ubuntu-phone team mailing list archive

[Peter Bittner <peter.bittner@xxxxxxx>]

I think it takes more than "fixing bugs" to make a successful phone
platform. I've proposed a solution to a problem that a lot of people
face, presumably, today in a world of hectic chatting and information
exchange [1]. Sadly, not a single comment from a single Canonical
employee on it, even though it has a few votes, so there is general
interest.

[1] https://bugs.launchpad.net/qtubuntu/+bug/1627747

It feels like Canonical has gone back to do what they love to do: Make
good user experience for an operating system. A system that boots up
faster than any Linux before and has a desktop manager that feels
good, because it has elements borrowed from OS X and other nice
goodies. This is just not the same as "we do something that no-one has
done before". It's probably a people problem: Canonical can do things
well only where they have proven they're good at for years.

The problem I see with "the community should do the rest" is that
coming up with such a central decision of building an infrastructure
for communication exchange (as in my proposal) is a big and risky
endeavor: All the effort you put in would be for nothing with a
Canonical saying "we're not interested" or a Canonical not responding
at all. Felipe De La Puente has written in another thread [2] that
communication plugins should build on Telepathy. But clearly,
Canonical should take the lead, make implementing plugins
super-straightforward and promote it, so larger companies listen up.
Make it a hype. Just like they do for Snappy.

[2] https://lists.launchpad.net/ubuntu-phone/msg22870.html

I really want Ubuntu Touch, or Personal - or whatever.

I used to show off my bq Aquaris E5 to everyone, but I figured it was
limiting me too much in getting my daily endeavors done. Just a Gmail
web app and and finally a working calendar is just not enough. If
there were "convergence" in the sense of "my browser shares its
settings, bookmarks, passwords, ... with my desktop" and an easy,
built-in way of setting up file synchronization with my desktop
machine that would be something to help me feel being helped in
getting my business done.

Now I have an ugly, pretty slow Android system on my bq Anquaris E5
that does all the things that help me feel connected (I need to use
Slack, not Telegram, I have to use that horribly distracting WhatsApp
even though I hate it as hell, and it's friggin' helpful to use a
working video telephony on my phone, damn!, with whatever platform -
Hangouts, Viber, Skype, Slack, you name it). The Android UI is
horrible, ugly, and quite slow. And apps are crap, many of them
bloated with ads. It makes my bq feel more a "plastic device" than it
was with Ubuntu. I really really do NOT want Ubuntu to be such a
platform, with a shedload of apps you constantly have to switch from
and to, back and forth. Apps are stupid, get over it.

I'm checking regularly on the Ubuntu Phone mailing list if there is
some progress that makes me confident to make the switch back, but
nothing. Not even a new phone on the horizon, no vision any more, all
faded away. Just advertising for "please repackage your webapps with
Snappy". Oh great, I feel so empowered (yawn). Canonical really makes
me sad.

Peter


2016-11-19 14:09 GMT+01:00 Felipe De La Puente <fdelapuente@xxxxxxxxx>:
> Hi,
>
> I would say that the currently expected way to achieve this is by
> implementing telepathy plugins, and may be in the future the platform could
> be opened to be user configurable with respect of which plugins it uses for
> different types of communication (text, voice, video). Of course this allows
> for multiple alternatives for each communication type, setting priorities
> and so on.
>
> Right now, the standard telephony voice data flows through the ofono plugin
> of telepathy.


2016-12-16 6:50 GMT+01:00 mark <j.m.holmes@xxxxxx>:
> Hi
>
> All the narrative surrounding convergence has been about one code for all
> devices: so developments in one area supposedly improves the experience in
> all areas. I realize that convergence hasn't quite happened yet, and that so
> far, seemingly Touch has been doing its own thing, but surely,
> tantalizingly, we're on the cusp of it with core and snaps: i.e. there's
> going to be a new protocol for the phone (desktop etc) soon. But more than
> that: so long as Canonical continue with convergence, the phone (and
> everything else) will always be part of it.
>
> i.m.o. Bryan Lunduke is an agent provocoteur: all he wanted last Christmas
> was a truly Linux tablet, which he thought he'd never see. Well, that
> arrived literally a few weeks after his post in the form of the M10. :/
>
> f.w.i.w My predictions for Ubuntu phone in 2016: Core and Snaps. New devices
> from OEMs. Perhaps a more easily portable system. And maybe other flavours
> of UT.
>
>
> m
>
>
> On 15/12/16 12:38, advocatux wrote:
>
> Dear Ubuntu Developers & Supporters, first of all thank you for your work.
> Also Happy Holidays, and Happy New Year.
>
> I do think this is the perfect time to talk about Ubuntu Phone (UP) and its
> next future.
>
> Mark Suttleworth said in May UP is not in the main focus, and that his daily
> phone is not UP [0], but I don't interpreted it as far as Bryan Lunduke
> (Social Media Marketing Manager of SUSE) does, when talking about his 2016
> predictions [1]:
>
> "(Prediction for 2016) Canonical will pull away from phones.
>
> Canonical/Ubuntu pulling away from the phone market? This is a hard one to
> measure.
>
> Wait. No, it’s not.
>
> The last press release from Canonical that was phone-related was back in
> April. And the main press page for Canonical doesn’t list a single thing
> about phones. The last several announcements from Canonical have been very
> enterprise-centric. Even in the lead up to the holiday shopping season, not
> a peep about phones.
>
> Nailed it. Canonical pulled away from phones during 2016 in order to focus
> on enterprise functionality."
>
>
> Personally, I simply do think is just a question of time, and I have great
> faith in the UP project.
>
> So Dear Devs, what's the plan for 2017? How can we help to speed up Ubuntu
> Phone development? What can we do to get UP to play in the "First Division"?
>
> Regards.
>
> --
> advocatux
>
>
> [0]
> http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2016/05/mark-shuttle-worth-talks-ubuntu-phone-snappy
>
> [1]
> http://www.networkworld.com/article/3145664/linux/2016-linux-predictions-which-ones-came-true.html