Copernicus | # 351 | 2015-09-15, 17:40 | Report

Ok, I've been following today's discussion, and for some reason finding myself more and more confused. I think it finally gelled in my head with javispedro's statement:

So. As I understand it, we've got a fine, fully open-source OS base for mobile devices, Mer. And, there's even a fully open-source UI on top of this OS, Nemo.

To my knowledge, Jolla's Sailfish is not an integral part of Mer. It is, instead, an attempt to build a _commercial_ operating system on top of Mer, in very much the same vein as Android. (And, given Android's success, this seems like a decent strategy.)

Which leads me to the obvious (at least to my mind) question: why in the world would you want to open-source Sailfish? For those folks who want to see (and participate in!) a fully open-source OS, Nemo seems to be the way to go. For those folks who want to see Sailfish succeed as an alternative to Android, there seems little point in them opening the closed bits; they'll need to keep some items closed just to do business in the current environment.

Really, I see this as a perfect use of Mer, myself: one side pursues a commercial, closed-source UI on top of Mer; the other provides a fully open-source system top-to-bottom. Both approaches have their advantages. I just don't see the need to force Jolla to go full open-source as well...

smoku | # 352 | 2015-09-15, 17:52 | Report

What about folks that just want to fix annoying bugs in already existing piece of code, instead of wasting time on developing it from scratch?

Copernicus | # 353 | 2015-09-15, 18:02 | Report

I believe the correct answer to that question is "iOS". A company with the market valuation of Apple can spend the money to hire enough people to fix all their bugs quickly. (And really, that's at the heart of the Apple experience, right? You're forking over your cash to them to get a feature-full, hassle-free device...)

Jolla needs to fix Jolla's bugs in whatever way Jolla sees fit. If you find their methodology lacking, well, it is a free market... If you want code that you yourself can fix bugs in, Nemo just seems a better bet to me.

smoku | # 354 | 2015-09-15, 18:05 | Report

Incorrect.

I just presented you an alternative view, on why would anyone want Jolla open-sourcing SailfishOS. Pity you didn't want to get it...

JulmaHerra | # 355 | 2015-09-15, 18:09 | Report

It seems they have been too busy with all the hassle with developing Jolla Tablet and all snags with it. On that part it wasn't really surprising that they decided to spin off the devices to independent company. As they stated by themselves, after the split is complete they can fully concentrate on developing Sailfish. For company with personnel count of something like 125 it is a big thing. So, way I see it, there is hope for things to get better on that part.

And yes, I still like the new UI and consider it to be improvement over old one.

MisterMaster | # 356 | 2015-09-15, 18:13 | Report

For example aren't the documents and browser apps open-source? How many have contributed to those? 1(well maybe more?) guy for the documents and a few for the browser? Well I don't know how hard it is to contribute to those so that might be one reason if it is difficult.

---

Last edited by MisterMaster; 2015-09-15 at 18:19.

Copernicus | # 357 | 2015-09-15, 18:21 | Report

Ok, so, let me ask you: why are you shooting down Nemo then? I mean heck, if Jolla actually wanted to go the full open-source route from the start, we'd be seeing Jolla selling Nemo-based phones, not Sailfish-based phones, wouldn't we?

All I'm saying is, there's no point in having a fully open-source Sailfish, as Nemo already exists. Jolla is attempting to make a profit off of Sailfish, and so, they should do the work of fixing its bugs themselves. Community effort seems better spent on the community-based project instead...

itdoesntmatt | # 358 | 2015-09-15, 19:38 | Report

but what state of nemo roms? are them usable for everyday use? i dont know anything about it.

marxian | # 359 | 2015-09-15, 20:00 | Report

I suspect they are not usable for everyday use, because all those people that are claiming that they would be willing to contribute to Sailfish, if only it were FOSS, have not bothered to do so in the case of Nemo. This naturally raises the question of whether they really would contribute, or whether it's simply a load of gumflap. In this context, terms like 'we' or 'the community' usually mean 'someone else'.

itdoesntmatt | # 360 | 2015-09-15, 20:24 | Report

but regard this, i have a question. why all developers (and we have so much good ones here) waste their energy with sailfish os and not with nemo? just a question, because it seems paradoxal..

I have never heard about nemo as indipendent rom, i m going to be honest.

Another question: sailfish os is as far as i know only partially open, but only silica UI is closed or not? because i have two consideration to do, and they depend from that question.
because if there are some other components closed (apart alien dalvik sure) it would be not so good, but if its only the Silica UI, we would deal with the fact that they are a company and in order to make some money (even only to hire developers) they have to earn enought to eat and let devs eat. If they opened completely the ui, what an hardware company would have pay Jolla for? they could take os and use it as it is.. or i am missing some logic step?

---

Last edited by itdoesntmatt; 2015-09-15 at 21:26.