Surely they are aiming for a repairable and modular smartphone eventually. That’s going to be super hard to do. My guess is their next form factor will be a tablet.
You can get laptops that have 5G radios that you can use for data with Linux.
As I understand it, there’s no support for voice/SMSes at the radio level, but in theory, if you were willing to tolerate it and your cell service provider offers support, you could do WiFi calling.
Could also get service from a random other VoIP provider, use that over the data connection.
Probably not as battery-efficient, requires more of the stack to be awake to be listening for incoming calls.
I think that a larger downside is that Android software is designed for a touch screen and low power usage and low data usage across the board, and GNU/Linux software generally isn’t.
We can say that for any kind of drivers needed to run a mobile phone.\ Manufacturers of components are less and less providing any documentation, just throw a binary blob and say “put it in your Android build”.
Eh, Pinephone and Librem 5 made it work, but there’s still a fair amount of software limitations here, and I didn’t think Framework should be a software company. But the radios themselves probably aren’t the blocker you make them out to be.
They absolutely did not make it work. Go read any of the reviews and the complete unreliability of the cellular functions of both devices are chief among the criticisms.
My understanding is that those issues are due to suspend to save battery life, which isn’t directly related to the radios. A more appropriate SOC (i.e. one designed for mobile use) would probably be more reliable with the same radios they selected when going on standby.
You can install Linux on their Chromebooks, so it would be good to have the choice. Some people will prefer a slightly more seamless Android experience and some people will prefer Waydroid
Chromebook makes sense. They could also do full on Linux. Star labs has a tablet coming out, so they don’t have to reinvent the wheel for software (I assume, I haven’t tried touchscreen Linux).
Surely they are aiming for a repairable and modular smartphone eventually. That’s going to be super hard to do. My guess is their next form factor will be a tablet.
Any Linux phone is DOA for the foreseeable future because of the cellular radios.
You can get laptops that have 5G radios that you can use for data with Linux.
As I understand it, there’s no support for voice/SMSes at the radio level, but in theory, if you were willing to tolerate it and your cell service provider offers support, you could do WiFi calling.
Could also get service from a random other VoIP provider, use that over the data connection.
Probably not as battery-efficient, requires more of the stack to be awake to be listening for incoming calls.
I think that a larger downside is that Android software is designed for a touch screen and low power usage and low data usage across the board, and GNU/Linux software generally isn’t.
We can say that for any kind of drivers needed to run a mobile phone.\ Manufacturers of components are less and less providing any documentation, just throw a binary blob and say “put it in your Android build”.
They didn’t say Linux phone though, it could still be android with a custom ROM.
Eh, Pinephone and Librem 5 made it work, but there’s still a fair amount of software limitations here, and I didn’t think Framework should be a software company. But the radios themselves probably aren’t the blocker you make them out to be.
They absolutely did not make it work. Go read any of the reviews and the complete unreliability of the cellular functions of both devices are chief among the criticisms.
My understanding is that those issues are due to suspend to save battery life, which isn’t directly related to the radios. A more appropriate SOC (i.e. one designed for mobile use) would probably be more reliable with the same radios they selected when going on standby.
Tablet is almost free, just don’t have a hinge and have a touchscreen. Release as Chromebook, it will run Android applications
Why Chromebook?
To run Android stuff on x86
Linux can run Android apps since we have Waydroid too and it’s universal, no need for single device - single OS nonsense.
You can install Linux on their Chromebooks, so it would be good to have the choice. Some people will prefer a slightly more seamless Android experience and some people will prefer Waydroid
Chromebook makes sense. They could also do full on Linux. Star labs has a tablet coming out, so they don’t have to reinvent the wheel for software (I assume, I haven’t tried touchscreen Linux).
https://us.starlabs.systems/products/starlite
A reminder that if something can run Android or ChromeOS doesn’t mean drivers would be available for Linux. And usually they aren’t.
You can order that tablet with Ubuntu, mint, Manjaro, zorin, elementary, etc. There’s gotta be some kind of driver support to build on, no?