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by 5hoom 5352 days ago
The definition of a personal computer is probably a topic that could be endlessly debated. I would personally classify it as a general purpose computer that the user can program, so why not a phone running (non crippled) Linux?

Once you can run your own native code on the thing the differences are down to factors like software ecosystem, hardware performance and input mechanism, but the potential is there.
2 comments
bergie 5352 days ago
I actually did some on-device hacking on the Nokia N900. Terminal, Git, Python and a reasonably nice code editor: http://maemo.org/downloads/product/Maemo5/pygtkeditor/

Python was especially well suited for on-device development as you're not so dependent on special characters not available on typical phone QWERTYs.

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wladimir 5352 days ago
Exactly. Hardware (CPU/GPU) performance of current phones is on par with "desktop PCs" of only a few years back, so I would even count that one out. It's fast enough, and they're catching up.
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