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Jolla: Ex-Nokia Employees Launch Smartphone (MeeGo Resurrected)
mrspoonsi writes "A team of ex-Nokia employees has released the first handset running on a new smartphone platform. The Jolla phone — pronounced Yol-la — is powered by open-source operating system Sailfish, but can run most apps designed for Google's Android platform. The platform — originally called MeeGo — was developed by Nokia, but dumped in 2011 in favour of the company adopting the Windows Phone system. Nokia released just one handset running the software, the N9-00. Antti Saarnio, chairman and co-founder of Jolla, told the BBC in May that MeeGo — now called Sailfish — had not been given enough chance to succeed."
Duper
Dupe much?
Silence is a state of mime.
You posted this story yesterday.
Except yesterday here is today in Australia and Japan.
#DeleteChrome
Dupe comments on a dupe post. Dupe-a-licious!
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
Actually, yesterday here in Australia is today in backwards regions like the USA.
Dupe comments on a dupe post. Dupe-a-licious!
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This exact comment has already been posted. Try to be more original...
Does the title of 'editor' even actually mean anything anymore on this site?
Did it ever?
And if you need it spelled out to you: Install Rhythm Software File Manager. It can not only browse files stored on your tablet but also copy whole folders on and off a Windows or Samba share.
If you believe all that you really should actually read the stuff Snowden releassed. The NSA is all over Apple like a rash. With google they at least had to hack into the data centers by re-routing their traffic when it goes between googles data centers. Microsoft on the other hand actually goes through all your stuff , even stuff you have never sent to them and then hands it all over lock stock and barrel to the NSA with an automatic program.
Android , Jolla, Sailfish etc are the future, Apple is the past. get used to it.
Actually, as an experienced MeeGo developer, this just makes me sad because they won't sell one to North Americans. Nokia did this to us with the N9 too, but at least they sent me a developer device. These guys still haven't released the official GSM/LTE frequencies it supports for some stupid reason, so I don't even know if I should bother trying to import one.
Yeah, the lack of a microSD slot is a deal killer, but it's your fault for buying a tablet without checking the specs.
Circumcision is child abuse.
it runs Android apps
Which version of Android are you using? Android 2 had plenty of inefficiencies, many of which were fixed by 4.1. A lot of people who develop apps for personal or low-volume use aren't willing to pay an estimated $1,050 extra (one Mac mini to replace an existing other-than-Mac computer plus four years of a developer license) just to fix an occasional MP3 skip. If it still happens in recent Android, I could try to replicate it in Amazon MP3 or Google Play Music.
If it's a Finnish company not owned by Microsoft or any other company in cahoots with the NSA, this could be the only smartphone worth buying anymore.
That is nice. Lets hope it takes over and we get more choice 13|OAA84Z0X5CSWAWIV8W3Y069S8IQCA4869TMOPL4XQ8EA87H[C1WK4QNY2[XV[ZIP9[X
Antti's brother, Prro Saarnio, disagreed.
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
TFA has it wrong. N9-00 was never released, N900 was. I have/use N900.
Sailfish is more like a traditional GNU/Linux distribution. The Android compatibility is a useful feature, but the idea is not that most apps should need it. It's very much a continuation of Meego.
Sorry I just don't trust a continent where the toilets flow backwards.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bart_vs._Australia#Reaction_in_Australia
Careful with names containing L slashdot.org/~AiphaWolf_HK slashdot.org/~AlphaWoif_HK slashdot.org/~AiphaWoif_HK
"Oh my god I bought a bicycle and now I realize I am supposed to work the pedals myself! It sucks! Where is my engine?!"
So you bought a product without first checking its specifications, and then it turns out it doesn't fit your needs? Your own fault.
more like mer + meego, kinda.
and well if they did that then it would just be a bunch of android apps now wouldn't it? and yes they're using android HAL since it simplifies buying the parts/pre manufactured phones a lot..
if they just did a devkit for android they wouldn't be a phone design company though would they?
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
...and I am sold.
I tried the iPhone. Didn't like it, too much of a walled garden.
I tried Android. It's UI sucks. Huge incosistences all around.
I will stick with my N900 until a Sailfish phone with a hardware keyboard arrives.
Am sure this new model is an "Android Metoo" phone.
Far fom it! Sailfish has a very distinct feel and it actually goes back a few years, being from the same lineage of Meego and Maemo before it. Check out the main interface features in this short video. And it's a proper GNU/Linux system (as opposed to Android/Linux), if you're into that sort of thing.
To be fair, yesterday existed, so the editors might not have been paying full attention to the site.
FTFY
No colour or religion ever stopped the bullet from a gun
Otherwise, I'd stick with iOS - also iOS (like Windows and Metro) has a hybrid kernel, unlike Android or Linux.
ZOMG SOME RANDOM BITS OF DARWIN LIVE IN USERLAND AND GET MESSAGES FROM THE KERNEL THAT'S SO KOOL!!!!!!1111ONE!!!!!!!!!
And, whilst NT has a bit more such stuff, neither of them are sufficiently different from an Old Fashioned Monolithic Kernel to be particularly interesting in that regard.
As soon as I read the line "...but can run most apps..." a feeling crept in that they most probably doing something wrong or had to make some hard compromises - just replicate the damn Android API, piece by piece, it is open is it not? "Most" today is a recipe for disaster - nobody likes almost working things. Jolla - talk with Google, certify Jolla as Android API compatible to a degree it is possible to actually "certify" for that kind of thing, and don't make yourself smaller than need be by stating "can run most apps". As a startup, you only have one shot at it, before you are shot back at - don't mess things up with inferiority in critical areas. Today it is not about hardware, it is about software - Android and iOS rule, and "most apps" means that you will win over "few" customers. Mark my word - unless you fix Androd compatibility, forget about it (and we will forget about you in 1-2 years.)
they are doing way better than nokia.
Wait, you needed a MicroSD slot and you bought a tablet without one? I see why you didn't log in.
Also, you don't need to use a google account at all, unless you want to use google services.
Nice-ish troll, though.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Otherwise, I'd stick with iOS - also iOS (like Windows and Metro) has a hybrid kernel, unlike Android or Linux.
OSX and Windows are both about equally microkernel operating systems, which is to say, they both have a HAL. That's about all OSX is using the underlying microkernel for. Just like Windows EXEs don't run against the HAL but against the kernel, OSX executables run against the kernel, not the microkernel, which is why it's not really a microkernel-based operating system. Meanwhile, Linux has been moving more and more functionality into userspace, which gives it some properties similar to a microkernel.
Or IOW, you don't know what you're talking about.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
They licenced an android compatibility layer from people who have talked to google a lot over five years or so and who had decided to "replicate the damn Android API, piece by piece" quite some time back.
The platform â" originally called MeeGo â" was developed by Nokia
Uh what? It's a merge of Moblin, from Intel, and Maemo from Nokia. And the nicest-looking interface is from Moblin. Nice Nokia fellation, though, submitter.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Witness the extremely aggressive push to even remove things like (micro)SD slots from mobile phones and tablets under the guise that it's a "design compromise"
I thought the point of removing support for microSD cards and USB flash drives was to avoid needing to pay royalties to Microsoft for use of its patented file systems VFAT (long file names in FAT16 and FAT32) and exFAT (default file system for microSDXC cards). But with Windows XP going away within the next half year, I guess phone makers could just use UDF instead.
Even then, I think the patents only covered storing both forms of the filename so IIRC if you store only the long form and don't bother creating an 8.3 filename then I don't think you're technically in violation.
One still has to create an 8.3 filename because the information that would be associated with an inode in *n?x file systems is associated with the directory entry containing the 8.3 filename in FAT.
exFAT I'm not very sure about since I inevitably end up formatting them FAT32 anyway
Having to reformat is inconvenient. First, the user would lose all data on the card, which is kind of hard if the user is sharing the card with a camera or something. Second, the formatting tool that ships with Windows caps FAT32 at 32 GB. ("It's called FAT32, isn't it?" I know that's not the real reason, but first tier tech support is almost as clueless about these things as the public.)
The Verge has posted a hands on with Jolla. It's not good news:
http://www.theverge.com/2013/11/29/5156446/jolla-smartphone-hands-on-preview
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Eastasia
"We have always been at war with Eastasia"
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
That... is bizarre. That's probably like a hundredth of the market demand, if not less.
Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!
But Panama Canal splits Panama - it's not the border of Panama & Colombia. In fact, a wee bit of Columbia is in the Central American strip. Just like the Sinai is a part of Egypt, yet is considered a part of Asia/Eurasia.
Doesn't matter. Everything east of the Urals is in Asia. At any rate, if Eurasia is being considered a single continent, Russia very much falls within it.
If it is Meego, what is it based on? Atom (like Intel originally planned?) or ARM?
Yeah, I too am wondering what's different b/w this story, and the one posted yesterday
I'm one of the guys who got the phone two days ago. You can read my quick review here.
To summarize: the user interface based on swiping works quite nicely, even if a bit confusing at first, and the phone works OK as a minimalistic smartphone. On Day 1, there still are quite many bugs and usability issues that need to be worked out.
Compared to Android or iOS, the visual simplicity of the user interface views is extreme, no buttons or decorations almost anywhere. When you open the phone app, you just see a very plain call log. In the email app, you just get a list of emails, and when you open an email, there's just a title followed by text. On the downside, views are often rather over-simplified, so that things are hidden too well, and workflows to get to what you want are often a bit complex and unintuitive. There's no status row that is always visible, system settings aren't accessible immediately everywhere, but you need to go to the start screen, etc.
Some critical features such as WiFi access point missing (or I just haven't found it after poking around 2 days).
Around 30 native apps; some Android apps work just fine, but many do not, and the selection is in practice very limited.