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Nokia Crawls Towards Comeback With New Phones Announcement (theregister.co.uk)
An anonymous reader shares a report on The Register: The "new Nokia" appears going for volume rather than margins as it makes a comeback into phones. A new venture called HMD Global has licensed the rights to the Nokia brand for use in phones, which will be made by Foxconn. Three or four new Nokia-branded devices will be launched, Nokia's China chief suggested in August, with the first to be announced before Christmas. Benchmarks for one device, named in the benchmarks as the "D1C" have been spotted, indicating a solid midrange device, with 3GB of RAM, and Android Nougat 7. The CPU is identified as a Qualcomm Snapdragon 430 octa core running at 1.4Ghz. In 2013, Microsoft bought the exclusive right to use the Nokia brand for phones, for a limited period. That exclusivity period expires at the end of this year.
Seriously?
"I bless every day that I continue to live, for every day is pure profit."
one day they ditch Android and replace with a new Symbian OS. I'm tired of the binary Android or iOS choice. If Nokia can deliver new phones with Symbian and a great battery life, people will buy them in record numbers.
Give me a solid OS alternative to iOS or Android and I might be interested.
I am really tired of closed-source walled gardens and phones that leak personal information like a sieve. I want something better, and (since I use an iPhone currently) am obviously willing to pay for it.
Don't-Can't leak much info.
Email only encrypted files from your laptop, no text. Oops, computers can be hacked, too.
After selling the name to microsoft, now this anyone who would choose a nokia because it's a nokia based off nokia's past heyday will know to steer clear because it will just be a piece of shit with the word nokia written on.
Wanna buy a shirt?
https://www.redbubble.com/people/stealthfinger/shop?asc=u
If I ever actually won the lottery, how much would it cost to have someone design and build a smartphone to my very own specs?
I would really like to see the Communicator line make a comeback.
Nokia Maemo was not "a 3rd platform (windows phones, BB10, FirefoxOS, etc)". It was standard Linux being able to run regular commandline (and some X11) applications compatible with UNIX API existing for approx. 50 years. Windows phones are not Win32 ABI compatible (and Windows applications are not distributed in source but AFAIK Windows phones are not even API compatible). And BB10 or FirefoxOS are also from-scratch OSes, no backward compatibility there. Nokia Maemo was special, this is also why Microsoft killed it by/after acquiring Nokia.
Wanna stand out, 'Nokia'? Make flip phones.
If no else, Hollywood will buy them, as movie and TV directors cannot give up the dramatic closing of a flip phone.
one day they ditch Android and replace with a new Symbian OS
Common, Nokia had thrown money to their R&D department.
They have thrown money at developping their Maemo/Meego platform.
They have thrown money at building the N700/N800/N900/N9 series of Linux PDAs/Phones.
They have basically paid all the things that became Jolla after the Linux R&D at Nokia got Sacked.
(Hence the joke - name).
In short they have already financed some sort of "new Symbian OS", i.e.: they have already financed a cool new OS.
Jolla has built Sailfish OS, a very nice full-blown GNU/Linux platform (that has support for Android Apps, through at least 2 different solutions).
But Jolla isn't that stellar with hardware (see tablet fiasco).
Why the heck won't Nokia reach out Jolla and find possible uses for Sailfish OS ?
They've basically paid for building it,
it will help them to distinguish themselves from an over-saturated Android market (just like Samsung is trying with Tizen, build on the exact same "Mer" core),
it will help them break the Andoird/iOS binary situation,
and unlike Microsoft's failed attemps, it can also leverage an existing App eco system (Android) so it doesn't feel like the poor App-less parent (like Palm/HP WebOS was, or like Windows is trending now) but has access to a proven successful ecosystem of Apps *right now".
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
This. Bringing back Nokia's GNU/Linux tablets and phones from the noughties (with modern hardware, of course) would be a good start.
Exists right now.
Said GNU/Linux R&D team that was responsible for N900, got sacked by Nokia and went on to create "Jolla".
The company responsible for Sailfish OS : an very nice looking full GNU/Linux smartphone OS, based around the "Mer" core - what is currently become of the Maemo/Meego platform of N900 - with a nice polished Qt interface, and at least 2 different solutions to run Android Apps - so it has access to a proven ecosystem.
Imagine a phone with a real QWERTY keyboard that actually fits in your pocket, unlike today's thin and wide slabs
...and thought not featured as a base feature on the Jolla 1 phone, there were some 3rd party hobbyist sliding keyboards designed to work around the "Other Half" concept of Jolla (the back cover is supposed to be modular, well documented, and exports a few interesting things on pogo-pins, enabling 3rd party to create such things as this keyboard).
Nokia should stop fumbling around and simply get an arrangement with them.
(The paid for the development of most of what has ended up in Sailfish OS any way,
and Jolla, though they have a super cool OS, are struggling producing good hardware).
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
The sad part is that those Nokia devices may well be the origin for what is plaguing the Linux world these days.
The development of these Nokia devices, is what has given us over time Maemo, Meego, and nowadays the Mer core.
On which you have nice usefull OS built like Sailfish OS (by Jolla - the same people who used to work at Nokia's Linux R&F)
or Tizen (the thing that Samsung would like to bring as an alternative to Android).
It has seen the creation of oFono, a very practical DBus-driven telephony middleware, which is used by the above Mer-core based OSes, but also by Ubuntu touch.
Okay, it's not Android, but it has still seen more developpement and real-world usage than other projects (like FreeSmartphone.org (FSO) which I haven't seen much deployed beyond OpenMoko).
So I wouldn't call Nokia a failure on Linux land.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Nokia bet its manufacturing and marketing on Symbian, and the GNU/Linux line was basically a skunk works project.
Luckily for us they aren't skunk work anymore nowadays.
After Nokia closed it's Linux R&D department, the same people went on and created Jolla, and have had some success with a nice OS called Sailfish OS (built on the "Mer" core, direct successor of the Maemo/Meego projects)
Nokia could try betting on them for once.
The OS is nice (Qt based), has Android App compatibility (so there's a proven app ecosystem which will be accessible to the users).
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
You won't see any mainstream phone featuring a physical keyboard.
They aren't very popular among the average sheeple.
But you could go with after market.
Android supports a physical keyboard out-of-the-box without any extra driver.
Maybe some asian manufacturer are making tiny backcovers with sliding keyboards and mini USB-OTG cables ?
Some phones like Jolla 1 or Fairphone 2 expose extra channels on pogo pins, are designed to have a modular backcover, and have the whole thing documented for 3rd party to be able to design accessories.
(e.g.: there's a guy called Dirk Van Lesum that made a DIY sliding keyboard kit designed for Jolla's I2C pins on the back cover).
That's probably the route you'll need to go in the future.
Find phones where after-market keyboard by 3rd party are available.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Why try to squeeze a keyboard onto the phone when you could get a larger foldable bluetooth keyboard?
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ooooh, I didn't know or didn't remember about that. Explains a whole lot of stuff that has been happening.
Nokia has been talking about new Android phones for quite a while now, it made me think why they haven't released it just yet.
That exclusivity period might explain it. Also why Microsoft is abandoning the Lumia brand.
Guess it's a good thing to have Microsoft changing directions next year, and Nokia coming back to the market.
We'll see how that goes.
Because my Nokia Communicator E90 fits nicely in my pocket. Will I be able to fit a phone, the bluetooth keyboard and whatever support structure is required for me to be able to use it while standing? If I can somehow make a regular Android phone+bluetooth keyboard as convenient to use as the E90 that would be great. Oh, this contraption would need to be as durable as the Nokia phone too, I sometimes accidentally drop my phone from ~1m height.
HMD Global is in Finland and consists primarily of former Nokia employees.
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At the price the phones sell - talking about if one buys a phone not tied to a carrier - it's hard to believe that Apple or Google or Samsung lose money. Heck, even things like the OnePlus 3 sell for a bundle. The only time phones lose money is if the carrier loses money selling them, but I believe that they've got that down
What I like about it is the intuitive user interface, and what seems to be the way that applications are interacting with each other, so it seems like one system and not a bunch of independent applications, or apps as some people prefer to call them.
Yup.
That's also the thing I liked with Palm/HP webOS (another OS like Meamo/Meego/Mer Core/Sailfish OS which is a Computer shrunken down successfully to pocket size, rather than some Phone middleware bloated trying to make it look "Smart").
There, the concept was called "synergy".
One one side you had a bunch of providers : you sign your Google account, and that provides contacts, e-mails, calendars, XMPP chat, Youtube video.
On the other side you had a bunch of consumer : generic e-mail application that concentrate all mail comming from all contacts (be it Google, some corporate MS-Exchange stuff, or generic IMAP), generic contacts (that automatically agregate all your address books from Google, Facebook and LinkedIn), etc.)
(For Android people:
think a little bit how some app can add a "Share with..." contextual menu on file/media/image browsers. Except the *whole* system is like this, not only the sharing/uploading function, but anything that could be provided by an account: calendars, contacts, etc.)
Compared to Maemo/Meego/MerCore/etc. webOS went even a little bit further :
- synergy was able to automatically collapse info.
if you have the same person on your SIM card's phone book, on Google, on Facebook and on LinkedIn, it is automatically detected (based on names/e-mails/Etc. similarities) and unified as a single "contact".
In Sailfish OS, that's still a manual operation (you need to "Link account..." from the pulley menu).
- Starting from webOS 2.x application could also provide "search" or "fast action" called "Just Type...".
(It's basically a descendant inherited by the universal search function on older Palm OS )
If you start to type on the hardware keyboard while no application is in focus, the system will start making auto-suggestions based on your typing
(a little bit like google's automatic suggestions, bug using above-mentionned "Just type..." plugins)
Contacts would suggest people matching your search keyword,
Notes would suggest make a new note.
if you typed a number you would be suggested to call it, if it matched a phone format, and/or if it matched a time format, calendar would propose to make a new appointment, Wikipedia and Google would suggest a search on their respective websites, etc.
That's a wonderful feature I liked a lot in webOS (and liked its Palm OS ancestror), and I miss it a lot currently.
(I've tried Google's assistant, but it is catastrophic in comparison).
And the most useful for me: all the above Linux OS (webOS, and the M*** family) have multi-processing done right.
Their card metaphore is nice (webOS deck-of-cards is even better at "tabs" and other "two-levels" problems)
Switching, starting and closing apps is only a slide or a fling away.
(Which is to be expected, as both have ancestry in desktop multi-processing, successfully shrunken down to pocket-size)
I find iOS (my friend has an iPhone) and Andoird (cheap ~100$ tablet) much more cumbersome.
Other things I find cool :
both webOS and Salfish are extremely gesture oriented.
Coming from PalmOS to webOS straigh without ever having any smartphone in between, I didn't understand what was so much the fuss about. It's only after having been exposed to Android (and iOS) I understood how much the other are cumbersome, and how navigating inside and between apps is intuitive and simple in webOS and Sailfish (everything is always litteraly 1 fling or slide away).
The most extreme difference I've seen is pickup a call between Android and Sailfish.
Android (both phone and apps like WhatsApp) seem to have a fixation about asking you to drag around on-screen icons. You to "catch" the "pick-up" green thingy, and drag it to the opposite
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]