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PinePhone

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    • T Offline
      trainailleur
      last edited by trainailleur 2 Dec 2019, 02:15 12 Feb 2019, 02:14

      I don't think they're linked yet from the main page of the Pine64 wiki, but here are the pages for the dev kits:

      Project Anakin - Phase 1 Dev Kit

      Project Don't be Evil - Phase 2 Dev Kit

      Crossing my fingers Phase 3 (the shipping phone) comes to fruition (same with the Librem 5).

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
      • P Offline
        PINE64
        last edited by 14 Feb 2019, 11:28

        That is correct @arubislander , they aren't linked yet ... mostly because the wiki articles are for devs and really not meant for users. Clearly the Phase 2 article isn't even finished πŸ™‚

        Open. Friendly. Community Driven.

        T 1 Reply Last reply 14 Feb 2019, 18:12 Reply Quote 2
        • ? Offline
          A Former User @kalle.kruse
          last edited by A Former User 14 Feb 2019, 13:33

          Numpty question then: how big, in reality, is the gap between Unity8 and UBports' Ubuntu Touch?

          F 1 Reply Last reply 16 Feb 2019, 13:26 Reply Quote 0
          • T Offline
            trainailleur @PINE64
            last edited by 14 Feb 2019, 18:12

            @PINE64 said in PinePhone:

            [T]hey aren't linked yet ... mostly because the wiki articles are for devs and really not meant for users. Clearly the Phase 2 article isn't even finished πŸ™‚

            Not surprising, and I figured that was the reason. Since this is a dev-heavy and dev-supporting community, I hope you don't mind my posting the links for those with a thirst to know more. ☺

            Welcome, BTW. Glad to see you here.

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • D Offline
              doniks @kalle.kruse
              last edited by 14 Feb 2019, 19:16

              @kalle-kruse Thanks for the link. It's an impressive post. And it was an impressive stand that they had at fosdem. Also the camera and the tablet looked really nice. But I forgot to try to play any audio or video on the tablet. Can someone comment? Is it Loud enough? Does it sound good?

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              • P Offline
                PINE64
                last edited by 14 Feb 2019, 20:59

                @trainailleur not at all, its not even a secret. Its just because since regular users cannot (and will not) be able to obtain those kits there isn't really a reason to have them in our wiki. Thanks for having us here πŸ™‚

                @doniks glad you liked the stall and the post - I wrote it up, so I immodestly take the credit πŸ˜‰ I only played audio on the PineTab once ~6-7 months ago on a super early prototype, so I honestly cannot answer the audio question. I think that it will be serviceable but won't knock your socks off (as you probably expect). As for video; 720p and 1080p playback will be fine with a dedicated player using HW acceleration. Lets see what devs can do with in-browser playback (in-browser 480p sw rendered will work fine but higher will require hw acceleration - newest cedrus has a vaapi wrapper!)

                Open. Friendly. Community Driven.

                1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 3
                • F Offline
                  flohack @Guest
                  last edited by 16 Feb 2019, 13:26

                  @3arn0wl What exactly do you mean by that question πŸ˜‰

                  My languages: πŸ‡¦πŸ‡Ή πŸ‡©πŸ‡ͺ πŸ‡¬πŸ‡§ πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡Έ

                  ? 1 Reply Last reply 16 Feb 2019, 14:04 Reply Quote 0
                  • ? Offline
                    A Former User @flohack
                    last edited by 16 Feb 2019, 14:04

                    πŸ™‚ Hey, @Flohack - thanks for... well just thanks for being, really.

                    Ubuntu was always explained as being all one code, in all one language... Which is a fantastic thing... A real strength.

                    But UT on the N5 seems to be more advanced than Unity 8... Is that an incorrect perception?

                    What I guess I'm asking therefore is: is it a big effort to get Unity 8 working on PinePhone at the same level as UT on my beloved N5? Is it to do with Mir and Wayland?

                    And will all the apps in the OpenStore work on Unity8?

                    F 1 Reply Last reply 16 Feb 2019, 18:14 Reply Quote 0
                    • F Offline
                      flohack
                      last edited by 16 Feb 2019, 18:13

                      The challenge to get Ubuntu Touch running is not unity8 I would say, and the click apps will stay. We have to remove the Android container and instead access the hardware directly.

                      We still dont know the exact amount of work what will be involved, but yes, the goal is to give the same experience at the end.

                      Also we must say here that the hardware specs might not be final and we dont know yet about GPS, sensors etc. And the main CPU is for sure slower than N5.

                      But dont judge the phone by its specs. Its a groundbreaking chance to show that we do not need Android hardware and that an open phone is possible. I think thats the huge message we want to get out.

                      My languages: πŸ‡¦πŸ‡Ή πŸ‡©πŸ‡ͺ πŸ‡¬πŸ‡§ πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡Έ

                      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
                      • F Offline
                        flohack @Guest
                        last edited by 16 Feb 2019, 18:14

                        @3arn0wl Also watch todayΒ΄s Q&A we might have some answer for you there.

                        My languages: πŸ‡¦πŸ‡Ή πŸ‡©πŸ‡ͺ πŸ‡¬πŸ‡§ πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡Έ

                        ? 1 Reply Last reply 17 Feb 2019, 18:07 Reply Quote 1
                        • ? Offline
                          A Former User @flohack
                          last edited by 17 Feb 2019, 18:07

                          @Flohack - It was great to see UT working on the Pine board in yesterday's Q&A. From what Jan has said recently about Google's direction with Fuchsia, the development of a completely Open alternative becomes vital.

                          F 1 Reply Last reply 17 Feb 2019, 18:10 Reply Quote 2
                          • F Offline
                            flohack @Guest
                            last edited by 17 Feb 2019, 18:10

                            @3arn0wl Yes I cannot repeat it too often: Android Fuchsia threatens the last part of openess that Android currently has: By removing the Linux kernel they are free to go fully closed source. Even if their microkernel might be open, all high level functions can then nicely be wrapped in closed source modules.

                            The idea of a microkernel seems neat for phones, true: Lots of features of a fully blown Linux kernel might never be used on phones at all. But its more about the political decision here than a technical one. So yes, UBports is fully aligned with fiinding alternatives, seeing Android porting as a temporary measure as the underlying problem cannot be fixed at all.

                            BR

                            My languages: πŸ‡¦πŸ‡Ή πŸ‡©πŸ‡ͺ πŸ‡¬πŸ‡§ πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡Έ

                            D 1 Reply Last reply 18 Feb 2019, 00:39 Reply Quote 0
                            • D Offline
                              dobey @flohack
                              last edited by 18 Feb 2019, 00:39

                              @Flohack said in PinePhone:

                              Even if their microkernel might be open, all high level functions can then nicely be wrapped in closed source modules.

                              So no different than currently. All the high level stuff in Android is closed. It's why we can't ship the foundation services to be able to hook up push notifications, which are already implemented in most web services for Android, and thus must have our own implementation which almost nobody supports. Beyond that, it will basically not be any different than needing something like libhybris, but for Fuchsia, instead.

                              T F 2 Replies Last reply 18 Feb 2019, 02:18 Reply Quote 0
                              • T Offline
                                trainailleur @dobey
                                last edited by 18 Feb 2019, 02:18

                                @dobey said in PinePhone:

                                Beyond that, it will basically not be any different than needing something like libhybris, but for Fuchsia, instead.

                                The permissive license has potentially vast implications.

                                D 1 Reply Last reply 18 Feb 2019, 03:59 Reply Quote 0
                                • D Offline
                                  dobey @trainailleur
                                  last edited by 18 Feb 2019, 03:59

                                  @trainailleur said in PinePhone:

                                  The permissive license has potentially vast implications.

                                  Feel free to elaborate. The drivers aren't going to be any less free, and that's where the real issues are. We've already got overly proprietary drivers with a GPLv2 kernel, so I don't see how having the kernel be Apache 2 is going to make it any worse, considering vendors already don't respect the GPL in most cases. All it does is put Google themselves in the position of not having to worry about the kernel license versus proprietary drivers.

                                  Beyond that, nothing else is really going to change. Most of the middleware that we do need to run in the android container for UT is already Apache 2 anyway, and that's unlikely to change with Fuchsia underneath.

                                  Really, all I see is people being hysterical for no reason.

                                  ? T 2 Replies Last reply 18 Feb 2019, 13:04 Reply Quote 1
                                  • ? Offline
                                    A Former User @dobey
                                    last edited by 18 Feb 2019, 13:04

                                    @dobey said in PinePhone:

                                    The drivers aren't going to be any less free, and that's where the real issues are.

                                    I guess that's why it's important that the Pine and Librem efforts are successful: to demonstrate to hardware manufacturers that there's a strong desire for open devices, to encourage them to produce more.

                                    There are efforts though to produce Open Source drivers, aren't there?

                                    P D 2 Replies Last reply 18 Feb 2019, 13:50 Reply Quote 0
                                    • P Offline
                                      PINE64 @Guest
                                      last edited by PINE64 18 Feb 2019, 13:50

                                      @3arn0wl said in PinePhone:

                                      There are efforts though to produce Open Source drivers, aren't there?

                                      Yes, of course, and for the A64 such drivers are quite far along too [video showing open source hw video acceleration] : https://youtu.be/X18JN1pq2H4?t=1
                                      Then there is lima for the GPU (WIP): http://linux-sunxi.org/Mali

                                      Not saying that initial releases will not use blobs - they probably will - but in time devs will surely switch over to FOSS drivers.

                                      Open. Friendly. Community Driven.

                                      ? 1 Reply Last reply 18 Feb 2019, 14:02 Reply Quote 1
                                      • ? Offline
                                        A Former User @PINE64
                                        last edited by 18 Feb 2019, 14:02

                                        πŸ™‚ Well that's very encouraging news, @PINE64

                                        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                        • D Offline
                                          dobey @Guest
                                          last edited by 18 Feb 2019, 17:14

                                          @3arn0wl said in PinePhone:

                                          There are efforts though to produce Open Source drivers, aren't there?

                                          For Pine64 systems, yes. But Pine is not based on Fuchsia. The previous comments were about how Fuchsia would be "bad" for things like UT. I don't think it will be any worse for alternatives to Android, than it is now, and was trying to explain that.

                                          There are also efforts to reverse engineer drivers to create open source ones in upstream kernel, for existing Android devices too. But it's extremely tedious to do. Unless the hardware manufacturers themselves are working to provide Open Source drivers, like Pine64 are, it's not going to matter much though.

                                          Point is, let's stop worrying about Fuchsia and other future possible Google Android things, and just work on making UT be the best it can be, on whatever hardware/kernel/drivers we must use.

                                          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                                          • T Offline
                                            trainailleur @dobey
                                            last edited by trainailleur 18 Feb 2019, 17:42

                                            @dobey said in PinePhone:

                                            @trainailleur said in PinePhone:

                                            The permissive license has potentially vast implications.

                                            Feel free to elaborate.

                                            First, note I used the word "potentially." Then, if you disagree, perhaps you could elaborate on how the implications of a permissive license cannot possibly be vast. ☺

                                            The drivers aren't going to be any less free

                                            This may be so, or it may not be. We simply don't know yet. More and more embedded hardware is seeing mainlined drivers. If this is only because Linux (deliberately) lacks a stable target for drivers and OEMs are finding it easier to live with the accelerated pace of kernel development if they mainline (which seems to be Jon Corbet's supposition), the situation may be very different with Zircon.

                                            Or perhaps it won't be, but I don't see how anyone has the information now in order to say. Even Google cannot know at this point what wrestling matches they may face with OEMs in the future.

                                            We've already got overly proprietary drivers with a GPLv2 kernel, so I don't see how having the kernel be Apache 2 is going to make it any worse, considering vendors already don't respect the GPL in most cases.

                                            For the moment, Google does appear to be dragging the OEMs kicking and screaming towards modern kernels, so if Google sticks with Android, we have reasons to believe the situation with Android drivers will improve as driver maintenance becomes more critical.

                                            Beyond that, nothing else is really going to change. Most of the middleware that we do need to run in the android container for UT is already Apache 2 anyway, and that's unlikely to change with Fuchsia underneath.

                                            Are you thinking to run the Linux kernel in a hypervisor on top of Zircon, or are you thinking of porting UT to Zircon (or something else that's not occurring to me)?

                                            Really, all I see is people being hysterical for no reason.

                                            Which is why I'm neither hysterical about it nor posted hysteria. But given how it's been eleven years since Android debuted on the market and we have only a handful of Android alternatives which will run on Android hardware, and only on a handful of devices, I won't blame anyone who does feel hysteria over the uncertainty surrounding a potential sea change in the OS and readily available hardware that will be available in the future.

                                            Edit to add (since I didn't refresh the thread while composing and just saw this):

                                            Point is, let's stop worrying about Fuchsia and other future possible Google Android things, and just work on making UT be the best it can be, on whatever hardware/kernel/drivers we must use.

                                            I agree completely

                                            D 1 Reply Last reply 19 Feb 2019, 14:12 Reply Quote 1
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