How many Linuxes are there?

[Mark S]

Sorry for this really dumb question, but why don't all Linux applications run on the 770/800? I can't get abiword or gneumeric to install, but I see there is Open Office for Linux. Is that some other Linux?

I know I am a broken record (see every post I have ever written). The 800 is incredible hardware. Indeed I think it is perfect. But the software bites and is too complicated for an average joe like me without time to spend learning a whole new language.

I wish I could do everything I ccan do on my Motorola Q with Windows Mobile 5.0 or even 50%.

This is the most frustrating device I have ever owned because of the enormous, unrealized potential

[barry99705]

There's pretty much a version of linux ported for every processor since the 286. So basically thousands.

[wallcraf]

There are a lot of Linux's out there, but that isn't why many Linux applications don't run on the N800. If you have an i386 (mainstream Intel compatible, Linux usually calls this x86) microprocessor, at least 256 MB of memory and at least 10 GB or disk then, no matter which variant of (Desktop) Linux you use, practically every Linux application on the planet either already runs or can be made to run on your system.

The problem that Nokia has is that a handheld device has to be very low power (excludes current i386 processors) with little memory and no hard disk. Linix can run (and run well) of such devices, but many existing applications are written for "Desktop" Linux. This situation is slowly changing, with a good head of steam behind software for small Linux devices. At the same time, i386 compatible machines are getting smaller and cheaper. The new Intel Mobile Internet Devices (due this summer) are i386 compatible with a hard disk, and yet will run Maemo-like software. I expect FireFox (for example) to run on such machines, and relatively lightweight applications like abiword or gneumeric will be simple to get running. Commercial (binary only) software like Adobe's acroread and Flash 9 will be available. MID's will be small, but probably not pocketable and more expensive than the U800.

[gsagers]

I second the enormous potential, but I'd say it's only half unrealized -there's a lot of great software packages that have been ported to the n800.

Just to clarify in terms of how many Linuxes there are, it goes something like this:

Linux proper is simply the kernel, or core of the OS. This kernel has been ported, or made so that it can compile and run, on literally dozens of machines and processors, including PC (x86 or x64), MAC (PowerPC), Sun (Sparc), IBM 390, and many embedded systems like the N770 & 800, Sharp Zaurus (ARM processors), Matell JuiceBox MP3 players and many, many others.

Linux in common speech means a distribution, or the kernel plus all these great applications: OpenOffice.org, Abiword, Gnumeric, the Gimp, media players, utilities, and thousands of other programs.

So, we have a situation where the Linux kernel has been ported to the ARM processor, on a device running with 128 MB of RAM (N800), and to mainframes, running gigabytes of RAM. Each application also has to be ported; you wouldn't expect to be able to buy photoshop for a Mac and install it on your PC, you'd buy the PC version. Similarly, you can't just take a program for x86 (PC) Linux and run it on the tablet. Each application has to be customized slightly for the different instructions each processor understands, and for the small screen size of the device. People are doing this porting, rewriting the applications to work on the N800, but it takes time, and the N800's only been out for 4 months or so. Even going from N770 to N800, some things have to be rewritten.

Contrast this with the windows or window mobile world, where there's only one or two types of processors for each, and you can see it's a daunting task. This is at least part of the reason that Microsoft dropped the PowerPC and Alpha versions of Windows NT - there just weren't enough customers to justify the extra work involved in porting the software.

So, there's your long-winded answer, hope it made some sense. The shorter answer is: No, there's no openoffice for linux on the n800, and I would guess there never will be - it's a pretty heavy program, and doesn't run well on old PCs with only 128 MB of RAM, which are kind of like this device. It would be a major feat to port it. But, look at the Application Repositories (http://maemo.org/maemowiki/ApplicationRepositories) page on maemo.org, and you'll see there's lots of software. Don't forget, Nokia made this as an "Internet Tablet", not a PC or notebook replacement, and yet, thanks to the efforts of the people frequenting this forum and others, it nearly is a PC replacement.

[barry99705]

I don't see why firefox won't run on the nokias. It runs on my Zaurus. Minimo just doesn't cut it.

[benny1967]

Sorry for this really dumb question, but why don't all Linux applications run on the 770/800?

Mark, this is not a 'dumb' question at all. It's (from what I know) one of the questions that confuse people most about Linux.

You see: Windows and Mac OSX are (I'm simplifying things now) monolithic operating systems, with everything from the kernel to the graphical user interface ("desktop") under the control of one company. So if someone writes a program for "Windows XP", he knows exactly what to expect. How drivers for printers work. What buttons will look like. How to check for certain hardware. How to display a tray icon. It's very easy.

Also from a user's perspective, if you know a certain software runs on "Windows XP", it will run on your XP. XP is XP is XP is ...


"Linux", on the other hand, is not even an operating system. It's the kernel, and people use the name for whatever system built around it. This can be a any variant of a desktop system, a server, an embedded system and anything in between. You can hardly write software "for Linux". You have to make assumptions about the rest of the system: Is there a graphical user interface? If so, which widget set is used? Is there a pre-installed function to record from a microphone or do you have to write it yourself? All this kind of stuff. The more assumptions you make, the more difficult it will become to re-write your program for a platform that, although still "Linux", does not meet your assumptions.

Nokia tried hard to build the 770/N800 very much like modern desktop systems, but they still had to change quite a lot in order to cut memory consumption and/or make things work for a touchscreen based system. So even small applications that would run quite well on the hardware as such usually need to be re-written in order to run on the 770/N800.

Does this make any sense to you? :)

[gsagers]

I don't see why firefox won't run on the nokias. It runs on my Zaurus. Minimo just doesn't cut it.

My old Zaurus 5500 wouldn't run either Firefox or Minimo, but I'd heard the clamshell models can. Any idea where the sources are that are used for the Zaurus build? I'm a little out of touch with Zaurus development at the moment, but I'd like to at least attempt a compile under the SDK.

[w14]

The Zaurus version of Firefox isn't Hildonised, which I guess is the main barrier to running it on the n800.

It would probably run with minimal repackaging on Penguinbait's KDE.

[megabyte405]

If you search the forums you can find an old(2.2) version of AbiWord, and there is a new version but itt doesn't work so hot on the N800 : I'm looking into it.

[Mark S]

Thanks all for these informative replies.

[TA-t3]

In addition to 'XP is XP', XP runs only on Intel x86 CPUs (or x86-compatible AMD CPUs). Linux (and some other operating systems) run on many more CPUs, sometimes dozens.

What runs on one CPU must be recompiled to run on another CPU. The N800 uses the ARM CPU, which is not x86-compatible. Desktop Linux, on the other hand, is typically used on x86-compatible PCs.

Then there's also the GUI issues, which have been covered in the above posts already: XP has a single GUI/Window system, other operating systems often have a choice. That been said, almost every GUI/Windowing system on Linux are inter-operatable (that is, one made for one system will work fine on another, e.g. KDE<->Gnome). One of the few exceptions though is Hildon on the N800.. in addition to recompiling you'll also need to do a little bit of additional porting, at least to get a good result (e.g. works with stylus etc.)

Still, the hurdles are not that big, so new applications keep coming on the N800 (although the few dozen apps available for the N800 is quite a bit short of the 20863 applications currently directly available and installable (and free) for my desktop Debian Linux system..)