboard, a more muscular CPU, more RAM, a bigger hard drive and so on.
It sold at a very competitive price.
Your sarcasm is old. And broken. Please get some new sarcasm. In the fresh, minty flavor!
When you want something built, come see me. If you want correct grammar and spelling, get a F*ing liberal arts student.
"Uhhhh...it sounds like about half the stuff on your tablets does not work but "other than that" it runs pretty well?"
He listed three minor issues. At least two I can think of a workaround for. If you think a modern tablet with a CPU that boasts 382 million transistors has six features, then it's time to take your meds. Considering 10.10 was not written with tablets in mind, I think this is an astounding acheivement, not a "shit-sandwich".
wow, "entirely lost" says it all!
.. and to "Year of Fusion"! Don't forget fusion!
The three laws of thermodynamics:(1) You can't win. (2) You can't break even. (3) You can't even quit.
Yeah, I guess it's natural for the tablet to come after the phone.
Not really we expect mobile technology to get smaller not bigger and if it is bigger its usually more powerful not the same speed. Have these people heard of the KNO tablet powered by ubuntu and tegra 2, www.kno.com?
Rocket Surgeon.
You check the button in the install process, Canoncial doesn't. With preinstalls it would be the OEM installing it for you, which makes the OEM a lawsuit target
Canonical licenses mp3 and H.264 for its OEM distributions:
Licensed Companies, Licensees - PC Applications
AVC/H.264 Licensees
Walmart.com had 212 flavors of the Win 7 laptop and 95 Win 7 desktops on sale this holiday season - and all sold with licensed mp3 audio and DVD video play out of the box.
-Year of the Linux e-reader
-Year of the Linux home router
Comming soon
-Year of the Linux microwave (2015)
-Year of the Linux Swiss Army knife (2019)
I was just referring to Android becoming popular on the phone before the tablet (with my sig part of the punchline), not computing in general. In addition to Moore's law driving sizes down, there's also been a convergence, where not too long ago you had a phone, MP3 player, digital camera, and GPS, and the iPhone/Android merged those for most people. I foresee another convergence coming soon, with the smart phone and tablet merging to something in between, perhaps something like the Streak, though perhaps just a little lighter and smaller.
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
I'd bet for a distro based on MeeGo (or MeeGo itself). In general, the conventional Linux distributions are still stuck in the desktop/laptop interface and that's clear if you look at the picture shown in TFA. I'll spend a couple days playing around with the Nokia MeeGo image for the N900 to see how it goes, but the screenshots look promising. That could be the future of Linux (non-Android) GUIs for mobile devices.
Open Source Network Inventory for the masses! Kuwaiba
Good question. I did that on a keyboard. I'm doing this on the droid. Not horror but some reluctance. Virtual keyboards are not repeat not a perfect substitue for hardware and anyone who tells you different is a damn liar.
Typing fast on a virtual keyboard takes practice but can be done. You should see my daughter make her galaxy dance.
Editing is more of an issue. The biggest problem is that my finger easily covers three letters which makes it hard for the tablet to know where to put the cursor. Droid has tap-tap-hold feature that pops up a magnifying glass for precise positioning. Cut and paste has improved but a mouse will always be faster.
On the other hand, operations that translate well to gestures can be faster on a tablet. Web browsing for instance is very fast and intuitive. It depends on what you're doing.
The point is, work can be done on a well designed tablet device with a minimum of pain, and i'm more likely to have a tablet in my coat pocket than a laptop.
I wouldn't want to type in that first article on a virtual keyboard, but did this one without too much trouble.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.