Why Linux Is Good For Low-End Smartphones

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Why Linux Is Good For Low-End Smartphones

Posted by samzenpus on Monday October 3, 2011 @04:41AM from the i've-never-needed-more dept.

jfruhlinger writes "Nokia's announcement that it was developing a Linux distro for low-end smartphones, shortly after abandoning the Linux-based Meego OS for Windows Phone 7, was a little puzzling. But it actually makes good business sense in the smartphone world. While WP7 aims for the high end, there's a market for cheaper and less complex phones that still beat boring old feature phones, especially in emerging economies. And, unlike Symbian and the heavily tweaked Meego, Linux can be quickly and cheaply brought to market as a low-end smartphone OS."

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Here's hoping by Anonymous Coward · 2011-10-03 04:49 · Score: 4, Interesting

I would love to see a very small version of Linux on a smartphone. Think kernel less than 1MB (less than 500kB ideally), and a very lightweight graphical library. This could easily be made to boot in under 5 seconds and run on put-put hardware. I've done it myself with a system with pretty old Arm v5 at 300MHz, with 32MB RAM and 64MBytes of ROM it's capable or running a lot of goods - certainly any simple smartphone task.
I wish them luck!
1. Re:Here's hoping by thopkins · 2011-10-03 05:37 · Score: 2
  
  It's against FAA regulations to have your phone on during take-off or landing, even while in airplane mode. You're free to think that this is a stupid policy, but it's there.
2. Re:Here's hoping by Rob+the+Bold · 2011-10-03 06:09 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  What you have described is a feature phone, which these days tend to run Nucleus and not Linux.
  I don't think he's quite described the end product so thoroughly as to be able to make that distinction between "smart phone" and "feature phone". Or at least I wouldn't feel like I could make that call without a little more information.
  
  --
  I am not a crackpot.
Re:The android by Microlith · 2011-10-03 04:59 · Score: 2

It's Google's liver, actually.
Errr... by Servaas · 2011-10-03 05:00 · Score: 2

And, unlike Symbian and the heavily tweaked Meego, Linux can be quickly and cheaply brought to market as a low-end smartphone OS.
Err... so 2 OS's that are already developed, marketed and beta tested are more expensive then 1 new one?
1. Re:Errr... by hitmark · 2011-10-03 06:16 · Score: 2
  
  The Nokia release of Meego is more a version of their earlier Maemo with some changes to be Meego-"compatible" (not that this is any different from Intel basically rebranding their netbook Moblin to Meego and tossing some Qt libs in there for good measure).
  I suspect that unless someone at Nokia have gone axe crazy, this "new" one will be based on that again but have a interface and feature set more suitable for low end phones.
  
  --
  comment first, facts later. http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScience/RelativityofWrong.htm
And Symbian S40? by Parker+Lewis · 2011-10-03 05:09 · Score: 2

Why not just keep updating/upgrading S40?
1. Re:And Symbian S40? by randomlogin · 2011-10-03 07:58 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  Why not just keep updating/upgrading S40?
  Short answer - because Nokia senior management have now completely lost the plot. Symbian is still a much better option at the low end because underneath all the shiny stuff is an RTOS designed specifically to run on resource constrained devices. Proper real time capabilities were baked into the current Symbian kernel specifically so that a single processor could be used for both the protocol stack and the applications. As someone pointed out earlier, other vendors pay good money to use proprietary RTOS platforms like Nucleus for their low end phones because they deliver the same benefits.
  Putting a full Linux workstation in your pocket in the form of the N950 is cool - and I wish they'd let me buy one. But this is a different market, and it's not one where using Linux makes a hell of a lot of sense.
Re:Low end, only?? by tech4 · 2011-10-03 05:12 · Score: 2

Nokia has several phones with Linux, already.
I wouldn't count MS out of the mid and low range.. by Sir_Sri · 2011-10-03 05:24 · Score: 2

I wouldn't count on MS not being interested in the low end smartphone range. Just because they're only barely crawling into the market now doesn't mean they aren't aiming for a huge section of it. That's why they partnered with Nokia, who did everything from the low end $20 phone to the $20k phone with dual sim and special call centre, and everything in between. But it will take time for that to emerge as viable (or, more likely, not) from MS. Nokia at this point cannot afford to wait around.
Android is better by brainzach · 2011-10-03 05:32 · Score: 5, Interesting

If a phone manufacturer wants to make a low end smart phone, Android is the way to go. It comes with a huge app ecosystem, more polished and cheaper to implement than any new Linux solution. I don't see how anything Nokia produces can compete with a $150 Android phone.
Nokia is probably only considering Linux after they realized that WP7 does not scale down to low end smart phones. They are covering up poor strategic decisions.
Re:Low end, only?? by Dark+Lord+of+Ohio · 2011-10-03 08:02 · Score: 2

yup, thats why Linux is good for both. I don't see any difference between $500 and $50 phone when it comes to an OS. Linux fits perfectly, the only limitations are applications, different for different phones.
Re:Qt? by timotten · 2011-10-03 21:55 · Score: 2

Calling C++ "the Windows ME of programming languages" is like calling the Catholic Church "the Facebook of religious institutions." Both metaphors are trapped in a temporal-distortion field.