Mmm. I don't think you've quite grasped the nuances of what many people say:
- Maemo is a dying platform, and
- this means fewer software updates than initially expected, and
- Nokias N900 support cycle and focus seems to be non-existing.
People are feeling that Nokia forgot about the N900 and gave up on Maemo before it reached maturity.
As such, the NiTDroid project only underlines the truth of this. If Maemo was healthy, people wouldn't be rooting for OS replacement like NiTDroid. Instead there'd be a focus on combining a running Maemo with EasyDroid or Maelvik: An android emulation layer.
NiTDroid is exciting as an alternative and once it's is deemed complete enough, maybe a virtualization solution pops up too. But if NiTDroid is the future for the N900 users, then Nokia and it's users are parting ways on unhappy terms.
I think it is a case of 'is the glass half full or half empty', it is a matter of how you look at it. Being able to dual boot/chroot to different o/s certainly is a good thing, it speaks to the openness of the unit itself and it is also a good thing. The biggest issue with other phone is that if it feels 'half-empty', then you have not much choice(either you take it or buy a new different one at end of your contract)
While dual booting can be interesting, give new opportunities and whatnot, it's not necessarily right for a communications device. You'll want all of your call logs, sms conversations, IM logs, email folders etc. in the same place. Also, it's natural to want the communication device to be online when someone tries to contact you, as opposed to in a bootup sequence. So for me, the concept of using dual boot instead of virtualization seems to be flawed on a rather basic level. As long as you're using it as a communication device, that is. It'd be like having a different phone for mondays and wednesdays. You can do it, but it is only making your life more complex. On the other hand, the advantages of having access to both Maemo and Android applications at the same time, are obvious.
You probably can't get a working EasyDroid unless you first get NiTDroid working, though.
I'm not knocking the people who are doing this wonderful work - I'm just saying that repeated switching between operating systems isn't optimal, any more than switching between two different phones is.
As for the N900, it's lovely that Nokia has made the device open enough for it to be able to switch away from the Nokia OS. But that sort of comes with the territory, doesn't it? If Apple made a cell phone that only worked with Apple's OS, God forbid, it wouldn't be considered all that open, would it? Even if the OS was based in part of, say, FreeBSD. If you want to brag openness, you've gotta make it open-like.
I don't think anyone much here feels that Nokia let them down in the design of the N900 environment: Maemo. Only later.
Edit: reading through this post, I see that it comes off as negative. Overall, the glass is more than half full in my opinion. I'm just trying to explain how I see the downside.
Hey guys I am from India I have installed the latest nitdroid version and the thing is: I am using vodafone prepaid here so the android OS is not identifying the network and thus showing a very tiny cross-sign up in the network icon @ the status bar, plz help me with this if possible ?... I wanted to know one more thing that does the present nitdroid can show numeric numbers after we open its dialpad n dial numbers ? I havent configured my gmail account yet coz there is no wifi up here (my router got bricked) n i use adhoc connection on windows vista to connect my n900 to install apps and updates....
CooL-HunK,nitDroid with phone support isnt out for download yet,just the demo.
@volt, the glass would be topped up a little more if we were given open drivers and completely full if they let us know they left even three devs still working on it.
