[justforpurism]

Registered just to post this. Love Purism, want it to succeed. But...

IMHO, the effort is going to fail miserably, unless folks stop wasting time trying to build a phone UI, i.e. another attempt to build Android/iOS ecosystem. There were Sailfish, MER, Openmoko, and whatnot attempts to make a pure Linux-running cell phone. Just stop it. You will burn through your money doing half-baked UI, there will be no adoption, then no developers, then no apps, and thus no users.

As per OP link, Purism just have shown that they wasted precious time on badly looking GNOME Clocks, Emacs, Password manager, a game, a half-baked music player, Torrent client (on a phone!), and Drawing app made with their native UI. What a waste of time to re-write (or port) all of this, all over again.

The only surviving plan for any Linux-phone: make it web-centric. You have to port ONE app: Firefox. Make it fast, make it perfect. Then, automatically you will get:

- Adoption. http://m.uber.com http://m.lyft.com/ work out of the box. I am not leaving home without the phone because it enables to access essential day-to-day services. Partner with companies that develop those web-based apps.

- Adoption. Web-based music: Spotify, SoundCloud. Out of the box. Purism doesn't need to waste time on this. Just have pre-installed bookmarks to those apps. Partner with companies that develop those web-based apps.

- Adoption. Endless web apps such as "Clocks", "Notepad", Games and drawing apps already exists. Purism don't need to waste time on this stuff. Just have pre-installed bookmarks for those apps. Partner with companies that develop those web-based apps.

Once basic needs satisfied, those of us who need Emacs, will be able to port Emacs and Torrent clients themselves. Why waste your time, Purism?

Focus on releasing the hardware, be different from other phones, be lean, get immediate adoption, community will fill the blanks.

[Mediterraneo10]

Sailfish has a lot of closed-source components and it runs on closed hardware that forces specific kernel versions and makes it difficult for the community to upgrade; one is completely at the mercy of Jolla or the device maker. It shouldn’t be compared to this project.

And seriously, basic functionality should be web-based? A phone should not be required to have an internet connection to do such things. While I am on a plane, or when I am traveling in a country but unable to buy a local SIM, then I should be able to expect that my phone’s non-communication-related apps will still work.

[RandomBacon]

> another attempt to build Android/iOS ecosystem

Do you understand what they are doing? They don't have to build the ecosystem, it already exists!

> Purism just have shown that they wasted precious time on badly looking

I think it looks good.

> What a waste of time to re-write (or port)

So you still have no idea what they are doing. Why are you taking the time to create new accounts and post long comments if you aren't taking the time to understand what they're doing?

> make it web-centric. You have to port ONE app: Firefox.

They aren't making a web-centric device. We don't want a web-centric device. They are making a privacy-focused, portable Linux device that makes calls.

---

It's weird. It seems like every Librem 5 post has new accounts that criticize it.

Is there someone who doesn't want it to suceed?

[justforpurism]

> So you still have no idea what they are doing. > They are making a privacy-focused, portable Linux device that makes calls.

Now understand, thank you.

Before your kind explanation, I indeed did not fully grasp what Purism was doing. I was naively thinking they were doing a privacy-focused device that I could someday use everyday.

But instead they are doing a device that will run Linux and will occasionally make calls. I had one of those: Openmoko. Still have it in a drawer.

Without making a device that is actually useful, which will survive more than one iteration, those are futile attempts. Truth is: one small company will not be able to make a full well-integrated phone software in the time/money the company is allowed to burn. Unless they embrace "outsourcing" apps to existing ultra-portable (web) ecosystem, the attempt is doomed to fail.

Sadly, but if the course continues, I will make my prediction: Purism will successfully release Librem 5, there will be a half-baked UI (like MER/Openmoko/Sailfish/OE), half-baked bunch of native "Notepad" apps, no one will seriously use it, and it will be the last phone Purism will release.

Then, the circle of life: a new company will try the same.

[RandomBacon]

I don't understand why people seem to have it out for Purism. Did they wrong you? Are you a competitor?

It's pretty clear you are being disingenuous.

[flukus]

> Are you a competitor?

justforpurism and learnfromstory, 2 brand new accounts just created to shit on purism, it certainly seems like someone has a bone to pick.

[justforpurism]

> I don't understand why people seem to have it out for Purism. Did they wrong you? Are you a competitor?

I love Purism. I mean no sarcasm here.

But you have to know history and learn from previous mistakes, and try something different. If Purism's approach is the same as to what Openmoko was, it is not going to end well. I hope they will try something different.

But, so far, they do exactly same thing as to what Openmoko was doing. I loved Openmoko, I bought their phone (and a debug board), but I was never able to use it as a phone. It did make calls. Due to limited resources (and all small companies have limited resources), they could never master native UI. I still don't believe that a small company can make all-encompassing software apps for a phone, thus I suggested to try something different: use existing web apps, don't spread already thin resources on "porting" native apps yourself.

[RandomBacon]

They aren't "porting" apps.

[flukus]

> The only surviving plan for any Linux-phone: make it web-centric. You have to port ONE app: Firefox.

You are aware of the failure of firefox OS right?

> Purism just have shown that they wasted precious time on badly looking GNOME Clocks, Emacs, Password manager, a game, a half-baked music player, Torrent client (on a phone!), and Drawing app made with their native UI.

They haven't wasted time, pretty much all of these are existing apps, you can run most of them on a gnome desktop.

> Focus on releasing the hardware

That is what their doing and what differentiates them from most previous efforts like sailfish, they are a hardware company making a phone the runs linux, others were trying to re-create android and leave the hardware for others.

[hajile]

I think Firefox OS didn't have to fail.

1. Allow non-kernel updates without carrier interference. Google has had to learn this lesson the hard way. Let the carriers lock down the lower layers, but Firefox and the user-facing stuff should still be able to update well enough for a few years.

2. Don't launch on crap, low-memory devices. KaliOS works on low-end devices, but that's because it is hyper particular about which apps run and what web APIs they use (and a lot of websites don't run very well). There's no reason a web device can't work for high-end devices. Most people run the same 50 apps as everyone else (and 25 of those ship with the phone anyway). High-end devices also open up other options like running Android in a linux container (like ChromeOS does).

3. Make WebAssembly (then asm.js) first-class. "Native" wasm apps with more direct access to APIs and access to a standard set of canvas widgets (sorry, HTML sucks for a lot of things). New APIs need to be available for more specific cores (especially things like DSP or ML units). Finally, add support for fully-native processes for trusted programs because sometimes 25-50% slower is too much and sometimes a spec (eg, Vulkan) simply isn't available as a webAPI yet but competition is needed here and now.

4. Be different. Make something that tries to clone Android and people will expect it to be Android. Firefox OS would have gone much farther looking and acting like webOS (which is still a better UI than Android more than a decade later). You can't disrupt a free, mature project with an identical, but immature project and a bunch of ideals that 95% of people simply don't understand.

[justforpurism]

> You are aware of the failure of firefox OS right?

Right. And this was a mistake by Mozilla: they tried to make an OS, and a browser and interact/negotiate with 3rd-party phone vendors. I did not care for FirefoxOS-based phones indeed because they where "same old ridden-with-firmware black boxes".

Mozilla makes a good browser, they'd rather keep doing that.

Purism is a different story. It seems they understand that some folks appreciate open hardware, privacy-focused designs. Cool, one ingredient for the success: check. But in order to be a successful product, the phone has to be useful out-of-the-box. And if the hardware company will attempt to make a whole "native" software stack, they will fail the same way as Mozilla failed at being an OS-company and HW-facing company: not enough resources.

So, how about Purism makes a great hardware (+ drivers), and integrates exactly three apps: 1. a phone app that is able to make/receive calls, 2. a short-text messaging app 3. and a blazing-fast browser to access the world. Done. Basics are there: I can make calls, I can receive/send messages, I can access email, slack, hail uber/lyft, use web-based maps/navigation, listen to online podcasts/music, use web-based calendars, etc. A phone I could use everyday.

[RandomBacon]

Purism pretty much is doing what you're suggesting.

They're working with upstream packages so that when you install Linux on it, it just works, no hunting for additional drivers to make it work.

Those apps already exist. Again, they're working with those apps to make the phone "just work" when you install the apps/programs/packages/whatever. They don't need to reinvent Firefox, they can let Mozilla focus on that, and Purism can focus on what they're doing.

[ptman]

Failure of firefox os and success of kaios, based on firefox os and with investment from google

[Apaec]

Just be happy for industrial competitiveness and stfu dude.

Honestly, I've been noticing this trend of bashing the newcomers or defending the monopolists more and more here on HN.

It doesn't really feel more like a startup/hacker news.

Just trying to promote awareness here.