PureOS 10 is Released for all Librem Products(puri.sm)
puri.sm
PureOS 10 is Released for all Librem Products
https://puri.sm/posts/true-convergence-is-here-pureos-10-is-released-for-all-librem-products/
139 comments
The PinePhone is fine as a daily driver. If it's not good enough for you, that's fine, but don't generalize it as if it's something obvious and applies to everyone.
Edit: People responding to me as if I said it's suitable as a daily driver for "most people" or "casual users" need to learn how to read. Not only did I not use either of those phrases, the context of the conversation was "those looking for a Linux phone", which neither of those demographics are.
Edit: People responding to me as if I said it's suitable as a daily driver for "most people" or "casual users" need to learn how to read. Not only did I not use either of those phrases, the context of the conversation was "those looking for a Linux phone", which neither of those demographics are.
I mean, please be honest and say that the exception is those who find it usable as a daily driver.
Compared to the “average” phone of a typical person (which depends on country), the pinephone is slower and less capable than that with worse battery life. I do own one, but this is the unfortunate reality. I could probably use one as a daily driver, but at that point I could probably just as well be without a phone, as taking photos is 2000s category and desktop firefox is not the most usable on a touch interface, let alone on such a weak CPU.
Compared to the “average” phone of a typical person (which depends on country), the pinephone is slower and less capable than that with worse battery life. I do own one, but this is the unfortunate reality. I could probably use one as a daily driver, but at that point I could probably just as well be without a phone, as taking photos is 2000s category and desktop firefox is not the most usable on a touch interface, let alone on such a weak CPU.
Someone just mentioned browserbench.org to me and I tested my work iphone 12 mini (score 212) versus my personal moto x4 with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 630 (11.x score).
So this benchmark tells me the single-core JS performance of the iphone is 20x that of my just 2 year old phone. And you know what? I didn't notice it was supposed to be "slow". I don't have a comparison to the Pinephone and I'm too lazy to look now but if I, a casual (normal?) phone user don't notice this weak cpu, what else might I not notice?
So this benchmark tells me the single-core JS performance of the iphone is 20x that of my just 2 year old phone. And you know what? I didn't notice it was supposed to be "slow". I don't have a comparison to the Pinephone and I'm too lazy to look now but if I, a casual (normal?) phone user don't notice this weak cpu, what else might I not notice?
I have a PinePhone, with the distro that was recently selected as the "official" one, so it's supposed to be the most polished[1].
I can't even do things as basic as placing an app icon on the home screen, and expect that it will still be there after the next reboot.
So it is not a daily driver by any stretch of the immagination, regardless of what you mean by daily driver. Even if your idea of daily driver is "a feature phone would do", it's still not there yet (MMS not being fully working, most feature phones have that).
I love the PinePhone and I want to see it succeed, I don't regret spending the money on it, but it is most certainly not usable as a daily driver.
I can see some progress being made with every single update though, so in time it will eventually get there thanks to the community.
[1] https://pine64.com/product/pinephone-beta-edition-with-conve...
I can't even do things as basic as placing an app icon on the home screen, and expect that it will still be there after the next reboot.
So it is not a daily driver by any stretch of the immagination, regardless of what you mean by daily driver. Even if your idea of daily driver is "a feature phone would do", it's still not there yet (MMS not being fully working, most feature phones have that).
I love the PinePhone and I want to see it succeed, I don't regret spending the money on it, but it is most certainly not usable as a daily driver.
I can see some progress being made with every single update though, so in time it will eventually get there thanks to the community.
[1] https://pine64.com/product/pinephone-beta-edition-with-conve...
>I have a PinePhone, with the distro that was recently selected as the "official" one, so it's supposed to be the most polished[1].
It isn't. It's only pre-installed because there's a money deal involved with pre-installing it. Manjaro also did weird things like announcing they have working MMS when they didn't, and even outside of phones are considered to be a weird distro given their relationship with Arch. Going by the IRC channel, a lot of people install a different distro.
>I can't even do things as basic as placing an app icon on the home screen, and expect that it will still be there after the next reboot.
Known plamo bug that they haven't fixed in forever. I stopped using it for that and other reasons and have no idea why people like it. phosh works fine.
Also, "things as basic as" implies that saving the positions of homescreen items is somehow more fundamental than everything else on the phone, and if they can't get this to work then obviously everything else must also be broken. It isn't, and it's not.
>So it is not a daily driver by any stretch of the immagination, regardless of what you mean by daily driver.
It makes and receives calls, sends and receives SMS, downloads voicemails, runs an up-to-date web brower, takes decent photographs of documents when a scanner isn't available, and allows me to ssh to my other machines.
Turns out different people have different criteria for their daily driver phones. Shocking.
>Even if your idea of daily driver is "a feature phone would do", it's still not there yet (MMS not being fully working, most feature phones have that).
a) MMS matters to a few select countries in the world. But since you assumed everyone else has the same view as you about what a daily driver is, presumably you also assumed that everyone else finds MMS important.
b) Dumbphones can't do three of the five things I listed above as my criteria for a daily driver.
c) In the US, it's next to impossible to find a dumbphone that will continue to work in the next few years because of carriers shutting down everything that isn't 4G and 5G.
Really, all this conversation thread has revealed is that people don't think there's a middle ground between a phone that's 100% usable by all 8 billion people in the world and a phone that's 100% useless.
It isn't. It's only pre-installed because there's a money deal involved with pre-installing it. Manjaro also did weird things like announcing they have working MMS when they didn't, and even outside of phones are considered to be a weird distro given their relationship with Arch. Going by the IRC channel, a lot of people install a different distro.
>I can't even do things as basic as placing an app icon on the home screen, and expect that it will still be there after the next reboot.
Known plamo bug that they haven't fixed in forever. I stopped using it for that and other reasons and have no idea why people like it. phosh works fine.
Also, "things as basic as" implies that saving the positions of homescreen items is somehow more fundamental than everything else on the phone, and if they can't get this to work then obviously everything else must also be broken. It isn't, and it's not.
>So it is not a daily driver by any stretch of the immagination, regardless of what you mean by daily driver.
It makes and receives calls, sends and receives SMS, downloads voicemails, runs an up-to-date web brower, takes decent photographs of documents when a scanner isn't available, and allows me to ssh to my other machines.
Turns out different people have different criteria for their daily driver phones. Shocking.
>Even if your idea of daily driver is "a feature phone would do", it's still not there yet (MMS not being fully working, most feature phones have that).
a) MMS matters to a few select countries in the world. But since you assumed everyone else has the same view as you about what a daily driver is, presumably you also assumed that everyone else finds MMS important.
b) Dumbphones can't do three of the five things I listed above as my criteria for a daily driver.
c) In the US, it's next to impossible to find a dumbphone that will continue to work in the next few years because of carriers shutting down everything that isn't 4G and 5G.
Really, all this conversation thread has revealed is that people don't think there's a middle ground between a phone that's 100% usable by all 8 billion people in the world and a phone that's 100% useless.
Those are all ad-hoc hypotheses. I agree with the first part of your post, where you state that there are better distros for PinePhone. But this is still highly problematic because most people don't want to install a distro from a micro SD (I'm a "techie" and even for me it's an inconvenience, I had to go out a purchase one LOL)
Regarding the other points:
> Also, "things as basic as" implies that saving the positions of homescreen items is somehow more fundamental than everything else on the phone, and if they can't get this to work then obviously everything else must also be broken. It isn't, and it's not.
I strongly disagree with this, it's one of the first things every new user will do with a new phone, it's the very definition of basic considering that our discussion is in the context of usability. Dev priorities should be based on user needs not on some other obscure technical criterion.
> It makes and receives calls, sends and receives SMS, downloads voicemails, runs an up-to-date web brower, takes decent photographs of documents when a scanner isn't available, and allows me to ssh to my other machines.
So it's a feature phone, bar the SSH.
> MMS matters to a few select countries in the world. But since you assumed everyone else has the same view as you about what a daily driver is, presumably you also assumed that everyone else finds MMS important. Again, Dev priorities should be based on user needs not on some other obscure technical criterion.
I don't live in one of the countries where MMS messages are mainstream, so they don't matter to me, but I know those countries exist, and some of those are among the largest countries by population, so I consider it a priority. Again, Dev priorities should be based on user needs not on some other obscure technical criterion.
> b) Dumbphones can't do three of the five things I listed above as my criteria for a daily driver.
they can do everything you mentioned except SSH, and I'm pretty sure there was some Nokia Series 30 app that can do SSH, but of course it's debatable if Series 30 falls under smartphone or feature phone.
> Really, all this conversation thread has revealed is that people don't think there's a middle ground between a phone that's 100% usable by all 8 billion people in the world and a phone that's 100% useless.
At the moment PinePhone is usable by less than what, 2% of the population? So according to your own criteria it's 98% useless? :-P
Regarding the other points:
> Also, "things as basic as" implies that saving the positions of homescreen items is somehow more fundamental than everything else on the phone, and if they can't get this to work then obviously everything else must also be broken. It isn't, and it's not.
I strongly disagree with this, it's one of the first things every new user will do with a new phone, it's the very definition of basic considering that our discussion is in the context of usability. Dev priorities should be based on user needs not on some other obscure technical criterion.
> It makes and receives calls, sends and receives SMS, downloads voicemails, runs an up-to-date web brower, takes decent photographs of documents when a scanner isn't available, and allows me to ssh to my other machines.
So it's a feature phone, bar the SSH.
> MMS matters to a few select countries in the world. But since you assumed everyone else has the same view as you about what a daily driver is, presumably you also assumed that everyone else finds MMS important. Again, Dev priorities should be based on user needs not on some other obscure technical criterion.
I don't live in one of the countries where MMS messages are mainstream, so they don't matter to me, but I know those countries exist, and some of those are among the largest countries by population, so I consider it a priority. Again, Dev priorities should be based on user needs not on some other obscure technical criterion.
> b) Dumbphones can't do three of the five things I listed above as my criteria for a daily driver.
they can do everything you mentioned except SSH, and I'm pretty sure there was some Nokia Series 30 app that can do SSH, but of course it's debatable if Series 30 falls under smartphone or feature phone.
> Really, all this conversation thread has revealed is that people don't think there's a middle ground between a phone that's 100% usable by all 8 billion people in the world and a phone that's 100% useless.
At the moment PinePhone is usable by less than what, 2% of the population? So according to your own criteria it's 98% useless? :-P
>But this is still highly problematic because most people don't want to install a distro from a micro SD (I'm a "techie" and even for me it's an inconvenience, I had to go out a purchase one LOL)
>I strongly disagree with this, it's one of the first things every new user will do with a new phone, it's the very definition of basic considering that our discussion is in the context of usability.
>At the moment PinePhone is usable by less than what, 2% of the population?
Read the edit in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29310621
---
>Dev priorities should be based on user needs not on some other obscure technical criterion.
>Again, Dev priorities should be based on user needs not on some other obscure technical criterion.
Sorry, but you don't understand how Linux works. People create things that they want to use themselves, not because they have to satisfy KPIs about number of users to their management.
The whole reason MMS support exists now is that one person decided he needed it badly enough to spend time learning a large amount of time reading the spec, learning glib, etc.
---
>So it's a feature phone, bar the SSH.
Wrong. My feature phone can no longer work for calls or SMS because the carrier decided to block it, since it's shutting down 3G. It also doesn't have an up-to-date browser.
>I strongly disagree with this, it's one of the first things every new user will do with a new phone, it's the very definition of basic considering that our discussion is in the context of usability.
>At the moment PinePhone is usable by less than what, 2% of the population?
Read the edit in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29310621
---
>Dev priorities should be based on user needs not on some other obscure technical criterion.
>Again, Dev priorities should be based on user needs not on some other obscure technical criterion.
Sorry, but you don't understand how Linux works. People create things that they want to use themselves, not because they have to satisfy KPIs about number of users to their management.
The whole reason MMS support exists now is that one person decided he needed it badly enough to spend time learning a large amount of time reading the spec, learning glib, etc.
---
>So it's a feature phone, bar the SSH.
Wrong. My feature phone can no longer work for calls or SMS because the carrier decided to block it, since it's shutting down 3G. It also doesn't have an up-to-date browser.
Look I think our main disagreement comes from here:
> People create things that they want to use themselves, not because they have to satisfy KPIs about number of users to their management.
Instead, for me it is more something like:
"I create things for the community, including my mum who, back in the 90's, could never learn how to program her VCR".
Well, I've never contributed to any Linux distro but I contributed to a few OSS projects and I usually have that kind of goal in my mind.
Regarding the feature phones problem, I believe there are a few "new" feature phones that support new network standards, I will dig the links up, I'm a bit of an Amish when it comes to phones so I have researched this topic multiple times in the past (but eventually decided to go for the PinePhone instead). The browser is not going to be great of course, but should be serviceable in most cases.
Edit:
these are some of the feature phones I have evaluated, they all support 4G, at the time I did not have browser or camera among the requirements so some of those don't have them:
https://www.nttdocomo.co.jp/english/product/feature_phone/ky... This one has no camera
https://www.thelightphone.com/ this one has no browser or camera
https://mudita.com/products/phones/mudita-pure/ Unfortunately still says "pre order", so not viable right now
https://www.nokia.com/phones/en_au/feature-phones All models have camera, browser[1] and 4G, unfortunately they come with some unwelcome preinstalled software, such as Whatsapp and Google Maps. PS the link brings you to the Australian website, if you are in the US replace "_au" with "_us" in the URL, the selection of models is slightly different.
[1] all except the 225 have KaiOS Browser which from what I've read is serviceable for basic browsing, the 225 apparently comes with a lightweight browser based on Opera Mini which is unable to render correctly most websites so it would be only useful strictly as an "emergency" browser.
> People create things that they want to use themselves, not because they have to satisfy KPIs about number of users to their management.
Instead, for me it is more something like:
"I create things for the community, including my mum who, back in the 90's, could never learn how to program her VCR".
Well, I've never contributed to any Linux distro but I contributed to a few OSS projects and I usually have that kind of goal in my mind.
Regarding the feature phones problem, I believe there are a few "new" feature phones that support new network standards, I will dig the links up, I'm a bit of an Amish when it comes to phones so I have researched this topic multiple times in the past (but eventually decided to go for the PinePhone instead). The browser is not going to be great of course, but should be serviceable in most cases.
Edit:
these are some of the feature phones I have evaluated, they all support 4G, at the time I did not have browser or camera among the requirements so some of those don't have them:
https://www.nttdocomo.co.jp/english/product/feature_phone/ky... This one has no camera
https://www.thelightphone.com/ this one has no browser or camera
https://mudita.com/products/phones/mudita-pure/ Unfortunately still says "pre order", so not viable right now
https://www.nokia.com/phones/en_au/feature-phones All models have camera, browser[1] and 4G, unfortunately they come with some unwelcome preinstalled software, such as Whatsapp and Google Maps. PS the link brings you to the Australian website, if you are in the US replace "_au" with "_us" in the URL, the selection of models is slightly different.
[1] all except the 225 have KaiOS Browser which from what I've read is serviceable for basic browsing, the 225 apparently comes with a lightweight browser based on Opera Mini which is unable to render correctly most websites so it would be only useful strictly as an "emergency" browser.
While I love the PinePhone, I think "still a ways from being a daily driver" is a more accurate representation than "fine as a daily driver" for most people's experiences. Some people are definitely able to daily drive the PinePhone, but e.g. https://www.reddit.com/r/PINE64official/comments/qm1aut/pine...
> Firefox: 8 seconds to open; ... and loads my start page in 21 seconds.
It's constantly improving, and the PinePhone Pro seems similarly promising, but I'd be downright shocked if there triple digits of people daily driving it and enjoying the experience (outside the satisfaction of living on the bleeding edge).
> Firefox: 8 seconds to open; ... and loads my start page in 21 seconds.
It's constantly improving, and the PinePhone Pro seems similarly promising, but I'd be downright shocked if there triple digits of people daily driving it and enjoying the experience (outside the satisfaction of living on the bleeding edge).
I'm a causal user looking for a Linux phone. I want a non-proprietary OS and I want to support open source. I'm willing to give up a lot to get that. But Pinephone isn't quite there yet. I know it will be someday!
Agree with the other respondents here. I love the PinePhone project and want them to succeed long term. That said, recommending it to causal users as a daily driver before it's ready causes more harm than good.
If you want a Linux distro running on a mobile phone with good build quality and decent specs there is Sailfish OS:
https://shop.jolla.com/
It unfortunately not fully open source, but other than that its a normal Linux distro (Qt, DBus, systemd, rpm, Python, etc.). I have been running it on my primary device for years so I would say it is useable. ;-)
https://shop.jolla.com/
It unfortunately not fully open source, but other than that its a normal Linux distro (Qt, DBus, systemd, rpm, Python, etc.). I have been running it on my primary device for years so I would say it is useable. ;-)
What do you mean by a "Linux phone"?
If you just mean a phone that can run a more traditional Linux distribution, you could look into Postmarket OS. There's a list of supported devices here: https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Devices
If you just mean a phone that can run a more traditional Linux distribution, you could look into Postmarket OS. There's a list of supported devices here: https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Devices
One definition may be a phone that you can run current mainline Linux on (5.16-rc2) without much trouble or loss in functionality.
Maybe with some patches on top to enable more functionality, but easily rebaseable, unlike some abandoned 3-6 years old kernel with milions of lines of changes that you have no way of rebasing on top of the latest Linux release, to be able to enjoy all the latest Linux kernel advancements.
More strict definition would be that you can just boot Arch Linux ARM on it or other ARM distro out of the box, and all HW will be accessible and usable.
Otherwise Linux phone is any old Android, because all of them run some hacked up version of Linux. :)
Maybe with some patches on top to enable more functionality, but easily rebaseable, unlike some abandoned 3-6 years old kernel with milions of lines of changes that you have no way of rebasing on top of the latest Linux release, to be able to enjoy all the latest Linux kernel advancements.
More strict definition would be that you can just boot Arch Linux ARM on it or other ARM distro out of the box, and all HW will be accessible and usable.
Otherwise Linux phone is any old Android, because all of them run some hacked up version of Linux. :)
The actually usable category would probably start at a bootloader unlocked android, and arguably the best “distro” on them is graphene os, which pays a ton of attention to security and privacy (while “gnu/linux” derivatives mostly couldn’t care less about security unfortunately, but privacy without that is meaningless)
I've tried all the major Linux phone distributions and they are almost all completely unusable for day-to-day things for me. Ubuntu Touch, PinePhone, Plasma Mobile - they all have nice parts and bad parts but the overall thing is that none of them offer most of the things people need from their phone like third party messaging applications (Discord, WhatsApp, etc.) without janky workarounds and hacks.
You say third party, but I think you mean proprietary. Essentially everything running on these devices is third party. Pine themselves aren't making PineChat and similar programs.
Lack of support for proprietary apps is something to blame those proprietary app developers for, generally. They haven't given the people freedoms to port them.
Matrix and XMPP are third party, free, and already usable on a PinePhone.
Lack of support for proprietary apps is something to blame those proprietary app developers for, generally. They haven't given the people freedoms to port them.
Matrix and XMPP are third party, free, and already usable on a PinePhone.
By the way, PureOS is officially endorsed by the FSF [0], and it's the most popular OS among the endorsed [1].
[0] https://www.fsf.org/news/fsf-adds-pureos-to-list-of-endorsed...
[1] https://distrowatch.com/dwres.php?resource=popularity
[0] https://www.fsf.org/news/fsf-adds-pureos-to-list-of-endorsed...
[1] https://distrowatch.com/dwres.php?resource=popularity
Completely meaningless..
Purism gets around the requirements for FSF RYF by loading proprietary firmware from a separate chip instead of main CPU
Purism gets around the requirements for FSF RYF by loading proprietary firmware from a separate chip instead of main CPU
Why does it matter that some chip runs proprietary software, when it has no way to access network or RAM? It's basically what FSF call "hardware". Of course it would be great to have it open, too, but that goes beyond requirements of RYF.
I think his point is that the rules that FSF has created here are arbitrary and their dogma of claiming it doesn't use any proprietary blobs is lip service since they end up doing the same overall thing just with slightly different steps.
The rules are not arbitrary. They separate "hardware" from "software" from the point of view of freedom, as I explained above: "hardware" is non-updatable and with limited access, whereas software is vice versa.
So what is this thing actually based on? Can it run say Debian/Ubuntu packages? Running an obscure distro is usually more pain than it's worth, even for something like Raspbian.
Yes, you can run Debian/Ubuntu software. It's mostly Debian: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29308071.
Debian without contrib / non-free would be RYF-compliant, that's basically the Trisquel distribution. Taking Debian and making it RYF-compliant is not really an achievement. Sure, it's nice, but it doesn't bring much to the ecosystem.
It brings the convergence and commercial contributors.
Does it? Why would they contribute to PureOS instead of Debian for packages that are in both?
They upstream everything they can: https://puri.sm/posts/end-of-year-librem-5-update/. In the long term it decreases the amount of work for the support. AFAIK PureOS is trying to differ as less as possible from Debian and mainline kernel. It needs to differ due to the new hardware and some privacy/freedom-respecting defaults though.
Is the FSF’s opinion on what constitutes “libre” really that meaningful when we look at the full picture?
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29286715
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29286715
The problem you mention about the microcode is indeed debatable. But concerning the OS, I think FSF has a perfect case: it should be 100% free. Note that Purism allow updates of proprietary microcode and firmware on their laptops and phones. Those are just not a part of PureOS.
I'm not particularly interested in the FSF's opinion until they fix some major, foundational issues with the organization. These issues are both the continued presence of RMS, who aside from his sexuality related comments is far too dogmatic, uncompromising, and inflammitory, but also the under-the-table glad handing of the top management.
There is nothing wrong with RMS. After his return, the FSF got more members than ever. See also: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22299156.
nothing wrong with RMS? Wow. I can understand people defending him but it's just wrong to say he's without controversy.
Is this Linux? This article or their website don't use the name Linux or Unix, but they're showing software like Gnome or KDE that are typically used on Linux.
From TFA:
> PureOS leverages the legendary security support from upstream Debian.
> PureOS leverages the legendary security support from upstream Debian.
> the legendary security support from upstream Debian
Anytime I do a vulnerability scan of a Debian image (updated via apt) using AWS ECR I get a laundry list of open issues including a few high severity CVEs. Meanwhile images based on Amazon Linux, Alpine or Oracle Linux are clear or have only few lower severity CVEs. I haven't looked at AlmaLinux recently but I'll need to soon; if it is anything like CentOS I expect the scan will be fairly clean.
Whatever rationale there might be for this it is difficult to explain to stake holders. In any case 'legendary' seems a stretch comparatively speaking.
Anytime I do a vulnerability scan of a Debian image (updated via apt) using AWS ECR I get a laundry list of open issues including a few high severity CVEs. Meanwhile images based on Amazon Linux, Alpine or Oracle Linux are clear or have only few lower severity CVEs. I haven't looked at AlmaLinux recently but I'll need to soon; if it is anything like CentOS I expect the scan will be fairly clean.
Whatever rationale there might be for this it is difficult to explain to stake holders. In any case 'legendary' seems a stretch comparatively speaking.
Debian is legendary for being the most widely used Linux distro, and as such it has the most support. And that is probably the most important thing, but security is not one of its strengths.
Vulnerability scanners love false positives.
You really need a better vulnerability scanner then. Debian is one of the most security-centric distributions.
So they take security patches from Debian for some packages. I guess the kernel has to be Linux-compatible at least for that to be sensible, so it's probably Linux.
It's definitely Linux. They upstream everything they can: https://puri.sm/posts/purism-and-linux-5-13/.
PureOS makes an effort to avoid saying Linux. IMO it's a deceptive marketing ploy to take software from GNU/Linux without giving credit, and pretending to be something different, perhaps to attract lay people who are scared of "Linux".
https://tracker.pureos.net/T749
https://tracker.pureos.net/T749
They avoid Linux, because it's GNU/Linux: https://www.gnu.org/gnu/why-gnu-linux.html. (FSF requires calling the OS GNU/Linux, not Linux, in order to get the endorsment.)
That’s not what the parent commenter is saying at all.
They avoid mentioning GNU/Linux in general.
They avoid mentioning GNU/Linux in general.
No, they don't: https://puri.sm/faq/what-is-gnulinux/.
I'm mostly ignorant of the mobile space, but how plausible would it be to get PureOS installed on an existing handset? I'm guessing the process is considerably more involved than an Android ROM, but how crazy are we talking?
Why not try postmarketos with the "PureOS" user interface, phosh?
pmbootstrap will allow you to generate an image for your phone, flash it, set up a cross-compile environment and a chroot with emulation trough qemu for local testing, it's quite easy to use.
https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Devices
https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Installation_guide
pmbootstrap will allow you to generate an image for your phone, flash it, set up a cross-compile environment and a chroot with emulation trough qemu for local testing, it's quite easy to use.
https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Devices
https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Installation_guide
It's probably impossible due to proprietary drivers tied to a very old Linux kernel. More info: https://forums.puri.sm/t/is-there-a-way-to-put-pureos-on-ano....
The quality of the displays Linux laptop users will tolerate always amazes me. Where's the HiDPI 16:10 IPS panels? Macs and PCs are delivering mini LEDs and OLEDs and all kinds of wonders. I can't imagine actually working on one of these.
Dell sells XPS 13s with Linux preinstalled. The newer XPS has a 16:10 display, and they have hidpi OLED panels as an option.
I am sort of generalizing here, but I bet that most linux laptop users are probably into development more than they are into multimedia. Syntax highlighting doesnt require fancy displays.
> Syntax highlighting doesnt require fancy displays.
It does. Text looks better on high density displays.
It does. Text looks better on high density displays.
Density =/= color resolution. High DPI displays are great for text, but the amount of colors you need for highlighting is very small.
It's just 14". Are you sure you need 4k?
HiDPI != 4k
If the choice is between fullhd and 4k, then hidpi==4k.
I don't follow. In the general case it's not true e.g. Full HD at 42 inches is not HiDPI but neither is 4k at 42 inches. In this case (14" laptop) it's not true either as there are more options than 1080p or 4k panels, for instance 2560x1440 at 14 inches is perfect for HiDPI at 200%.
There aren't more options readily available at good supply and cost. E.g. dell xps 13: there are exactly two options, fullhd+ and 4k+ (it is 16:10 hence plus). Same for a thinkpad X1. Same for schenker/clevo whatever etc.
> In general case it is not true....
Really? You could at least pretend to argue in good faith...
> In general case it is not true....
Really? You could at least pretend to argue in good faith...
I don't see an issue with 1080 on 14", but having double pixel density (like retina) really makes using it a much better experience.
Higher resolution means higher power consumption. If you follow laptop reviews, you'll see that getting a 4k panel will set you back at least an hour of battery consumption compared to standard 1080p, perhaps two or three depending on panel and battery size.
I like high-res screens. But in general, the best course of action for a laptop is to get the lowest possible resolution that still works for you. Personally, I have a hard time seeing how an upgrade from 1440p-ish to 4K-ish makes any discernable difference on a 14" and how it justifies cutting into my power efficiency.
I like high-res screens. But in general, the best course of action for a laptop is to get the lowest possible resolution that still works for you. Personally, I have a hard time seeing how an upgrade from 1440p-ish to 4K-ish makes any discernable difference on a 14" and how it justifies cutting into my power efficiency.
It's probably a question of price and what this tiny company is able to do with the suppliers. Comparison with Apple is not very fair.
Based on my dealings with replacing random laptop panels for family members a 4k panel tends to be well within $50 of a 1080p one and supplied by the same manufacturers/distributers so I don't think it's related to price. Could very well have to do with keeping the supply chain and parts list simple though.
Buying some leftovers from some supplier is likely not the same as securing a reliable supply for periodic few thousand unit sales for a few years.
There's likely some sweet (sour) spot of "not enough" that the supplier will care, and "too much" to satisfy your demand from some stock leftovers.
There's likely some sweet (sour) spot of "not enough" that the supplier will care, and "too much" to satisfy your demand from some stock leftovers.
These panels are produced by the millions for use in dozens of different devices over many years so why are we talking about using leftovers and availability of a few thousand? The resolution doesn't even come into play here as 4k panels haven't been boutique items since a decade ago, you go through the exact same supply chain process talking to the exact same manufacturers as you would vetting and selecting which 1080p panel to source.
You don't need to be a mega company to source 4k panels instead of 1080p panels in 2021, both are long past being volume commodity parts the same as sourcing 16 GB DIMMs instead of 4 GB DIMMs doesn't require you be Apple or Dell either.
You don't need to be a mega company to source 4k panels instead of 1080p panels in 2021, both are long past being volume commodity parts the same as sourcing 16 GB DIMMs instead of 4 GB DIMMs doesn't require you be Apple or Dell either.
It makes for a much slower experience more like, assuming the other hardware isn't up to spec. Which it definitely isn't, it being a laptop.
Maybe for some. I personally would not pay a single extra penny for 4K on 14" and do not see much difference in practice.
Why on earth would I want waste money on 4K (or whatever their version is) laptop displays. Size of such display makes this kind of resolution useless. They work just fine at HD. When I want proper graphics I hook up large hires external monitors.
Framework laptop
Very high DPI is mostly a marketing gimmick, like it happened on megapixel count on cameras.
Humans simply cannot see with such clarity without using a magnifying glass.
Plus, it uses more energy and require more expensive GPUs.
Humans simply cannot see with such clarity without using a magnifying glass.
Plus, it uses more energy and require more expensive GPUs.
As someone who is an avid Linux user for over a decade and MacBooks daily at work, this is 100% sour grapes.
There is absolutely a visible difference between HiDPI displays and standard ones.
There is absolutely a visible difference between HiDPI displays and standard ones.
I mean, sure. I've got a high-dpi tablet (Surface Pro 3, GNOME 3.38, 2x scaling), and it's obviously noticeable that the tablet is higher resolution than, say, my 32-inch 1440p monitor. Honestly though, the difference is pretty minuscule in day-to-day use. I can't help but roll my eyes when I hear someone brag about the merits of hidpi when it's really just a cool novelty that reduces the number of windows I can keep onscreen at once.
I wrote *very* high DPI
> Humans simply cannot see with such clarity without using a magnifying glass.
You may need glasses. The difference between a 1920x1200 panel, and a 2560x1600 display at 13.3" is slight, but very visible.
You may need glasses. The difference between a 1920x1200 panel, and a 2560x1600 display at 13.3" is slight, but very visible.
I suppose if you give a generous take on what "very high DPI" is this would be easily agreeable e.g. some phones pushing 600 DPI but for the devices in question they ship with ~160 DPI displays though and that's nowhere near needing a magnifying glass to distinguish more clarity.
It does suck some power though, same with high refresh. I used to have my laptop flip between 4k 200% DPI and 1080p 100% DPI based on whether I was plugged in. Usually ran games at 1080p. Important to use nearest neighbor scaling in that situation though or it'll get blurry.
It does suck some power though, same with high refresh. I used to have my laptop flip between 4k 200% DPI and 1080p 100% DPI based on whether I was plugged in. Usually ran games at 1080p. Important to use nearest neighbor scaling in that situation though or it'll get blurry.
Yes, I wrote *very* high DPI but the downvote dogpile already started.
Quick question (embarrassingly, I haven't looked into this yet myself), can I install this OS on my PinePhone?
You can use the Phone Shell (phosh) developed by Purism in Mobian OS on the Pinephone (by default).
Oh, phosh is developed by Purism... Shows what I know. It runs very poorly on the PinePhone and uses way too many animations and gestures for my taste. This is part of the reason I'm still not able to use the phone reliably.
If there was a keyboard as good as Android or iOS options in terms of speed and accuracy, then I would expect to see good text based interfaces popping up. But the keyboards I've seen have still been pretty clunky.
The SXMO image for Pine64-Arch [1] seemed pretty nice, but clearly still in development of the basic features.
[1]: https://github.com/dreemurrs-embedded/Pine64-Arch/releases/d...
If there was a keyboard as good as Android or iOS options in terms of speed and accuracy, then I would expect to see good text based interfaces popping up. But the keyboards I've seen have still been pretty clunky.
The SXMO image for Pine64-Arch [1] seemed pretty nice, but clearly still in development of the basic features.
[1]: https://github.com/dreemurrs-embedded/Pine64-Arch/releases/d...
I did enjoy playing around with SXMO! Thought it did a great job of showing what a power-user interface on a handheld device could be like (when it is not just and Android/IOS clone). That said, there is more to do before it is ready to be a DD....
That pretty much just leaves Phosh or Plasma for mobile DEs. IMHO Phosh is way more usable right now (particularly if you use the great Tweaks app developed for PostmarketOS). https://gitlab.com/postmarketOS/postmarketos-tweaks/
(I believe a version of the Tweaks comes bundled with Manjaro Phosh and it can be built from source on Mobian Phosh too...)
That pretty much just leaves Phosh or Plasma for mobile DEs. IMHO Phosh is way more usable right now (particularly if you use the great Tweaks app developed for PostmarketOS). https://gitlab.com/postmarketOS/postmarketos-tweaks/
(I believe a version of the Tweaks comes bundled with Manjaro Phosh and it can be built from source on Mobian Phosh too...)
Most users report that phosh works smoothly and without issues on Mobian.
You might have issues with your install or hardware.
You might have issues with your install or hardware.
The Pine64 forum says the port to Pinephone is no longer being maintained: https://wiki.pine64.org/wiki/PinePhone_Software_Releases#Pur...
Perhaps it's still possible if you can get the drivers and kernel from the right places, but if seems like you won't receive any official support on such a setup.
Perhaps it's still possible if you can get the drivers and kernel from the right places, but if seems like you won't receive any official support on such a setup.
so funny how they hated on Canonical's convergence 6 years ago and now they say stupid stuff like this "true convergence is here" LMAO
[deleted]
Meanwhile people have waited years to get their Librem 5 [1] and are still waiting while being denied a refund after the company retroactively changed their refund policy [2].
[1] https://old.reddit.com/r/Purism/comments/qsaap3/purism_is_a_...
[2] https://old.reddit.com/r/Purism/comments/htqz2q/purism_wont_...
[1] https://old.reddit.com/r/Purism/comments/qsaap3/purism_is_a_...
[2] https://old.reddit.com/r/Purism/comments/htqz2q/purism_wont_...
But they are getting them. I just got mine last month. It was almost a 4 year wait (!), but it is worth it.
I hope the company catches up while they continue to make the Linux computing world better. Being aware of their faults is important, but trying to drag them through the mud does a disservice to everyone.
I hope the company catches up while they continue to make the Linux computing world better. Being aware of their faults is important, but trying to drag them through the mud does a disservice to everyone.
I've followed the company for years and sometimes observing a company's behavior with costumers will tell you a lot more about them than pretty blog posts. I mean, let's not forget how they lied about the phone being able to make calls for months while it couldn't. All I'm saying is I invite others do dig deeper into the company, I don't think they are as transparent as they claim.
I also followed the company for years. They are much more transparent than any other company, although still not 100% transparent. All software development proceeds in the open. All code is free and upstreamed. Developers and employees reply to questions on the public forum.
They're having a hard time with the funds now, so they probably have to delay refunds in order not to go bankrupt. Recently they got some inestments, so it should get better: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27949435.
They're having a hard time with the funds now, so they probably have to delay refunds in order not to go bankrupt. Recently they got some inestments, so it should get better: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27949435.
> They're having a hard time with the funds now, so they probably have to delay refunds in order not to go bankrupt.
That right there is a red flag. Sometimes companies don't make it. I've never heard of a story where a company put themselves above their duty to their customers in a way such as that which didn't lead to massive problems down the road.
I sincerely hope your interpretation is incorrect.
That right there is a red flag. Sometimes companies don't make it. I've never heard of a story where a company put themselves above their duty to their customers in a way such as that which didn't lead to massive problems down the road.
I sincerely hope your interpretation is incorrect.
Companies have to develop a product and then recoup the R&D from sales. If it costs $X to do the R&D and your margins are $M, you recover them after N = $X/$M sales.
But then you need $X before you can make even the first sale. One way to do that is by taking pre-orders. Then you have money for the R&D before you have a product to ship.
The problem comes if the product is late to market and then the people with pre-orders are unhappy. To give them a refund you have to have sold N products -- not including the one they're canceling -- or else you don't have the money because you already spent it on R&D.
As long as you eventually sell N products, you can eventually give the refund, but you might not be able to do it yet. And, of course, if you never sell N products, you're in trouble.
But then you need $X before you can make even the first sale. One way to do that is by taking pre-orders. Then you have money for the R&D before you have a product to ship.
The problem comes if the product is late to market and then the people with pre-orders are unhappy. To give them a refund you have to have sold N products -- not including the one they're canceling -- or else you don't have the money because you already spent it on R&D.
As long as you eventually sell N products, you can eventually give the refund, but you might not be able to do it yet. And, of course, if you never sell N products, you're in trouble.
I understand this, and I understand the reasoning. I've just never seen it turn out well. That can definitely be a sort of survivorship bias, where I haven't heard of most the companies that did it and succeeded and that didn't have later problems where it came to light.
I just think that once you've accepted money for a good or service and haven't delivered that good or service, and the person wants their money back, you should be giving that money back to the degree you're capable. That it's inconvenient and may actually lead to the dissolution of your company or result in people not getting all their money back isn't really relevant. Make a case to the people and see if they are willing to accept it or alternatives (such as waiting a bit for more of their return), but don't make decisions on their behalf when your duty to return their money is clear.
I just think that once you've accepted money for a good or service and haven't delivered that good or service, and the person wants their money back, you should be giving that money back to the degree you're capable. That it's inconvenient and may actually lead to the dissolution of your company or result in people not getting all their money back isn't really relevant. Make a case to the people and see if they are willing to accept it or alternatives (such as waiting a bit for more of their return), but don't make decisions on their behalf when your duty to return their money is clear.
For months? The first batch (shipped to people who opted in) didn't yet have automatic call audio configuration in software, but it worked when configured manually and a software update that made it work out-of-box came in 2 or 3 weeks afterwards IIRC (Nov 2019). At that point phone calls worked on the devkit for many months already.
Yeah for months. I was there at the Chaos Camps in August 2019 when Nicole did her presentation and the phone couldn't make a call. The excuse she gave was the phone overheated. It became obvious by september/october that the phone couldn't male calls and it wasn't until End of Nov/early December 2019 that you guys figured it out, but it didn't stop Purism from claiming it did for months while it wasn't true.
I was there as well and I was successfully making phone calls from the devkit at CCCamp19 (in fact I actually received my devkit there so this was my first contact with it). Anyone who stayed around after Nicole's presentation could also see her placing a call.
> It was almost a 5 year wait (!)
The phone was crowdfunded in September/October 2017, so it's 4 years.
The phone was crowdfunded in September/October 2017, so it's 4 years.
Thank you for correction, I updated. I just know it was a long time, but I have patience and willingness to support the project.
I've paid for mine, still haven't received it.
> It was almost a 4 year wait (!), but it is worth it.
Linux is only free if your time is worthless
Linux is only free if your time is worthless
4 years and counting for me, and my estimated shipping date (i.e., no sooner than date) is "1st Quarter 2022".
One note: according to the email they sent to crowdfunders in September, they've changed their policy back to what it was originally and will now issue refunds.
> If you would like us to go ahead with refund, we can now allocate your parts to another order and refund your Librem 5 product in accordance with the policy.
One note: according to the email they sent to crowdfunders in September, they've changed their policy back to what it was originally and will now issue refunds.
> If you would like us to go ahead with refund, we can now allocate your parts to another order and refund your Librem 5 product in accordance with the policy.
Got mine two months ago - original backer. Last year Purism offered backers to choose the batch - I replied - put me in the latest one possible, because I wanted most up-to-date hardware. I could have gotten my device in May if I would have chosen an earlier batch.
Also moved twice in last 4 years and Purism accidentally sent it out to old address. When I noticed that and asked for help - they stopped the package and re-sent me a new one to the new address.
Very happy with the device. Very happy with service and support. Freedom is well worth waiting for.
Also moved twice in last 4 years and Purism accidentally sent it out to old address. When I noticed that and asked for help - they stopped the package and re-sent me a new one to the new address.
Very happy with the device. Very happy with service and support. Freedom is well worth waiting for.
They may have sold it as if you had a choice of which batch to get. You did not. Evergreen is the only batch sent to customers
Their website clearly states that the Librem 5 USA ships in 90 days when ordered: "Now Shipping! Place your order now, get in approximately 90 days!". I had ordered mine in November of 2020. One year later and still no device delivered.
This either seems like a lie or they are having issues managing a proper queue.
This either seems like a lie or they are having issues managing a proper queue.
I for one love to get the news blasts about Librem 5 USA shipping while waiting for my Librem 5.
On an unrelated note, the video at the end demonstrating the new release it is awful. Awful in that anyone new to this who isn’t a tech nerd will be very confused and put off purchasing.
I know that purism does focus on the tech nerd audience - but with demos like that, good luck selling it to people who are just privacy-conscious who want a glorified, private flip phone replacement.
I know that purism does focus on the tech nerd audience - but with demos like that, good luck selling it to people who are just privacy-conscious who want a glorified, private flip phone replacement.
Every dollar that Purism puts into its products as opposed to marketing is a dollar well spent. Good products advertise themselves. But before they can advertise themselves they need to become good. Catch 22. Purism is on the right track though.
There are many privacy-conscious non tech-nerd's who like nothing more than watching a video of some guy punching in different passwords on a phone.
Yes - but Purism is really limiting their audience here, going for the tech nerd privacy conscious crowd.
I know far more people in my life who are privacy conscious but not tech nerds, to the point they would consider buying a flip phone.
If Purism marketed to them as being a superior private flip-phone alternative, they could sell far more phones.
I guess what upsets me most is that Linux companies like Purism claim they want to build a 3rd ecosystem. You aren’t going to get a 3rd ecosystem going with videos like that.
I know far more people in my life who are privacy conscious but not tech nerds, to the point they would consider buying a flip phone.
If Purism marketed to them as being a superior private flip-phone alternative, they could sell far more phones.
I guess what upsets me most is that Linux companies like Purism claim they want to build a 3rd ecosystem. You aren’t going to get a 3rd ecosystem going with videos like that.
Perhaps you will like videos here more: https://puri.sm/products/librem-5.
Adding to my prior comment above: If I was trying to build a 3rd Ecosystem, this webpage is, even though better than the announcement, still pretty bad.
The top half part is quite good. It's not presenting itself as modern or slick, but as privacy and freedom and transparency. It's a good angle, because hardware is not this phone's strength.
The bottom half is where things go off the rails. "One Powerful GPU?" Don't gaslight me - anyone who has played a game on a smartphone looks at that and goes oof. HTML5 apps because you don't have real apps? Blegh - especially because it says in the description "we plan to." The "competitive chart"? A huge mistake because it gives the competition absolutely no points - which makes it look obviously biased and completely lacking credibility. What other company makes "competitive charts" that don't acknowledge, at least somewhat, the good points about the competition?
And then there's the availability part which is just really bad. 52 weeks? There will be two OnePlus phones, a new iPhone model, and a new Samsung model by the time that thing supposedly ships. Also, if you are really concerned about your privacy - you can't wait a year being no more private than before!
The top half part is quite good. It's not presenting itself as modern or slick, but as privacy and freedom and transparency. It's a good angle, because hardware is not this phone's strength.
The bottom half is where things go off the rails. "One Powerful GPU?" Don't gaslight me - anyone who has played a game on a smartphone looks at that and goes oof. HTML5 apps because you don't have real apps? Blegh - especially because it says in the description "we plan to." The "competitive chart"? A huge mistake because it gives the competition absolutely no points - which makes it look obviously biased and completely lacking credibility. What other company makes "competitive charts" that don't acknowledge, at least somewhat, the good points about the competition?
And then there's the availability part which is just really bad. 52 weeks? There will be two OnePlus phones, a new iPhone model, and a new Samsung model by the time that thing supposedly ships. Also, if you are really concerned about your privacy - you can't wait a year being no more private than before!
> "One Powerful GPU?" Don't gaslight me - anyone who has played a game on a smartphone looks at that and goes oof.
It's the best mobile GPU working with fully free software. This is for the audience that cares about it.
> HTML5 apps because you don't have real apps?
But they do have real apps. Thousands of desktop Linux apps.
> Also, if you are really concerned about your privacy - you can't wait a year being no more private than before!
If you're in a hurry, consider this: https://puri.sm/products/librem-5-usa.
Agree concerning the "competitive chart". Still it looks funny IMHO.
It's the best mobile GPU working with fully free software. This is for the audience that cares about it.
> HTML5 apps because you don't have real apps?
But they do have real apps. Thousands of desktop Linux apps.
> Also, if you are really concerned about your privacy - you can't wait a year being no more private than before!
If you're in a hurry, consider this: https://puri.sm/products/librem-5-usa.
Agree concerning the "competitive chart". Still it looks funny IMHO.
> It's the best mobile GPU working with fully free software. This is for the audience that cares about it.
T860MP4 in Pinebook/Pinephone Pro is similar or better, and also works with fully free software.
T860MP4 in Pinebook/Pinephone Pro is similar or better, and also works with fully free software.
That is better, but it doesn't negate my point that for non-tech-nerds, that announcement video of the new OS is pretty droll.
I think my point is more along the lines that Linux people overestimate regular folk's interest in specs and details. But that isn't a winning strategy in the real world. Apple doesn't say how many megapixels their cameras have, or how many GBs of RAM their phones have, or the CPU clock speed, or the modem version - and the specs they do give, they don't advertise them out loud. Has Apple ever announced that we have a 2000xSomething OLED display in huge letters? No, it's a "Liquid Retina XDR" display and that's all most people need to know. If you really care, it's in the specs sheet.
That's also not counting the actually embarrassing parts of this release. You just got a Camera app? In 2021, where phones are all about Cameras, you only got an out-of-the-box Camera app just now? (Maybe there was a camera app earlier - but the release video implies the camera app is all-new and wasn't there before.)
And despite not advertising specs - they sell just fine. If Apple got overly technical, they might sell less because it's confusing.
I think my point is more along the lines that Linux people overestimate regular folk's interest in specs and details. But that isn't a winning strategy in the real world. Apple doesn't say how many megapixels their cameras have, or how many GBs of RAM their phones have, or the CPU clock speed, or the modem version - and the specs they do give, they don't advertise them out loud. Has Apple ever announced that we have a 2000xSomething OLED display in huge letters? No, it's a "Liquid Retina XDR" display and that's all most people need to know. If you really care, it's in the specs sheet.
That's also not counting the actually embarrassing parts of this release. You just got a Camera app? In 2021, where phones are all about Cameras, you only got an out-of-the-box Camera app just now? (Maybe there was a camera app earlier - but the release video implies the camera app is all-new and wasn't there before.)
And despite not advertising specs - they sell just fine. If Apple got overly technical, they might sell less because it's confusing.
> that announcement video of the new OS is pretty droll
The whole post is droll, it's a big fat nothing-burger based on my casual perusal. Felt like they just needed to say something about the version number changing on their distro.
The whole post is droll, it's a big fat nothing-burger based on my casual perusal. Felt like they just needed to say something about the version number changing on their distro.
So you think that convergence is nothing? Perhaps you know some other vendor developing and selling phones with a desktop OS and desktop apps?
The problem is that it doesn't do a super good job of explaining why non-nerds -- or arguably, nerds! -- should care about "convergence" in this regard, and how it improves over existing solutions. I mean, I'm over here in Apple-land, walled garden etc. etc. etc., but there are a lot of applications that I have that exist in both macOS and iOS versions. This is true for most of Apple's own apps, and actually true for a lot of third-party apps, too: in a practical sense, I've had "convergence" for many years now.
Sure, these aren't usually literally the same pieces of software running on the Mac, the iPhone, and the iPad. But from what I can tell, that's not literally true on Purism, either, because the software is going to have to be recompiled for different CPU architectures. So now we're actually a lot closer to what Apple's been doing the last few years with Catalyst (and kind of slouching toward a grander strategy with SwiftUI). And again, not to put too fine a point on it, but I don't actually care in practice how much code is shared between the versions of my prose editor I'm running on the desktop and on the phone, given that they function the same way and edit the same files. (And share them all completely transparently, because they're using iCloud. Walled garden etc. etc., but this is a real selling point.)
Purism's real argument is free-as-in-freedom software. And that's a good argument. But I think they need to get a lot better at reaching the "casual but concerned" audience, and that means getting better at writing press releases and product announcements. Speaking as a professional writer, the PureOS 10 announcement page is really, really bad. You may not think it's fair to judge the quality of the product based on that, and it isn't, but it's still going to happen. (Judging from the comments here they also need to get better at, well, shipping hardware, which is an even more serious problem, granted.)
Sure, these aren't usually literally the same pieces of software running on the Mac, the iPhone, and the iPad. But from what I can tell, that's not literally true on Purism, either, because the software is going to have to be recompiled for different CPU architectures. So now we're actually a lot closer to what Apple's been doing the last few years with Catalyst (and kind of slouching toward a grander strategy with SwiftUI). And again, not to put too fine a point on it, but I don't actually care in practice how much code is shared between the versions of my prose editor I'm running on the desktop and on the phone, given that they function the same way and edit the same files. (And share them all completely transparently, because they're using iCloud. Walled garden etc. etc., but this is a real selling point.)
Purism's real argument is free-as-in-freedom software. And that's a good argument. But I think they need to get a lot better at reaching the "casual but concerned" audience, and that means getting better at writing press releases and product announcements. Speaking as a professional writer, the PureOS 10 announcement page is really, really bad. You may not think it's fair to judge the quality of the product based on that, and it isn't, but it's still going to happen. (Judging from the comments here they also need to get better at, well, shipping hardware, which is an even more serious problem, granted.)
Based on my understanding of how all this "convergence" stuff is integrated into GTK/GNOME apps; by explicit integration of libhandy, I know this is a rather unsubstantial post because I didn't see anything illustrating GTK+ apps I actually care about working "convergently". i.e. there was no demonstration of GIMP working in a phone/tablet touch interface being dragged into a desktop monitor seamlessly.
So, what exactly am I supposed to be impressed by here? Maybe I need to revisit the post, since I did skim it pretty quickly.
So, what exactly am I supposed to be impressed by here? Maybe I need to revisit the post, since I did skim it pretty quickly.
> GIMP working in a phone/tablet touch interface being dragged into a desktop monitor seamlessly.
It's a desktop OS. If you connect an external monitor, you can use any desktop software, including GIMP. Works fine on my Pinephone with phosh.
It's a desktop OS. If you connect an external monitor, you can use any desktop software, including GIMP. Works fine on my Pinephone with phosh.
> It's a desktop OS. If you connect an external monitor, you can use any desktop software, including GIMP. Works fine on my Pinephone with phosh.
How is that any different than literally any other distro you can boot on a handheld?
You're basically confirming my point; nothing especially "convergent" about pureos to see here, no?
How is that any different than literally any other distro you can boot on a handheld?
You're basically confirming my point; nothing especially "convergent" about pureos to see here, no?
Not sure what you're talking about. Which other phones allow to run unmodified desktop apps?
> Not sure what you're talking about. Which other phones allow to run unmodified desktop apps?
I'm not sure what you're talking about.
We've had the ability to run unmodified desktop linux apps on handhelds since the bad old FPU-less days of the Sharp Zaurus.
That's ancient history, and the whole f!cking promise of "convergence" AIUI is to make those applications usable in touch interfaces while being capable of transitioning seamlessly back into a desktop point-and-click interaction model when you dock the handheld.
It's basically just an Android thing to be a linux-based handheld that actively obstructs running conventional desktop linux software. And even in that world you can coax it by adding the missing userspace bits, isn't there an android app that does just that (termux)? https://github.com/termux/x11-packages/issues/144
Anyways, this feels like a pathetic strawman discussion at this point, I have better things to do today, cheers.
I'm not sure what you're talking about.
We've had the ability to run unmodified desktop linux apps on handhelds since the bad old FPU-less days of the Sharp Zaurus.
That's ancient history, and the whole f!cking promise of "convergence" AIUI is to make those applications usable in touch interfaces while being capable of transitioning seamlessly back into a desktop point-and-click interaction model when you dock the handheld.
It's basically just an Android thing to be a linux-based handheld that actively obstructs running conventional desktop linux software. And even in that world you can coax it by adding the missing userspace bits, isn't there an android app that does just that (termux)? https://github.com/termux/x11-packages/issues/144
Anyways, this feels like a pathetic strawman discussion at this point, I have better things to do today, cheers.
That’s not what convergence generally means, though. It means the same apps working across devices in their native formats.
People aren’t going to connect their phones to a monitor and dock to use GIMP. People might use GIMP on their phones if it were available.
People aren’t going to connect their phones to a monitor and dock to use GIMP. People might use GIMP on their phones if it were available.
Pine64. :)
They're using Purism software mostly.
I don't think so.
Or is KDE now a Purism project? Or is Sailfish? Or sxmo? Or is p-boot? Or Linux kernel when no drivers overlap between the two SoCs? Or is crust? Or modem manager? Or all the work going into modem's kernel and firmware? Or is megapixels a purism project? Or debian/arch linux arm and all the packaging effort done there that many distros with pinephone support rely on?
Pinephone software support is so much more than re-using PureOS components.
Anyway your question was:
> Perhaps you know some other vendor developing and selling phones with a desktop OS and desktop apps?
And that doesn't require any PureOS components for full functionality. I run i3wm on my Pinephone for convergence. Easy to dual-boot into i3wm/arch linux or any other mobile distro for use on the go (mobile wayland based DEs have terrible performance with dual monitor use anyway, compared to plain old Xorg, and if anything is less needed is to fluidly swap between desktop and mobile UI, when reboot takes a few seconds anyway). Maybe some people really need that kind of convergence, but dual boot is enough for me.
I've made this project to showcase that functionality to people, and to also show that there's not just PureOS/phosh
https://xnux.eu/p-boot-demo/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7GjXQFnMHGY
Or is KDE now a Purism project? Or is Sailfish? Or sxmo? Or is p-boot? Or Linux kernel when no drivers overlap between the two SoCs? Or is crust? Or modem manager? Or all the work going into modem's kernel and firmware? Or is megapixels a purism project? Or debian/arch linux arm and all the packaging effort done there that many distros with pinephone support rely on?
Pinephone software support is so much more than re-using PureOS components.
Anyway your question was:
> Perhaps you know some other vendor developing and selling phones with a desktop OS and desktop apps?
And that doesn't require any PureOS components for full functionality. I run i3wm on my Pinephone for convergence. Easy to dual-boot into i3wm/arch linux or any other mobile distro for use on the go (mobile wayland based DEs have terrible performance with dual monitor use anyway, compared to plain old Xorg, and if anything is less needed is to fluidly swap between desktop and mobile UI, when reboot takes a few seconds anyway). Maybe some people really need that kind of convergence, but dual boot is enough for me.
I've made this project to showcase that functionality to people, and to also show that there's not just PureOS/phosh
https://xnux.eu/p-boot-demo/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7GjXQFnMHGY
On your list, you have actually mentioned some projects that Purism has worked on, upstreamed patches to or financed development for things that also benefit PinePhone and other environments than GNOME/phosh. I'd add SDL and Wayland as other obvious examples, but there's likely more than what comes to my mind right now :)
Hmm. :)
I actually said mostly. More than half users use phosh on their Pinephone AFAIK (including myself). I don't argue that it's all there is to software on the Pinephone. There are definitely many other important pieces. But I don't like how they do not sufficiently acknowledge the Purism contributions IMO.
Thank you for the p-boot, it's great and I'm using it myself. However I don't think that volunteer development is sustainable in the long-term and can lead to a usable (daily driver for non-nerds) GNU/Linux phone without commercial contribution.
Thank you for the p-boot, it's great and I'm using it myself. However I don't think that volunteer development is sustainable in the long-term and can lead to a usable (daily driver for non-nerds) GNU/Linux phone without commercial contribution.
> I don't think that volunteer development is sustainable in the long-terms and can lead to a usable (daily driver for non-nerds) GNU/Linux phone without commercial contribution.
That's interesting, but arguing that is not my goal in this discussion.
You just asked what other comapny builds phones that can run dekstop OS and apps. Pine64 now has two. And IMO best uscease for that is without any PureOS components, just with straight desktop apps as existed before all this adaptation to smartphone form factor and touch interface. (It's my bias showing here, because I don't like nor use GNOME dekstop environement. Someone who likes GNOME may enjoy that PureOS putting some effort into making it possible to connect to a monitor and seamlessly transition into some convergent environement where their favorite apps will adapt to the current screen size.)
That's interesting, but arguing that is not my goal in this discussion.
You just asked what other comapny builds phones that can run dekstop OS and apps. Pine64 now has two. And IMO best uscease for that is without any PureOS components, just with straight desktop apps as existed before all this adaptation to smartphone form factor and touch interface. (It's my bias showing here, because I don't like nor use GNOME dekstop environement. Someone who likes GNOME may enjoy that PureOS putting some effort into making it possible to connect to a monitor and seamlessly transition into some convergent environement where their favorite apps will adapt to the current screen size.)
Wow, a lot of the copy on that page is pretty bad...
"Parents: You will love the Librem 5 because it will allow you to communicate with your child, ..." -- Um, in 2021 people know what a phone is. Maybe skip to the part about why yours is better than the competition?
"Lifetime updates that actually extend your phone’s life" -- Do they think updates from other companies make their phones self destruct? Seems like they're alluding to specific scandals, but it is kind of odd not to link to them directly. Also comes across as really evasive to not say how many years of updates they guarantee.
"Real convergence means bringing your desktop computer with you wherever you go." -- Have you not heard of a laptop? Surely they could have started with an actual definition of what convergence means. Doesn't help that the rest of the paragraph is talking about how hard they worked shrinking the OS instead of why you'd want the feature. (Side note: operating systems are software so nothing special is needed to get one to physically fit in my pocket)
"Parents: You will love the Librem 5 because it will allow you to communicate with your child, ..." -- Um, in 2021 people know what a phone is. Maybe skip to the part about why yours is better than the competition?
"Lifetime updates that actually extend your phone’s life" -- Do they think updates from other companies make their phones self destruct? Seems like they're alluding to specific scandals, but it is kind of odd not to link to them directly. Also comes across as really evasive to not say how many years of updates they guarantee.
"Real convergence means bringing your desktop computer with you wherever you go." -- Have you not heard of a laptop? Surely they could have started with an actual definition of what convergence means. Doesn't help that the rest of the paragraph is talking about how hard they worked shrinking the OS instead of why you'd want the feature. (Side note: operating systems are software so nothing special is needed to get one to physically fit in my pocket)
> Do they think updates from other companies make their phones self destruct?
Actually, it's the lack of updates from other companies making their phones self-destruct, as in they become unusable bricks. If the software is proprietary, you have no way of updating it yourself.
> Also comes across as really evasive to not say how many years of updates they guarantee.
It's "forever". The devices run FLOSS, which means that even if Purism disappears, they will still get updates from the Linux community. My 12+-year-old laptop runs latest Debian.
> Surely they could have started with an actual definition of what convergence means.
It's linked: https://puri.sm/posts/converging-on-convergence-pureos-is-co....
Actually, it's the lack of updates from other companies making their phones self-destruct, as in they become unusable bricks. If the software is proprietary, you have no way of updating it yourself.
> Also comes across as really evasive to not say how many years of updates they guarantee.
It's "forever". The devices run FLOSS, which means that even if Purism disappears, they will still get updates from the Linux community. My 12+-year-old laptop runs latest Debian.
> Surely they could have started with an actual definition of what convergence means.
It's linked: https://puri.sm/posts/converging-on-convergence-pureos-is-co....
Those are all reasonable arguments which would have made sense to include on the product webpage. That said, are there really that many people who are unhappy with the 5-7 years of support that a company like Apple provides? And is it really such a great strategy to emphasize a target audience of "people who want to keep their phones indefinitely instead of buying new ones"?
I agree that the page could benefit from some improvements. However see this nice comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29309861.
If all you care is longevity, then Apple is definitely a good choice. However, if you also value freedom, then your only other mainstream choice is Android, which is only supported for 3 years or less.
If all you care is longevity, then Apple is definitely a good choice. However, if you also value freedom, then your only other mainstream choice is Android, which is only supported for 3 years or less.
> going for the tech nerd privacy conscious crowd
Which is kind of stupid frankly, most of those will rather install themselves something custom.
Which is kind of stupid frankly, most of those will rather install themselves something custom.
It's a $1200 alpha product. The amount of tech enthusiasts willing to drop that amount of cash is small, and probably already close to exhausted.
For those looking for a Linux phone, is Purism the only (close to) usable option?