Also, I do not see any confirmation of the N9 running standard GNU/Linux apps like the N900. But if the N900 continued, it would have been entirely different.
N9's Harmattan still used a regular X11 environment on a Debian-based system, just like N900's Fremantle (though it was supposed to be a stop-gap as MeeGo proper wasn't Debian-based anymore). However, aside of Aegis being a PITA, its portrait form-factor with a capacitive touchscreen and lack of physical keyboard simply wasn't providing a comfortable experience with "standard GNU/Linux apps" that N900 did.