Thread: FOSDEM update
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Posts: 285 | Thanked: 1,900 times | Joined on Feb 2010
#24
Maemo was to be a computer in your pocket first and mobile phone second (or third, fourth... or dead last!). It surely had it's advantages, but also disadvantages:

- Being like downsized desktop OS usually results in slower device, N900 was slow to boot up and even slower to update all the repositories every time when trying to install some app, for consumer device it's not acceptable even if it allows some kind of "privacy"
- Previous can be mitigated with some serious optimization to some degree, however, being on top of X brings additional limitations that cannot be fixed, nor mitigated (hence Sailfish was designed on top of Wayland)
- Almost no go without HW keyboard, this of course doesn't bother anyone who explicitly want HW keyboard (like me, I just don't want the device to be thick as a freaking brick...) but it's no go for consumer market
- Without compatibility layer for Android commercial software is severely limited and OSS may not be that optimized for mobile pocket computer, which again rules it out from consumer market

In the end devices like N900 would be very much like niche in niche product. In my experience, N900/Maemo 5 was quite effective but in every day use Harmattan or Sailfish is just more efficient, thought it's more limited in sense that it's not meant to be like sysadmins pocket-tool for "doing it all".
 

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