Database Develop

Ubuntu/Linux realease for mobile devices planned soon

The release is planned for October, but there are bound to be betas beforehand.
Normally with Ubuntu there are major new releases every six months(ish) and with being open source there is no risk of anyone spitting the dummy at libraries of ROMS.
http://www.ubuntu.com/news/ubuntu-for-mobile-internet-devices
For the benefit of those wondering WTF ubuntu is - its already been voted one of the top 100 products of 2007 in PC World. (Can products be free?)
http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,131935-page,13/article.html
It is also being offered now by Dell as an alternative to Vista...
http://direct2dell.com/one2one/archive/2007/05/01/13147.aspx
...prompted by Michael Dell using it on his home PC for years.

Well, if I'm not mistaken, the Mobile Internet Device referred by the news, are UMPCs (e.g. fully functional PCs). As such, porting the OS over is easy job, as compared to porting it over WinCe devices.
However, having said that, it is not all lost. With Intel on the market with Linux, chances are, probably there will be more applications written for Linux based OS and will then encourage the dev on Linux on WinCe (if you google, there is a Linux for Wizard project running already).

As far as I know there have been a few shots at linux for the wizard (et al), although the benefit of being ubuntu would be a far wider range of developers, the release structure they favour, and the finances to back it.
I still have a windows 98 boot (for some specific software than runs badly on any newer versions) and if you look at the spec of machines from then (I swapped the board, processor and memory from a Cyrix 166 with 32meg, to a pII 450 with 128 meg about late 1998), the older machines spec does not look particularly good compared to the wizards.
The xubuntu flavour of ubuntu is quite capable of extending the life of older hardware, by running more efficiently - and I have set up a few older machines I was given as scrap to play games for friends' children - to introduce them to 'proper computers' when it does not matter as much when they discover jacobs crackers fit in the floppy, or a CD rom cannot close with enough force to cut off action mans legs.
Anyway - returning to the plot - I would suspect xubuntu is currently not too far from working in a PDA - but the xubuntu project has far lower funding than ubuntu, but could be an excellent platform to adapt.

Well, as far as I know, Linux based systems do not 'really' run more efficiently. The primary reason that Linux OS is able to utilize older hardware is that it is lightweight. Thats like running DOS on older hardware.. it works well.

die, bill, DIE
hanmin said:
Well, as far as I know, Linux based systems do not 'really' run more efficiently. The primary reason that Linux OS is able to utilize older hardware is that it is lightweight. Thats like running DOS on older hardware.. it works well.
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Nah, its my experience that ALL windows OSs are resource hoggging pigs and linux isn't and it makes much better use of system resource than winblows
take a web server running apache under winnt, replace the os with a flavor of linux and the same machine running apache has more throughput than before.
and there are distros that run very well on just about any machine, put xp on a 200mhz pentium mmx and see if you have a useable machine, that same puter with linux will work great for the average joe blow who just, web browses, emails, does word processing/ doc. creation.
linux will put computing power in the hands of people who cant blow 1000$ every 2 years to get the latest greatest pc. I wont even go into the ridiculous amounts of cash micro$oft charges for new versions of the bug ridden code they pass off as a finished product, then release 4 service packs to band-aid it together.
thanks linus, you should get a nobel peace prize or some sh1t...
bhang

bhang said:
Nah, its my experience that ALL windows OSs are resource hoggging pigs and linux isn't and it makes much better use of system resource than winblows
take a web server running apache under winnt, replace the os with a flavor of linux and the same machine running apache has more throughput than before.
and there are distros that run very well on just about any machine, put xp on a 200mhz pentium mmx and see if you have a useable machine, that same puter with linux will work great for the average joe blow who just, web browses, emails, does word processing/ doc. creation.
linux will put computing power in the hands of people who cant blow 1000$ every 2 years to get the latest greatest pc. I wont even go into the ridiculous amounts of cash micro$oft charges for new versions of the bug ridden code they pass off as a finished product, then release 4 service packs to band-aid it together.
thanks linus, you should get a nobel peace prize or some sh1t...
bhang
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Here's a good example of some everyday anti-Microsoft rhetoric.
Linux on a slow computer won't make it do anything more than it could do running a Microsoft product. Sure, a finely customized (read: limited) Linux system might use a little less memory, but a slow computer is a slow computer.
Back on topic, I'd look more towards the already-existing Linux projects for the Wizard being useful before any Ubuntu branded distributions would be available. The BlueAngel Linux project from a couple of years ago got pretty far, I wonder if the Wizard is really all that much tougher to get working.

tone007 said:
Here's a good example of some everyday anti-Microsoft rhetoric.
Linux on a slow computer won't make it do anything more than it could do running a Microsoft product. Sure, a finely customized (read: limited) Linux system might use a little less memory, but a slow computer is a slow computer.
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Yours will be a good example of a .. anti-old PC rhetoric?
I beg to differ. A PC's speed heavily depends on how many instructions it is running. The number of instructions run per second for any PCs is fixed, but having less unnecessary instructions to runs, yields a faster PC. Try running Vista with all fancy eye-candy enabled and browse the internet. Do the same with Windows 95. A slow PC is slow when you run something heavy on it, hence 'a slow computer is a slow computer' isn't true.

hanmin said:
Yours will be a good example of a .. anti-old PC rhetoric?
I beg to differ. A PC's speed heavily depends on how many instructions it is running. The number of instructions run per second for any PCs is fixed, but having less unnecessary instructions to runs, yields a faster PC. Try running Vista with all fancy eye-candy enabled and browse the internet. Do the same with Windows 95. A slow PC is slow when you run something heavy on it, hence 'a slow computer is a slow computer' isn't true.
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When Ubuntu for Mobile phones is in 20 years of development, then I will consider it, however for my everyday needs, WM6 has me covered. Thanks, but no thanks. This is just the beginning for Linux on a phone, it has a LONG way to go to keep up.
Not only that, you have to find someone WILLING to create the software for FREE and well, you get what you paid for.
If you are a C++ programmer, Linux on a Mobile Phone will be a welcome challenge, but there is no market for Linux on a phone YET. Only reason anyone one the market will choose to switch is due to a CHANGE from what's already out there. I do not feel it compares at all to WM6 yet.
Sure, you can run faster, once you remove all of the graphics, background processes, etc, but you can do that with WM6 too. That's what people are creating their own roms for.
Water down any OS and you will find that it runs really fast and really well.

I wonder if there will be Blackberry support? It might be interesting to toy with.

NeoDMD said:
When Ubuntu for Mobile phones is in 20 years of development, then I will consider it, however for my everyday needs, WM6 has me covered. Thanks, but no thanks. This is just the beginning for Linux on a phone, it has a LONG way to go to keep up.
Not only that, you have to find someone WILLING to create the software for FREE and well, you get what you paid for.
If you are a C++ programmer, Linux on a Mobile Phone will be a welcome challenge, but there is no market for Linux on a phone YET. Only reason anyone one the market will choose to switch is due to a CHANGE from what's already out there. I do not feel it compares at all to WM6 yet.
Sure, you can run faster, once you remove all of the graphics, background processes, etc, but you can do that with WM6 too. That's what people are creating their own roms for.
Water down any OS and you will find that it runs really fast and really well.
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So that's why Motorola already have, and Palm are developing linux mobile phones?
Linux on a mobile device is going to be here on mainstream handsets very soon, within the next 12 months guaranteed.
The reason?
Licensing costs.
If you develop an open source OS, and set of codecs to handle media, you don't have to pay so much to all the companies you traditionally hand money over to when you sell a phone.
People who buy a mobile phone rarely care if it can run Microsoft's pocket office apps, or RIM's office apps, or anyone elses, just as long as they can write that document, or email, and easily send it, or get it onto their PC.
People also don't care if it runs WM6, Symbian UIQ, S60, Linux, Palm, or Blackberry, they just care if it can do xyz functions, looks nice, and they can afford it.
We care, but we are not the majority of the market.
And lets be honest, out of all the mobile OS' out there, which is going to be the most hackable?
Linux on our HTC devices is always going to be a hobby more than a real alternative OS, since it's based on who wants what, and has the time to develop it. But on a commercially available device sold with it, it's already here, and more are on the way!

Linux is faster - especially non GNOME distros.
There is also Ubuntu light on the horizon.
I read this article which to me is a good summary...
http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=40532
...and to reiterate my aforementioned point in addition to the seeking of fees - who requested the removal of the rom library here? So greater control with open source to the savvy end user.
Additionally - many of us are running linux without even realising - as its often the OS running in your routers/wireless modems.
Finally - if Windows kit for PDAs/smart phones was any good - would there be a reason for a forum like this to improve upon it, or are we all just really pernickety people?

Ubuntu is a really amazing OS.
I have been running it for a while already, and I love it (except sometimes I screwed up, need to resetup).
U should all try it

Straight from the disk it saw and set up everything - including setting the two hyperthreading processors as 4 processors (I have the non server disk version too).
Only problem so far is its not happy with my Sandisk U3 Titanium.
Another point worth mentioning is the lightest/fastest/most secure browser is purportedly 'Dilo' which is written for Linux - but I have not tried it yet. (Although the security is based on the 'you cannot hijack it - if we dont support it' school of thought.)

Linux rocks, I have ubuntu running on one of my desktops and am seriously considering dual booting my other with Fedora KDE. It really did a lot to speed up my old compaq, and i am not running a "watered down" version, I have more aps and programs on this than i did on xp, and it still boots faster and i have yet to have a weekly crash like i did with xp. I really would like it on my wizard, but in the meantime i'm going to watch palm's develpment and look in that direction.

Linwizard
If you want to play a bit this works on my wizard. Still a long way to go but I can say I have linux on my wizard. And I don't have to change anything or lose my current setup. Just extract the folder to your SD and run the app. I haven't figured out how to exit the program with out a soft reset, but big deal. Also there is no touch screen support or shifted or symbol support for the keyboard.
http://sourceforge.net/projects/linwizard/
Cheers...

Kaiser Video Drivers...will it ever happen?

I know the good people of class action drivers and also our community here at xda are working hard on getting the video drivers up and running and have come a very long way. I truly am impressed and I appreciate everything that is being done.
I guess my question is more of an opinion from everyone, do you believe that the drivers will ever take shape to their full potential and actually push the kaiser to where it should have been? Also, I know HTC said they will not update the drivers, but do you think one day they may backtrack and fix what they should have fixed long ago?

noktem said:
I know HTC said they will not update the drivers, but do you think one day they may backtrack and fix what they should have fixed long ago?
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Do you really think they would go back to something that now has 2 new generations in front of it? Nope, the Kaiser is only a mark in history for them now, end of line device forgotten back there. Except maybe for the repair returns that they might see for some more time...

Of course I understand, why would someone head back in time and fix something that is to them "outdated", but I also know that HTC should know that the Kaiser has a big following behind it and potentially could make profit, because I for one, if they would offer it for 5 dollars or even 10 dollars for video driver updates, would gladly pay. But I understand your logic, just it has always aggravated me how someone can release something that has so much unlocked power.

Even if they could do some development and make a little money selling an upgrade to some, they'll make a whole load more having their engineers work on the future devices and keeping up with competitor's offerings instead of looking back...
HTC made a decision to release the Kaiser without those drivers for whatever reason, be it technical, commercial, marketing or whatever...
The "unlocked" power has always happened and always will, the Kaiser's chipset also supports video out but that is not implemented, the Hermes supported GPS but it wasn't used, those are hardware related that would cost parts to make them usable. The software costs money to be developed, so it comes down to the same.
Much worse, I had a Motorola phone VERY long ago that did not have storage memory on the phone, no clock/alarm and was missing several other features, while those could be enabled just by setting the corresponding bits in the configuration memory with a hacked cable... They even had 2 versions of the exact same phone, with $100 difference, that were totally identical except for a couple more features being enabled (they were running the same software and you could enable the functions on the cheaper one with the cable).
But anyway, this subject has been beaten to death so many times... useless thread.

Agreed. This has been discussed in numerous threads before, please read those discussions and post any new musings there.
Ta
Dave

[Q] ICS 4.0 for Nexus One

Hi,
When do you think we can get ICS 4.0 for Nexus one or there is not chance ever? Thanks in Advance.

We already have two ICS ROMs.

look in the dev section

We will never see an official ICS ROM from Google, but devs have been hard at work, and as both above me said, we have two ICS-based ROMs in the development section of the forum.

bassmadrigal said:
We will never see an official ICS ROM from Google, but devs have been hard at work, and as both above me said, we have two ICS-based ROMs in the development section of the forum.
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This. Google has labeled the Nexus One dead less than two years after release. Pretty neat, huh? Glad you forked over all of that money for a Google supported Nexus device now?
Not that I'm bitter...

GldRush98 said:
This. Google has labeled the Nexus One dead less than two years after release. Pretty neat, huh? Glad you forked over all of that money for a Google supported Nexus device now?
Not that I'm bitter...
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I kinda am. I mean, not even two years has passed since the release of it and they're already officially claiming it dead?
Bull, wait for it, ****.
By th way, GldRush98, what is stock 2.3.6 like on the Nexus? I cannot be arsed to try it out.

GldRush98 said:
This. Google has labeled the Nexus One dead less than two years after release. Pretty neat, huh? Glad you forked over all of that money for a Google supported Nexus device now?
Not that I'm bitter...
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On ROM space alone it was already assumed the device would be unsupported. But hey, it lasted twice as long as my G1...

I'm already using ICS rom as daily driver on my N1 (no regrets but for camera). Ref: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1366897

GldRush98 said:
This. Google has labeled the Nexus One dead less than two years after release. Pretty neat, huh? Glad you forked over all of that money for a Google supported Nexus device now?
Not that I'm bitter...
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With the how fast paced the phones are changing, it really doesn't surprise me that it had a less than 2 year supported life. Look at when the G1 first came out in October of 2008. It had a 528MHz processor with 192MB of RAM and 256MB for the ROM. Then, in just over 14 months, we had the Nexus One which pretty much doubled all the specs there. 1GHz process, 512MB RAM, 512MB ROM, double the screen resolution... Dual cores showed up 1 year later with even larger screen resolutions. And quad cores in phones are just around the corner. The software needs to be rewritten to utilize the extra speed and/or features the new hardware provides, otherwise you are paying for all these extra cores or memory that you will never use.
How long did it take for these jumps in the PC world? 500MHz processor? 1998. 1GHZ? 2000. Dual Core? 2005. Quad? 2007. Phone technology is moving much faster than desktop computers ever did. Plenty of people were pissed when they found out their hardware that was good with Windows 98 didn't work with Windows XP. Same thing happened when Windows Vista and 7 were introduced, and I am sure the same thing will happen when Windows 8 is released. In the equivalent of the PC world, we are trying to take hardware that was released when Windows XP came out and trying to get Windows 7 or 8 to work on it. That is not the easiest thing to do, and even if you pull it off, is it going to have all the same functionality that would be available on a modern machine?
And since it seems that this will mostly come down to space requirements, could you imagine if your Windows 7 install was the same size as Windows XP? When XP was released, 20GB drives were still the norm. Now you install Windows 7 and a modern game, and nearly 20GBs is used. As you upgrade software, you eventually need to upgrade hardware. There is no way around this.
The point is... We had a good run with our devices and they got numerous official upgrades including and spanned across 3 major software versions. I applaud Google for actually supporting their devices much better than any other manufacturer out there.
And now that the official Google updates have sailed away, it is time to turn our phones completely to the dev community. TexasIce and samuaz have done an awesome job trying to get ICS working on our beloved N1. There are only a few things missing for it to be considered a fully working ROM.

bassmadrigal said:
With the how fast paced the phones are changing, it really doesn't surprise me that it had a less than 2 year supported life. Look at when the G1 first came out in October of 2008. It had a 528MHz processor with 192MB of RAM and 256MB for the ROM. Then, in just over 14 months, we had the Nexus One which pretty much doubled all the specs there. 1GHz process, 512MB RAM, 512MB ROM, double the screen resolution... Dual cores showed up 1 year later with even larger screen resolutions. And quad cores in phones are just around the corner. The software needs to be rewritten to utilize the extra speed and/or features the new hardware provides, otherwise you are paying for all these extra cores or memory that you will never use.
How long did it take for these jumps in the PC world? 500MHz processor? 1998. 1GHZ? 2000. Dual Core? 2005. Quad? 2007. Phone technology is moving much faster than desktop computers ever did. Plenty of people were pissed when they found out their hardware that was good with Windows 98 didn't work with Windows XP. Same thing happened when Windows Vista and 7 were introduced, and I am sure the same thing will happen when Windows 8 is released. In the equivalent of the PC world, we are trying to take hardware that was released when Windows XP came out and trying to get Windows 7 or 8 to work on it. That is not the easiest thing to do, and even if you pull it off, is it going to have all the same functionality that would be available on a modern machine?
And since it seems that this will mostly come down to space requirements, could you imagine if your Windows 7 install was the same size as Windows XP? When XP was released, 20GB drives were still the norm. Now you install Windows 7 and a modern game, and nearly 20GBs is used. As you upgrade software, you eventually need to upgrade hardware. There is no way around this.
The point is... We had a good run with our devices and they got numerous official upgrades including and spanned across 3 major software versions. I applaud Google for actually supporting their devices much better than any other manufacturer out there.
And now that the official Google updates have sailed away, it is time to turn our phones completely to the dev community. TexasIce and samuaz have done an awesome job trying to get ICS working on our beloved N1. There are only a few things missing for it to be considered a fully working ROM.
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Technology always change, but we all loved linux in all this era, for it could still support old/lower end machines without problems.
Since, Android is built on top of linux , in my opinion it is fair to expect a "better" deal.

anubhav77 said:
Technology always change, but we all loved linux in all this era, for it could still support old/lower end machines without problems.
Since, Android is built on top of linux , in my opinion it is fair to expect a "better" deal.
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But hardware can be just as incapable as running the "latest and greatest" in the Linux world. My laptop was only 2 years old when compiz came out and I was never able to run it. Nor any of the advanced graphic features KDE 4 offers. But, you take that now almost 8 year old notebook, and it can still run the latest Linux version out there (I use Slackware and am running 13.37), but I am not able to use all the eye-candy that is available to it.
In fact, I don't really use it for much any more. It struggles playing youtube at resolutions above 360p (and can't do it full screen). And with all the AJAX heavy websites out there, it takes a toll on the system when you have a few tabs open. Essentially, I have turned it into a dev notebook. It is where I do all my web development.
The reality is that Linux will work on most systems, but it may be an extremely stripped and limited version of Linux. Google didn't want to put out a crap version that have people complaining that it can't do something that was advertised with ICS. Also, putting ICS on our phones requires repartitioning the internal memory. I doubt that is something that Google can do with an OTA update. Plus, we have yet to see if they can pull off full hardware acceleration (it has been done with hacks so far, but from my understanding, leads to a larger battery drain). And we have yet to make the camera work.
It would've been nice had Google pulled out their magic fortune-telling ball and given us extra internal memory or a better graphics card. But reading the future is not an easy thing to do. Just like you buying the phone. You bought the phone with the hardware that was in it. It was awesome at the time and seemed to have adequate space, but then google upped the limit of apks to 49MB and apps kept getting bigger and bigger. Suddenly, you were pretty much required to use app2sdext to be able to use all the apps you wanted.
There was no guarantee on how long our phones would get updates, but they have covered three major versions of Android and a ton of minor versions. As far as support goes (especially when you look at the other manufacturers out there), I feel we have nothing to complain about.
Now we leave it in hands like texasice and samuaz so use true geeks can figure out how far we can push this hardware until it becomes so slow and incapable to do standard things... just as my laptop. And that is how you know you have truly used the product to the extent of its useful life

Can I Install WP8 on a WP7 Phone?

is there any way to install wp8 on a wp7 phone?

Really ? Did you do any homework or read any of the blogs about Windows Phone 8 ? I guess not. A key word that you should know is "search" as you would of found your answer.
To answer your question, NO. Window Phone 7 users will get a upgrade to Windows Phone 7.8 and it will give you the new start menu of Windows Phone 8 but, nothing else.

Windows phone 7.8
There will be update to wp7/wp7.5 called wp7.8 and you have same interface than Windows phone 8

kilus said:
is there any way to install wp8 on a wp7 phone?
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I'm pretty sure we'll be able to put some sort of custom ROM WP8 on a WP7 device.
Other than the secure boot, which should hopefully be easily turned off, I haven't seen anything which would prevent the OS from running on a WP7 device.

DavidinCT said:
Really ? Did you do any homework or read any of the blogs about Windows Phone 8 ? I guess not. A key word that you should know is "search" as you would of found your answer.
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really? did you do any homework or read any blogs about how to get laid as a nerd? i guess not. a key word you should know is "balls," as you'd require a pair as a real man and help you stop masterbating at online porn, move out your mom's house, and finally get laid at 43 years of age.
hetwo said:
There will be update to wp7/wp7.5 called wp7.8 and you have same interface than Windows phone 8
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thanks hetwo.
gedmurphy said:
I'm pretty sure we'll be able to put some sort of custom ROM WP8 on a WP7 device.
Other than the secure boot, which should hopefully be easily turned off, I haven't seen anything which would prevent the OS from running on a WP7 device.
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thank you too.. its good knowing there are some decent intelligent people out there willing to answer questions without having to be a disrespectful troll.

Hey guys,
Firstly please don't get this wp8 forum off to a bad start and keep flaming each other? Respect each other and the rules please :cyclops:
Secondly, from my understanding current hardware specs of wp7 phones are not high enough, do not meet, wp8 requirements so the answer is probably no. The official line is a definate no, wp7 devices, even new ones like lumia 900 will not get wp8 update

Hopefully soon wp8 on WP7 by Custom Rom

timmymarsh said:
Secondly, from my understanding current hardware specs of wp7 phones are not high enough, do not meet, wp8 requirements so the answer is probably no. The official line is a definate no, wp7 devices, even new ones like lumia 900 will not get wp8 update
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Definitely not via an update, that's clearly been addressed by Microsoft. However existing WP7 hardware is surely powerful enough to run WP8. The single core processor is definitely not a problem, and low end WP8 devices are looking to be lower in specs than current WP7 devices.
I'm no expert in usermode on WP, but I know the NT kernel extremely well, and it's more than capable of running on our hardware.

Some body will hack it
Sent from my Lumia 900 using XDA Windows Phone 7 App

Only problem maybe drivers. It is Microsoft way to release oem from out of warranty obligation to keep an outdated product updated.
Who wants to sell one shirt and that person never buys another because it last too long. I understand wanted to save money. But how can they keep making money if the people that work for them is trying to make something2 years old work off of the mere 500$ the phone is worth. Hey has to make money or they will disappear like farmer jack and circuit city
Sent from my HD7 T9292 using XDA Windows Phone 7 App

kilus said:
really? did you do any homework or read any blogs about how to get laid as a nerd? i guess not. a key word you should know is "balls," as you'd require a pair as a real man and help you stop masterbating at online porn, move out your mom's house, and finally get laid at 43 years of age.
.
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Hahaha. If you read ANY PLACE on this site, it says to SEARCH before posting.
You must not know how to read. This has been a major topic of discussion over every Windows Phone 7 related site.
It does not take a geek or loser like yourself just to spend 2 min reading before posting a subject that has been posted everywhere.
The new upgrade goes to the NT kernal over the WinCE one. That does take more horsepower than current devices can do. It will have native support for C++ and a lot of other modern tech (NFC and others). The current chipset in current devices will not be able to handle it with reasonable performance. As I understand it.
IF some hacker was to create a rom for a current device, it would not support more than 1/2 of the OS and the performace would not be anything worth using unless they stripped everything out.
It's really questionable if a hacker will be able to get it working on current devices and what type of performance. If you really want to know the changes, it's a little long but, it really shows what it can and will do...
http://channel9.msdn.com/Events/Windows-Phone/Summit
It's the full streaming event, and it's almost 2 hours but, it's impressive and I can see why they went this route.

DavidinCT said:
The new upgrade goes to the NT kernal over the WinCE one. That does take more horsepower than current devices can do.
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Absolutely not true. The NT kernel will run on seriously low specs without any issues. It'll happily run on an old pentium 233 and 32MB RAM without any notable issues in performance. In fact,WP7 hardware is sufficient to run full blown Windows 7, not just the NT6 kernel (assuming the processor was x86 and not ARMv7)
I don't se drivers being a huge blocker as the number of drivers for NT6 is huge, and even in the worst case scenario any drivers we may be missing can be written.
It'll be interesting to see how quickly someone gets WP8 running on a WP7 device.

gedmurphy said:
Absolutely not true. The NT kernel will run on seriously low specs without any issues. It'll happily run on an old pentium 233 and 32MB RAM without any notable issues in performance. In fact,WP7 hardware is sufficient to run full blown Windows 7, not just the NT6 kernel (assuming the processor was x86 and not ARMv7)
I don't se drivers being a huge blocker as the number of drivers for NT6 is huge, and even in the worst case scenario any drivers we may be missing can be written.
It'll be interesting to see how quickly someone gets WP8 running on a WP7 device.
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It's a good question. As I got that from a Tweet by someone at MS. As I understand Windows 8 has a updated kernel that they are using on WP8. Not sure on it, as I thought it was the same as you (I'm a 20 year Windows Systems admin, I know the NT kernel COULD run on 286 machines if needed, not sure on the updated one, just going on what I heard).
It might of been the option of forcing users to have not hard reset their phones (like going from 32bit to 64-bit, no upgrade path) and that would cause a big impact on customer reports. As I have understood from watching the whole MS thing on it, it came down to performance problems that ended it before it started. Some chipsets to support the new OS are not on WP7 devices, so it limits the options current users can take advantage of.
It's not just about the devices and the end users , its' about the PR nightmare. Any press is good but, bad press is a whole different story. In a year or 2 no one will even talk about this. Android does this all the time and even Apple did it to their first gen device.
Who knows. Maybe one of the great hackers here or DFT will make it run on a current device. It makes me question it though.
As long as WP7 devices have been out, Not one WM 6.5 devices (not incuding the HD2 as it was used as a test device for MS on WP7 and drivers were leaked) got a WP7 upgrade OR No Android device got WP7 or the other way around. There are plenty of Android devices or even a handful of 6.5 devices that could of run WP7 fine.
The hackers can do only so much but, time will tell, I just wonder IF POSSABLE (with out MS), just how long it would take.
It will be interesting to see tho...
I do know I am about 95% sure I will be buying one on release, just depending on the models on release.

The reason for almost none of the 6.5 devices running WP7 could be that most of the old devices running 6.5 didn´t have the needed display (capacitive and the WP7 resolution) or processor. Take the Toshiba TG01: resistive display and higher resolution.

btw....moved to Q&A:good:

this will be possible atleast for hd7 and focus 1st gen:good:

hackarchive said:
this will be possible atleast for hd7 and focus 1st gen:good:
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Click to collapse
for hd7? i see...

hackarchive said:
this will be possible atleast for hd7 and focus 1st gen:good:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just wondering... Where did you get your info on that ? Your HD7 and focus besides the display and case is almost like every other Windows Phone 7 device (standard hardware across all models).
Even though it has been clearly said by Microsoft that NO 1st or 2nd gen devices will get the update you seem to think the HD7 will.
Maybe it's me but, I'm smelling a little BS here....
Unless Microsoft says that they will be updating or DFT decides to dig in, your not getting a upgrade on any first or 2nd gen device and that includes the HD7 and Focus.

The problem with the kernel is not that it by itself would need that much power to run but rather that they would have to develop loads of drivers for it to work, as they would not be able to use those that already exist for Windows CE.
A bigger problem might be the Bootloader process. The NT Kernel at least on ARM requires an UEFI firmware which is likely to be pretty different from the bootloaders we currently have on our phones.
So the steps would be:
- Develop an UEFI firmware for current WP7 hardware (HSPL needed because it would replace the old bootloader) - including UEFI hardware drivers
- Develop drivers for the chipsets from scratch
- Find out on how many hardware characteristics Microsoft chose to rely that are simply not there on old devices
I'm not saying that it is impossible to do or that it won't ever be done but I guess until it's done almost no one will still be using such an old phone.

RE:
DavidinCT said:
Hahaha. If you read ANY PLACE on this site, it says to SEARCH before posting.
You must not know how to read. This has been a major topic of discussion over every Windows Phone 7 related site.
It does not take a geek or loser like yourself just to spend 2 min reading before posting a subject that has been posted everywhere.
The new upgrade goes to the NT kernal over the WinCE one. That does take more horsepower than current devices can do. It will have native support for C++ and a lot of other modern tech (NFC and others). The current chipset in current devices will not be able to handle it with reasonable performance. As I understand it.
IF some hacker was to create a rom for a current device, it would not support more than 1/2 of the OS and the performace would not be anything worth using unless they stripped everything out.
It's really questionable if a hacker will be able to get it working on current devices and what type of performance. If you really want to know the changes, it's a little long but, it really shows what it can and will do...
http://channel9.msdn.com/Events/Windows-Phone/Summit
It's the full streaming event, and it's almost 2 hours but, it's impressive and I can see why they went this route.
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Click to collapse
Helooo???
Low end WP8 devices will have lower HW specs than some current WP7 devices.
WP8 could run very well on a focus s or HD7 or any other.
There will be custom roms for many current devices, there are many smart guys here that I'm sure will try to do this. Let's hope they will manage to do it.

[Discussion/Rant] Disappointments in Current technology

Hey Guys Kyuubi10 here again.
I had a thought on my head and couldn't help but share to see if people have the same views as me.
I am currently disappointed with phones, tablets and computers...both on a hardware level and on a software level.
While I do see technology getting better each year I have a feeling that we are currently stuck in a cycle which the major companies are unwilling to break.
Let me go deeper into detail. But to make this thought comprehensive to most people I'll try to organise it by topic.
Software:
Most developers nowadays have a huge disregard for code efficiency, and as such the advancement into making code more efficient has slowed almost to a halt. Because our devices are becoming each day more powerful, developers don't care anymore about creating applications which don't consume RAM, nor applications which are bug-free on release.
Instead buggy applications are released, which consume loads of RAM, because a future update will fix bugs, and devices will get better and have more RAM.
Thus new and inexperienced developers are not being taught the value in making an efficient program.
And this annoys me.
This brings me to Java, and Android. While I love android and what it stands for, the fact that it still runs mostly on Java annoys me. Java being hated by most developers, and being seen as a backward step in the development world is one of the major programming languages in today's world.
Google, being a great company should set up an institution made to further programming standards, and through such institution it should begin laying the foundations for a new programming language to be used with Android.and it's focus should be efficiency.
Also, highly disappointed in the progress of Windows 10. Mentioned to be a revolutionary step for Windows....yet it is simply a reworked GUI for Windows 8. It still even has the charms!!! All that was done was to make Windows store apps open within windows rather than fullscreen, and fixed a couple bugs. Oh yeh, and Cortana...which seems more like a spy than a virtual assistant. It actually refuses to work unless you let it monitor your location. Why does it need so much info?
Microsoft Edge feels like a beta testing version. I thought that they would at least incorporate some Internet Explorer functionality to Edge. But it is not even recognized as a browser by certain websites. At this moment in time IE is still better than the "revolutionary" Edge.
You are still better off with Firefox or Chrome.
On the Linux side of things...it still annoys me that there is very little support for Linux. But that has enough complaints on the internet to make its own case, I'll avoid repeating everything all over again.
Instead I'll make a complaint about Android. Why is almost no-one building an android port which works well as a desktop OS?
Why are we still limited between OSX, Windows and Linux (which has little support)?
Android has been around long enough...but very few people are making an effort in creating a fully functional version of android for desktop.
The way I see it is that Android is based on Linux...it should contribute back to the Linux community. Someone should use a well established Linux distro and mix it with Android. If their runtimes are incompatible then a technology such as CoLinux or UML could be used to run both at the same time. While also using KSM to keep RAM consumption to a minimum.
This could be well supported by Google (Now Alphabet), and the community.
Hardware:
While the development of CPUs is going strong, with Intel, Nvidia, Qualcomm and MediaTek trying to best each other...Other things aren't doing quite as well. Especially RAM. This mostly being the fault of OEMs, trying to keep costs as low as possible while squeezing every cent from their customers.
This is highly noticeable when you get Tablets which are up to 4x bigger than a phone and have the same amount of RAM as a phone. This kills multitasking abilities in our modern day devices.
We already have 64-bit CPU chips...why isn't it yet common for our devices to have 4GB+ of RAM? Asus showed that it's possible with its Zenfone 2.
How long will it take other OEMs to follow suit? The progress in this area has been too slow over the years.
Again, especially for tablets. Those things should have been reaching 6GB or more within 2014 and 2015. We definitely have the technology to do it.
While for desktop and laptops I'd love to see qualcomm and Nvidia to step up into this market with their ARM based chips.
It would be interesting to see a mix of Dedicated graphics interacting with an ARM CPU...I wonder if that is possible.
But the advantages of ARM chips are undeniable...They have even started to appear into the server market, and yet nothing for personal PCs. This is sad. The battery reduction, heat reduction achieved by such chips would make computers so much more powerful. But advances in this area are also moving foward too slowly even though we already have the technology to do it.
Security
But this annoys me most of all. The lack of focus about security.
While technology increases, it seems that no one is worrying about the security of new devices etc...
I mean, if someone stole my smartwatch all they would have to do is reset it and they could connect it to their smartphone as if I had never owned it.
That breaks my heart.
How hard is it to create a pair of symmetrical encryption keys, or 2 pairs of asymmetrical ones (if you want to be paranoid), in order to make sure that the smartwatch works only with that specific smartphone which has the correct keys.
This would also mean that if the owner wanted to use a second device to connect to their smartwatch it would be fine and safe as long as they have the correct keys. Thus improve functionality and safety with one blow.
With a whole load of smart devices being offered currently and very few of them have any security whatsoever! It annoys me deeply.
Obviously there are other security issues all of which have already been extensively discussed, such as encryption while surfing the web as default, efficiency of current standards etc...
As a solution I believe that the major tech companies in the world should get together and make a consortium with the purpose of advancing technology.
The idea is that once a new technology/protocol/standard is introduced by one of these companies then the others test it extensively, and if it is found to improve current technology they all adopt it. Because the main issue is that while many solutions exist, they are not wide spread because most companies don't use these solutions.
But if the most significant companies in the tech industry lead the way by using the new technologies, then by default the other smaller companies will follow.
But such a consortium needs to exist in order to avoid useless competition.
Competition is good when it is a force to improve current standards, not when it isolates another company's improvements by rejecting their solutions.

I agree with most of your points but I have to disagree in regards to Windows 10. As Microsoft explained it will be continuously improved. I think with Win 10 they finally listen to its customers (more than 90% satisfied). In my opinion 10 is far, faaar better then 8 and I think its developing is going into the right direction.

As this is about more than smartphones... And not about anything in specific... I'm moving this to the off topic section. :good:
Thanks,
Darth
Forum Moderator

Darth said:
As this is about more than smartphones... And not about anything in specific... I'm moving this to the off topic section. :good:
Thanks,
Darth
Forum Moderator
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hehe, I found no thanks button. So I'll reply instead! Thank you! )

markdc said:
I agree with most of your points but I have to disagree in regards to Windows 10. As Microsoft explained it will be continuously improved. I think with Win 10 they finally listen to its customers (more than 90% satisfied). In my opinion 10 is far, faaar better then 8 and I think its developing is going into the right direction.
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Click to collapse
True, you bring a good point. But this comes back to what I said that developers now are not worried about bringing a great product into the market, they bring an unfinished project which will then be updated as time goes on.
In fact what people are happy about Windows 10 is more due to the GUI changes. (No full screen apps, start button is back where it belongs.)
While my complaint comes more from the fact that they took a really long time to build Windows 10, and it still is Windows 8 with a different GUI. Which makes me think, what did they do with the huge time they took developing it?
Personally, I liked Windows 8... Yes it had its flaws, but it was revolutionary. It was magnitudes faster than Windows 7, albeit it had many glitches. But those were ironed out with 8.1.
It was Microsoft's first attempt at merging their mobile OS to their Desktop one. And to me this was a great idea, and improvement.
Windows 10 on the other hand doesn't feel as revolutionary as they claimed, from a technical perspective. Yes from a business perspective, it is something new, but not the software itself.
Can you see my argument?
But you are right, and I agree with you in the fact that it is moving in the right direction. I hope that Microsoft's push to mix a mobile OS and a desktop OS will inspire Google to do the same to its Android OS.
Chrome OS just doesn't truly feel like a proper OS.