ubuntu-phone team mailing list archive

[Rodney Dawes <rodney.dawes@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Mon, 2016-11-07 at 16:09 +0100, Matthias Apitz wrote:
> Even if Linux (or FreeBSD) is OpenSource, you need some hardware
> vendor
> and firmare for the chips, for example the modem and wifi, etc.

That hardware will be produced anyway, and it will likely stay closed
source proprietary firmware, unless other venues for those chips result
in the drivers and firmware being opened up. Hopefully the popularity
of Ubuntu Core on the IoT side will help drive that.

> In 2008 I started to use the first time Linux on a phone, the
> Openmoko
> Freerunner: http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/Main_Page

Unless you were specifically using iOS, Windows CE/Mobile, or Symbian
before, there's a very good chance you were already "using Linux" on
your phone anyway. Many previous Java phones and such were built on
embedded Linux platforms.

> The BQ E4.5 and M10 (I own both) was a massive step forward i the
> sense
> of having something useable and not only hackable.

For any device where CyanogenMod can exist, it should theoretically be
feasible to create a ported Ubuntu image to run on said device. Whether
there are people who want to build and maintain such images is a
separate question, though, and unrelated to whether or not there are
new retail phones getting built with Ubuntu pre-installed. I think
that's the point that was being made.

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