Database Users

Google's Android - why isnt there more development for this?

http://code.google.com/android/
incase anyones not familiar with android, check that site out.
im not sure why there isnt more development or developers that are going after this in terms of getting it working on all devices? im currently using it on my vogue and its amazing. definately better UI in terms of EVERYTHING. its open source, so i think developers should be all over this! has so much potential its kind of ridiculous
vogue thread
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=382265
its working about 80% now thanks to amazing developer martin.
the browser and everything (overall UI) are so much better and smoother than windows mobile! and being that its open source with google ENCOURAGING development of apps and themes and skins and whatnot, i think this is the next best thing to happen to ppc's.
THIS is the actual iphone killer.
just some samples
on a vogue (very smooth)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d0z9bWiAT44
just a demo of the browser (mine is actually a little smoother than this)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2FpDDEVWtk
the reason im posting this here is because i was the first one to post in this section with manilla2d (when udk first released it), asking whether we can get this on other devices, and look what happened with that. if we can get the amazing developers from here to work on this like they worked on m2d, then wow this will be amazing!

Yeah, even I'm suprised at the low level of excitement of porting this to all devices. Hoping for some real development . Btw, those videos are pretty impressive.
Akshay

Yeah... I'm a little surprised too.
I have a Vogue now, so I'm OK, but I'd love to see somebody pick this project up for the Touch Pro. It seems to be very similar to the G1, so the porting would be a lot more complete than the porting to the Vogue.
Hopefully somebody with the skills (read: not me) will undertake this.

it'll pick up. i say in 6 months to a year people will snap out of the apple app dev craze. but from a dev point of view, apple is where its at right now. the amount of money you could make is a driver by all means.
htc will also be a key part in this. when they start to release better looking hardware, perhaps something on par with the diamond....you'll see a user increase. and user increase translate into dev interest. so just hang in there....i think you'll get what you want soon.

A ppc that works only on 80 Percent ? And no additional Software, no outlook syncronisation? Thats at the moment somthing for freaks or people with a second device
If there would be a 100 Percent Android i would install it, believe me, because i´m not very happy with windows anymore.
So i think we must wait and hope.
My next Device in half a year will be hopefully the Touch HD with Android rolleyes

because it makes no sense to port androud to a phone that is not 3G with GPS.
the only advantage of the g phone that I saw was the service. 3G and free GPS! i'm like, how much for the puppy in the window?
I honestly think that porting it to my wizard would be senseless.
without the service the gphone is just a phone wothout service.

S.V.I said:
because it makes no sense to port androud to a phone that is not 3G with GPS.
the only advantage of the g phone that I saw was the service. 3G and free GPS! i'm like, how much for the puppy in the window?
I honestly think that porting it to my wizard would be senseless.
without the service the gphone is just a phone wothout service.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Of course it is always pointless. We do it because we can (and because we don't want to do anything while at work)
(and much like bluemetal, we are all tired of the same old look and functionality in our WM devices). Then again, it can always be worse....
we could all have iphones
Anyways, I am looking forward to someone porting this to the Blue Angel.

The bigest stumbling block for me is lack of Exchange support. GPS isn't really necessary with the cell tower triangulation available. The accuracy is getting better. It will never be as tight as GPS but close is good enough for me. I can do with out 3G (I wish I had it) I don't enjoy the experience with the little screen. It's like looking at the ocean through a porthole. A 5 inch screen with much better resolution would be great. I use it for quick info but surfing is not fun.
I do like the idea of going linux on the phone. It would be that much closer to having a truely mobile desktop. We wouldn't have to install resource hogging shells that ride on top of an already bloated today screen to get better customization.
I think the biggest problem overall though is the hardware needed will put a lot of older equipment like my little wizard out to pasture. I don't have the funds to rush out an purchase a new phone. And yes I think all the bugs will need to be shaken out for a while before I take the plunge. Maybe by the 2nd or third generation of Android things will be a little less "bleeding edge". It all looks great now but I rely on my phone too much to gamble on an untried system.

To be completely honest, I too am suprised by the lack of progress.
This is a complete replacement for Windows Mobile: something we've all only dreamed about up until now. It will have a wicked Dev community around it soon enough.
There were a hell of a lot of efforts to get the Beta running. But now... nothing?
*so confused
The worst part is, it'd be gorgeous on my LG KS20, but I doubt we'll see it anytime soon: no one loves us KS20 owners. Guess you were all just jealous of our drivers.

bluemetalaxe said:
A ppc that works only on 80 Percent ? And no additional Software, no outlook syncronisation? Thats at the moment somthing for freaks or people with a second device
If there would be a 100 Percent Android i would install it, believe me, because i´m not very happy with windows anymore.
So i think we must wait and hope.
My next Device in half a year will be hopefully the Touch HD with Android rolleyes
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i don't know if you read my whole post, but i never said "hey everyone lets run something 80% finished on our ppcs."
waiting and hoping isnt going to do anything, thats why i started this thread. to get more attention instead of sitting and waiting for something we arent sure is going to ever happen.
im glad a lot of other people are on the same page as me, wondering why there is barely any development for this. thanks for the support guys
lets get some devs in here to weigh in on this!

Well, there's a number of quite simple reasons...
- Porting Android to another device isn't as simple as "Hey, it's Open Source, you just have to compile and install". First of all, you'd need to find a working cross compiler for ARM in the first place (one using Windows' API, like those used for PPC apps isn't much help). Then you'd need to write drivers for usually undocumented hardware with this cross compiler or in ARM assembler (reusing existing WM drivers, like in cooked ROMs, wouldn't work in Linux). Finally, you need to find a way to flash that system to your PPC (that's a bit more work than a patched/cooked variation of an already existing WM ROM), and so on. That's work for the kind of freaks who would do their taxes binary in mind...
- Writing apps for a system almost nobody own so far isn't that attractive. It's even less attractive if the potential developer doesn't own one - the real experience is always a bit different to an emulator, and usually would like some use for himself, too (what good is an mobile app for you if you'd need a laptop with emulator to use it? ). So far, there's only one official Android device out there, and aside from the fact it's still a bit "first try, for developers only" (no Outlook sync, ugly design, ...), you only get it in very few parts of the world or in overpriced eBay auctions. Inofficial ports with reduced functionality and maybe buggy or slow "beta" drivers aren't that great, too...
- While the Android API is quite close to common Java style, it's still something completely new, which requires some time to get into the framework's basic style, the available functions, the loopholes and small tricks, etc. With WM, the gap to common Windows (desktop) programming is way smaller, and I guess it's similar with the iPhone and Mac programming.
Or, in other words: Give Andoid some time to grow up. IMHO, G1 and the few existing ports are a playground for hackers and early adopters, so they can get startet with fixing (security holes, missing functionality, ...). Then, in some months, more devices with a "hacker improved" Android will be published, and when developers buy those, they also will start writing apps if they are missing something.

you'd think more people would be starting to port.. because god is that g1 terrible, you have to have sharpened pencils for fingers to type on that flush keyboard)

Mort said:
Well, there's a number of quite simple reasons...
- Porting Android to another device isn't as simple as "Hey, it's Open Source, you just have to compile and install". First of all, you'd need to find a working cross compiler for ARM in the first place (one using Windows' API, like those used for PPC apps isn't much help). Then you'd need to write drivers for usually undocumented hardware with this cross compiler or in ARM assembler (reusing existing WM drivers, like in cooked ROMs, wouldn't work in Linux). Finally, you need to find a way to flash that system to your PPC (that's a bit more work than a patched/cooked variation of an already existing WM ROM), and so on. That's work for the kind of freaks who would do their taxes binary in mind...
- Writing apps for a system almost nobody own so far isn't that attractive. It's even less attractive if the potential developer doesn't own one - the real experience is always a bit different to an emulator, and usually would like some use for himself, too (what good is an mobile app for you if you'd need a laptop with emulator to use it? ). So far, there's only one official Android device out there, and aside from the fact it's still a bit "first try, for developers only" (no Outlook sync, ugly design, ...), you only get it in very few parts of the world or in overpriced eBay auctions. Inofficial ports with reduced functionality and maybe buggy or slow "beta" drivers aren't that great, too...
- While the Android API is quite close to common Java style, it's still something completely new, which requires some time to get into the framework's basic style, the available functions, the loopholes and small tricks, etc. With WM, the gap to common Windows (desktop) programming is way smaller, and I guess it's similar with the iPhone and Mac programming.
Or, in other words: Give Andoid some time to grow up. IMHO, G1 and the few existing ports are a playground for hackers and early adopters, so they can get startet with fixing (security holes, missing functionality, ...). Then, in some months, more devices with a "hacker improved" Android will be published, and when developers buy those, they also will start writing apps if they are missing something.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ok now these reasons make a lot of sense. im just surprised that not as many people are trying to get it started so they can get started on fixing, like you said. but ok, all of your other reasons make complete sense. im sure the future releases of android will only get better.
android just seems like exactly what many of us have been looking for in wm devices, basically, a complete UI replacement endorsed/created by a large company (other than microsoft lol).

jakub_w said:
im just surprised that not as many people are trying to get it started so they can get started on fixing, like you said.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Who knows? AFAIK, the order numbers aren't that bad, and all those reviewers give some feedback, too. I mean, it's only a week since the G1 is available at all, and, as said, it's not very attractive so far. Not everybody wants to spend hundreds of dollars just to provide Google with requests and code changes and T-Mobile and HTC with money...
android just seems like exactly what many of us have been looking for in wm devices, basically, a complete UI replacement endorsed/created by a large company (other than microsoft lol).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't think the UI is the really big thing about Android. You can even replace it completely, and I don't know (yet) where the limits / design guides are for applications. I just hope it doesn't get as confusing as Linux on the desktop, where even a Gnome or KDE desktop can be modified so far that it's almost as hard to switch distros as switching from Windows to MacOS...
The important things about Android are more in the basic technology, imho, like
- A stable, timeless system core (*nix is older than me, so "modern" is not quite correct - that goes for MacOS X, too, btw...)
- Seamless integration of connection management and phone functions (opposed to WM, where it still acts like a makeshift patchwork, and with every update less APIs are working...)
- Portable application framework (Java, lots of system APIs)
- Simple application installation (no "is this EXE a PC setup or the PPC executable?", "How the hell do I install a CAB file?", ...)
However, I still wonder how/if Andoid will support direct PC synchronization (for shared files, contacts, appointments, music, ...) and how fast and memory consumptive the required Java VM is... (Well, at least none of the G1 reviews I read complained about that, so it seems to be faster than .NET on WM...)

i was just playing around with android and in the dev tools or api demos theres a section called opengl es. i have a vogue and i tried these, they ran extremely smoothly. isnt this something that everyone has been saying is impossible? (specifically for getting tf3d to run on the vogue) i think this proves that software driven 3d is more than capable of handling tf3d. just a thought.

jakub_w said:
i was just playing around with android and in the dev tools or api demos theres a section called opengl es. i have a vogue and i tried these, they ran extremely smoothly. isnt this something that everyone has been saying is impossible? (specifically for getting tf3d to run on the vogue) i think this proves that software driven 3d is more than capable of handling tf3d. just a thought.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I definitely agree with you on that. Thing is though is that this is a completely different environment with a different set of drivers (and rules) which makes (for example) modifying their parameters to allow for keys normally used for certain functions in WM to be used for something completely different. Also OpenGL (ES) is all that is used on *nix OSes whether or not they run on full or embedded hardware. All that's needed is the driver for the graphics chip. Microsoft wants you to use their proprietary D3D not OpenGL (ES) hence why it was impossible to have OpenGL (ES) before. Also TF3D uses DirectX and not OpenGL ES AFAIK.
Android is great. Only thing I need is a way to get the SDcard image working and a HTC Touch Pro to port Android, Angstrom and/or OpenMoko to, I'd be set.

why would you develop software for an operating system that isn't even fully ported yet?

joel2009 said:
why would you develop software for an operating system that isn't even fully ported yet?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Weeell....
- It's Linux and Open Source (some people wouldn't touch a closed system with a stick...)
- It's nice to be prepared when you get the running system
- There is a device with that OS
- The documentation is way better than Microsoft's
- There's a good chance the API will remain compatible, so it doesn't hurt to start early (opposed to WM, where some basic features can/could only be done with device dependant or inofficial APIs, which were dropped in newer updates...)

programming ON device

Hi,
i wonder if it's possible to code right ON an android device, such as the upcomming tablets?
plz correct me if i'm wrong, but i'm dreaming of coding and compiling direct on the tablet. (on my old wm6 device i did so by using basic4ppc, but it would be great to do so without using fring.)
Is this realistic or am i simply dreaming?
thanks for any reply to my silly noob question
your's
pedro
P.S.: by the way,do you gurus think there will be things like video-editing (similar functionality to pinnacle studio/vegas) and vst support for android?

No reply at all??
PLZ boys....can JDK and eclipse be run on an android device????

The only thing I'm aware of at the moment is the project (formerly) known as "Android Scripting Environment"
http://code.google.com/p/android-scripting
Among other things, it gives you Perl
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App

Well, Eclipse is a Java application, so in theory it should be port-able onto an Android device. However, I imagine there would be so many things to fix/work-around that it just wouldn't be worth it. For example, I don't think Android has the Swing/AWT components, which Eclipse probably uses, so you'd have to rewrite all the UI display classes to use the Android libraries.
Much more realistic would be simply a syntax-highlighting text editor, which would let you write (but not compile, of course) on the go. I looked around for one of those a while ago but couldn't find one. I started writing one, but then decided that my urge to program on my phone wasn't strong enough for the amount of effort it would take to write such a program...

NEWS
i've read today good news..... basic4android (basic4ppc) announced a basic4android version (early beta) and "maybe" an on-device-programming version

infantilo said:
i've read today good news..... basic4android (basic4ppc) announced a basic4android version (early beta) and "maybe" an on-device-programming version
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hello,
it will probably be no version to program with B4A on the device. The IDE runs in conjunction with windows. Net.
Cu
Amalkotey
Basic4Android-Betatester

Steven__ said:
Well, Eclipse is a Java application, so in theory it should be port-able onto an Android device. However, I imagine there would be so many things to fix/work-around that it just wouldn't be worth it. For example, I don't think Android has the Swing/AWT components, which Eclipse probably uses, so you'd have to rewrite all the UI display classes to use the Android libraries.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
These issues are not the only issue i see...
What about javacc wouldn't this need to be ported as a java application as well?
Which i dont see how you can develop a java compiler in java if you can i'll be amazed.
we'd have to wait for the native library imports to do that from my current knowledge
Please someone correct me if im wrong

I know this thread is old, but if anyone come across this thread search for Aide in the play store.

i think AIDE is the best way to coding ON the tablet/phone!

Try AIDE It's free on Google Play.

AIDE is a good choose if you can buy premium key. I personally did and I'm satisfied. I use aide when I'm away of my PC and get an idea
Free version allows only projects with 5 or less java files. Excluding R.java and BuildConfig.java that's 3. I doubt that anyone can write anything serious with 3 java files.
Sent from my Evo 3D GSM using Tapatalk 2

pedja1 said:
AIDE is a good choose if you can buy premium key. I personally did and I'm satisfied. I use aide when I'm away of my PC and get an idea
Free version allows only projects with 5 or less java files. Excluding R.java and BuildConfig.java that's 3. I doubt that anyone can write anything serious with 3 java files.
Sent from my Evo 3D GSM using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
+1 for AIDE you can't go wrong with premium especially if your projects are big (lots of files)
AIDE also supports ssh git and dropbox sync last I checked. It also features an auto complete kinda like in eclipse.
Although I always begin my projects on a computer especially for the ui design (I'm a noob this way)
as for C there is C4droid although I'm not sure if its possible to link it with android java code.
But c4droid beats having to set up the proper toolchains if your creating a pure native application.

Sybregunne said:
+1 for AIDE you can't go wrong with premium especially if your projects are big (lots of files)
AIDE also supports ssh git and dropbox sync last I checked. It also features an auto complete kinda like in eclipse.
Although I always begin my projects on a computer especially for the ui design (I'm a noob this way)
as for C there is C4droid although I'm not sure if its possible to link it with android java code.
But c4droid beats having to set up the proper toolchains if your creating a pure native application.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
+1 for AIDE
I has AIDE+PasGUI+C4Droid on my device and I quite satisfied with it, though it's difficult to manage with interface

DoR2 said:
+1 for AIDE
I has AIDE+PasGUI+C4Droid on my device and I quite satisfied with it, though it's difficult to manage with interface
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
pasGUI - will try that now. Thanks

Is Microsoft risking too much with windows phone 8?

Yo, so I installed the windows phone 8 SDK today, only to figure out that most computers in this world will not run this SDK's emulator.
You will need in an i3 or better CPU from intel or equivalent from AMD (aka latest generation) to run the emulator.
You also have to run this emulator on windows 8 x64 (yep, it HAS to be x64, otherwise it won't work). This, by itself, asks for at least 4 GB of RAM to run the system at a decent speed, also forces you to upgrade to windows 8 (i got it for free due to msdn) and to get Visual Studio 12.
This is, in my opinion, a terrible move from microsoft.
Not everybody has CPUs that have all the requirements. In fact, not even all the newest CPUs have this requirement (Second Level Address Translation it is called). This, automatically, makes developers like me either:
get a new PC
Get a windows phone 8 device.
Luckily for me i have a fairly new laptop, which has an i3 CPU capable to run this stupid emulator.
On top of that, there comes the non-backward compatibility from wp8 to wp7.5 apps. Applications compiled for windows phone 8 SDK will not work on Windows phone 7.5, unless you make another project for 7.5, compile it as dll and reference it from your 8 app. This is kinda overkill.
Windows phone 8 will probably bring in a lot of users, but for developers, it is a blow to the head. I bet windows phone 8 submissions will be very, very low in the next 1 to 2 years.
So, is microsoft risking a bit too much with the switch from 7.5 to 8? On top of all the development slaughter, there's the non-upgradable old devices...

Good question , but it's been shockingly quiet in here. One would think that after a new launch the forum would be jumping with activity.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

vetvito said:
Good question , but it's been shockingly quiet in here. One would think that after a new launch the forum would be jumping with activity.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well, to be honest, I think XDA isn't a good place for MS/WP anymore and I guess most of them know that. Just look at the front page, not even a single article/news about the Windows (Phone) 8 launch events. It's just android. Even the forum sections for the HTC 8X/S and Samsung ATIV S are missing whereas all the new Google devices have been added shortly after their announcement. So you see, even XDAdev isn't really well after Windows Phone at all.

morpheuszg said:
Well, to be honest, I think XDA isn't a good place for MS/WP anymore ....So you see, even XDAdev isn't really well after Windows Phone at all.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
so, what forums do wp dev's hang out ?

Are there any lol? I saw about 6 new apps, and one of them (Pandora) won't be out until sometime in 2013!
Sent from my HD7 using XDA Windows Phone 7 App

MSDN forums for example or prior to launch those who were part of the developer preview program had a closed discussion forum on Microsoft Connect, die to the NDA it was not allowed to discuss the information publicly.
On the CPU requirements - yes it sucks and there are other issues with the Emulator like missing 3d acceleration die to the fact it uses HyperV which does not have that capability. Still I would not suggest for people to develop for any platform without being able to test on a real device. This will be possible even without the Emulator.
I disagree with your assumption that we won't see Apps for WP8. Devs who write software for Windows 8 also need a Windows 8 installation, so people who think of porting those Apps will most likely have the infrastructure in place already. For higher profile the costs of a development machine would not be that problematic and C++ as well as middleware support for many gaming engines will make for a lot easier porting of existing Games from other platforms.
The people for which these changes really suck are student developers lile you and me. Only my Windows tablet currently supports the Emulator (Core i5). But still it is a lot nicer then the situation with the Android Emulator in my experience. The later is running to slow for anything iseful on my Core 2 Quad Desktop so I have to use the device for debugging anyway. Additionally only the WP Emulators have Multi-Touch support so I can test those features without deploying to the device.
Concerning XDAs, it has always been more about hacking and tinkering on the system level then user software development. Given that Android due to it's Open Source nature allows for a lot more in that regard it takes no wonder that there is a lot more going on with those than witj WP. Also market share and number of devoces makes for a difference as well.

vetvito said:
Good question , but it's been shockingly quiet in here. One would think that after a new launch the forum would be jumping with activity.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
All in all WP8 announcement was not that good...
also, they didn't release the SDK for us devs in order to build nice apps ready to be distributed for new win8 devices...Making us wait for months like if winphone had killer features hidden..and then it was the same old stuff so... i'm also considering to jump the android ship...

StevieBallz said:
MSDN forums for example or prior to launch those who were part of the developer preview program had a closed discussion forum on Microsoft Connect, die to the NDA it was not allowed to discuss the information publicly.
On the CPU requirements - yes it sucks and there are other issues with the Emulator like missing 3d acceleration die to the fact it uses HyperV which does not have that capability. Still I would not suggest for people to develop for any platform without being able to test on a real device. This will be possible even without the Emulator.
I disagree with your assumption that we won't see Apps for WP8. Devs who write software for Windows 8 also need a Windows 8 installation, so people who think of porting those Apps will most likely have the infrastructure in place already. For higher profile the costs of a development machine would not be that problematic and C++ as well as middleware support for many gaming engines will make for a lot easier porting of existing Games from other platforms.
The people for which these changes really suck are student developers lile you and me. Only my Windows tablet currently supports the Emulator (Core i5). But still it is a lot nicer then the situation with the Android Emulator in my experience. The later is running to slow for anything iseful on my Core 2 Quad Desktop so I have to use the device for debugging anyway. Additionally only the WP Emulators have Multi-Touch support so I can test those features without deploying to the device.
Concerning XDAs, it has always been more about hacking and tinkering on the system level then user software development. Given that Android due to it's Open Source nature allows for a lot more in that regard it takes no wonder that there is a lot more going on with those than witj WP. Also market share and number of devoces makes for a difference as well.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ya, I saw that w8 64bit was required to develope at all, and thought wow, why would you limit developers to a brand new unproven ecosystem?
the prehighschool kids are going to be the ones with real innovation, new thinking, and the next Facebook, (I hate fb, but you get the idea) without them, what do you have? Office? really , just Office?

ohgood said:
ya, I saw that w8 64bit was required to develope at all, and thought wow, why would you limit developers to a brand new unproven ecosystem?
the prehighschool kids are going to be the ones with real innovation, new thinking, and the next Facebook, (I hate fb, but you get the idea) without them, what do you have? Office? really , just Office?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
64 bit is likely to not be the big issue here. I haven't seen to many 32 bit Windows 7 machines. The more problematic move is to lock out everyone who is not using Windows 8. Given that students have access to Windows 8, Visual Studio and the Marketplace for free through Dreamspark that does not sound as that big an issue to me.
In the end it seems they had a reason to go with Hyper-V and Windows-8 simply is the only Desktop operating system which has Hyper-V functionality. The biggest problem is that hardware that is older then 2 years does not support the needed virtualization modes.
How the ecosystem argument plays into this I don't really understand but I guess you meant: new OS that has not that big an installed base yet. Well 4 million upgrades over the last 4 days, not counting the people who bought it with new Hardware or downloaded it from MSDN or Dreamspark it seems to go big rather quickly.

The emulator is a crucial part of application development.
I don't think you want to bring in your early app in alpha stages or even earlier than that on your phone, simply because:
a) you don't have it.
b) Your code might cause damage to the phone, especially on things that use hardware components like vibrators, camera, leds and stuff like that. An unleaded exception can wreck havoc on your phone.
c) The emulator is faster.
Yes, you will eventually need a windows phone 8 device before you publish it, but you should be able to develop your apps before you even have one...
The windows 8 issue is not big. The upgrade from win7 costs like 50 bucks. It is really not that much of an effort.
The insane hardware requirements are, however, and most PCs will not have them. From intel's side, only i3, i5 and i7 processors have what they need, and Pentium dual core for sandy bridge won't...
This is the biggest issue here.

ohgood said:
so, what forums do wp dev's hang out ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i'm just a noob, but i think when the devs don't hang out here they hang out nowhere or compared to android extremely rare so that it makes no sense to spend time on...
I wish WP8 RT a good future with Dualboot Android.

Maybe someone can shed some light on this?

After reading and watching multiple demonstrations of the Ubuntu phone os. I just can't seem to find features that I can't already do on my android. The notifications drawer is pretty neat in that you can pull it down at different places, but other than that, it just seems like a lightly modded android.
Sent from a galaxy far far away.

luc.highwalker said:
After reading and watching multiple demonstrations of the Ubuntu phone os. I just can't seem to find features that I can't already do on my android. The notifications drawer is pretty neat in that you can pull it down at different places, but other than that, it just seems like a lightly modded android.
Sent from a galaxy far far away.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think for most users, they may not find value in this yet (until more apps are available and/or cheaper phones come out), but for those familiar with linux it will make a lot of sense.
I have been a linux developer for 3 years now (as a full time job) and I am just imagining all the cool stuff I can do with this device (at home and at work).
For one thing, you will likely be able to develop (native) apps on the phone itself instead of having to have a separate computer to do it. It might even be possible to develop Android apps!
It's basically a PC in your pocket so the apps will not be as limited as Android and iOS apps. There is still software out there that is not available on Android and iOS because those systems are designed for phones and tablets and don't fully support a desktop style interface. The appeal to an Ubuntu phone is that it can function as both, and you can develop software that will be interchangeable as both.

Thanks for your reply.
I'm not a developer (yet) so I can't say much on the subject. But I do know that you can develop apps directly on an Android device. There's even a Linux terminal Window.
I guess I'll just have to wait and see what people can make out of the phone. till then, I'll just stick to my beloved android
Sent from a galaxy far far away.

If you love linux, this *could* be a game changer if it's done right. As BukaKing mentioned, the ability to run native apps on the OS is a huge plus, as you would then be able to make the most of the hardware presented rather than utilising a java engine.
Customisation I am assuming will also be a huge factor - Ubuntu Desktop can be so heavily customised, to function exactly how you want it to, so I am *assuming* that Ubuntu for Phones will be similar. So, just because the OS behaves a particular way on those video's circulating, does not necessarily mean that is how it is destined to remain. Once it's out there in the wild, I would even assume people unhappy with the lack of soft buttons may find them re-appear, as gnome/unity has the ability to create custom panels.
The oportunities I think this OS presents to smartphones is amazing, but in the end it comes down to 2 things for me. Will it be completely open source? If yes, then there could be a bunch of forks/derivitives explode around the webs where teams have customised the OS the way they want it. Developing for it would be far easier, so i'd expect if popularity gets high enough, apps will appear from everywhere. And, implimentation - will it be as easy for a non-linux user to pick up and use, as it will be for a linux user? Hopefully, that answer is yes too.

According to Shuttleworth, it will be 100% opensource! I can't wait till the code is released and we can all play with this. Since it will be using an android kernel and drivers I'm hoping it won't be to hard to compile from source for my phone.

onlychevys said:
According to Shuttleworth, it will be 100% opensource! I can't wait till the code is released and we can all play with this. Since it will be using an android kernel and drivers I'm hoping it won't be to hard to compile from source for my phone.
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Click to collapse
Helllooo! This what i was waiting for....Open source! so that ports can be made for devices that cant be officially supported by ubuntu. For those who keep saying ubuntu cant on GT-$5660 just STFU! No offense but Samsung said ICS or JB cant fully run properly on gio! and look it runs almost perfectly! So a bit of tweaking ubuntu for my device and we can run this!
Sent from my GT-S5660 using xda premium

batman38102 said:
Helllooo! This what i was waiting for....Open source! so that ports can be made for devices that cant be officially supported by ubuntu. For those who keep saying ubuntu cant on GT-$5660 just STFU! No offense but Samsung said ICS or JB cant fully run properly on gio! and look it runs almost perfectly! So a bit of tweaking ubuntu for my device and we can run this!
Sent from my GT-S5660 using xda premium
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Click to collapse
:banghead: :banghead: No.. It won't work on the S5660... Ubuntu phone is not android... Have you ever wrote a program? Compiled software? The binary is compiled using the arm hard float v7 instructions, you will need to recompile the kernel, the OS and every damn app.. the native apps are made with C++ not java ... You may be able to get a running build on a arm v6 like the S5660 but you can't install 3rd party apps from the store or proprietary apps unless the developer thought about that and supports it .. Likely not, they will be natively for arm v7 hf only...
If canonical would have chosen soft float instead of hard float then it would have worked, but it will be freaking slow and laggy..
Getting JB on that device is something else, it and android apps are running of a virtual machine .. That is the good thing about managed code and virtual machines and the reason sun Microsystems invented java in the first place ...
QML and c++ is not running off a virtual machine.. Its 100% native ...
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using xda premium

I'm wondering if native C++ Apps will not only be more efficient than Java on Android but if Ubuntu can take more advantage of multi-core systems than Android does. At least I have heared that Android isn't that optimized for multi-core phones.

jscurtu said:
:banghead: :banghead: No.. It won't work on the S5660... Ubuntu phone is not android... Have you ever wrote a program? Compiled software? The binary is compiled using the arm hard float v7 instructions, you will need to recompile the kernel, the OS and every damn app..
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Click to collapse
Why does it have to be him that has to do that, some one else could do it and provide an image.
the native apps are made with C++ not java ...
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Yeah, who ever heard of making native apps in java!
The Ubuntu Phone OS equivalent to java will be HTML5.
You may be able to get a running build on a arm v6 like the S5660 but you can't install 3rd party apps from the store or proprietary apps unless the developer thought about that and supports it .. Likely not, they will be natively for arm v7 hf only...
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Click to collapse
You go from saying "No.. it won't work" to saying "You may be able to get a running build", nice!
And what proprietary apps are there right now? The only apps that I have seen are either HTML5 or the one native app (the gallery app) that Canonical made which will be open source and can be rebuilt for any device.
Also this same problem exists for Android native app (android has a lot of them), the developers have to build binaries for the different Android devices. So you can port Android to an x86 device but you will not be able to run a lot of games unless they include binaries that support it. Games built with Unity 3D are native apps, games built on Adobe Flash/Air are native apps. Native apps *can be* more efficient in performance, memory and battery than Java apps. Also C++ in the case of mobile devices is more cross platform than Java, since it can be used on both iOS and Android, and the libraries in Android Java are not available on other platforms with Java.
QML itself is not technically native, it depends on how it is used. QML is a mix of objects/widgets and javascript (similar to HTML5), but native C++ code can access QML objects/widgets through Qt.
But that said, if Canonical doesn't officially support a device I would steer clear of updates. I just spent the weekend trying to update my HP Envy from Ubuntu 10.10 to 12.10 and I had a ton of problems, and while it works now, my USB is disabled for some reason (even though internal USB devices work). This isn't the first time this has happened to me with Ubuntu updates.
I wouldn't worry about it for the Galaxy Nexus since it is an officially supported device, but for devices that are ported too by some one else, I would avoid updates coming from Canonical.

Valve is testing Steam games for Ubuntu so we could be playing some real games on our phones soon.
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getrdy said:
Valve is testing Steam games for Ubuntu so we could be playing some real games on our phones soon.
Sent from my SGH-T999 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ARM != x86 .....

blackout23 said:
ARM != x86 .....
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Click to collapse
What about those x86 based phones?
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Lesicnik1 said:
What about those x86 based phones?
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The smartphone GPU drivers and chips probably don't support OpenGL 3.0 like Steam games require.
Smartphones never had full blown OpenGL only OpenGLES (Embedded System).
Desktop PCs are still waaay more powerful than any smartphone. Any cheap Celeron CPU for 40 bucks will obliterate your Intel Atom powered smartphone.

Enough

I've been developing apps for android and windows phone for a year now, and I'm completely furious about android development. When I open visual studio to work on a game it is a joy, I know everything will be working clean, fast, just as you'd expect from the most used IDE of the platform.
But when I open eclipse it laggs for a couple of seconds (this is not about my computer, no lack of power) and greets me with tens or hundreds of problems and red crosses and exclamation marks. The xml editor usually fails to present the simplest of xml, and complex UIs let the hell loose. I've seriously spent more time cleaning and cleaning projects, googling for solutions, refreshing, closing, reimporting, changing settings and screaming at the screen than I have written code. The problem is never in my code, always something stupid like r.java not generating or some library has magically disappeared in matter of seconds. This is unacceptable! Biggest mobile platform and the dev tools(eclipse) are absolute ****ing ****. Somehow even an empty line in java code is able to produce an error after multiple cleanings. I think this should be fixed.
Are there any other IDEs or some other things that could help me with this?

There's a thread in this forum discussing IntelliJ IDEA. I've only tried it very briefly, but it was like butter compared to Eclipse, and much more familiar to me (also a Visual Studio user - for a looooooong time!)
Have a look and see what you think.
http://www.jetbrains.com/idea/
You can find the thread for that IDE here...
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2231422
I hope this helps

PDABAUS said:
I've been developing apps for android and windows phone for a year now, and I'm completely furious about android development. When I open visual studio to work on a game it is a joy, I know everything will be working clean, fast, just as you'd expect from the most used IDE of the platform.
But when I open eclipse it laggs for a couple of seconds (this is not about my computer, no lack of power) and greets me with tens or hundreds of problems and red crosses and exclamation marks. The xml editor usually fails to present the simplest of xml, and complex UIs let the hell loose. I've seriously spent more time cleaning and cleaning projects, googling for solutions, refreshing, closing, reimporting, changing settings and screaming at the screen than I have written code. The problem is never in my code, always something stupid like r.java not generating or some library has magically disappeared in matter of seconds. This is unacceptable! Biggest mobile platform and the dev tools(eclipse) are absolute ****ing ****. Somehow even an empty line in java code is able to produce an error after multiple cleanings. I think this should be fixed.
Are there any other IDEs or some other things that could help me with this?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I use Netbeans with the nbandroid extension and it is working pretty good. The only thing that is missing is a decent gui editor but the guys are working on this.

PDABAUS said:
I've been developing apps for android and windows phone for a year now, and I'm completely furious about android development. When I open visual studio to work on a game it is a joy, I know everything will be working clean, fast, just as you'd expect from the most used IDE of the platform.
But when I open eclipse it laggs for a couple of seconds (this is not about my computer, no lack of power) and greets me with tens or hundreds of problems and red crosses and exclamation marks. The xml editor usually fails to present the simplest of xml, and complex UIs let the hell loose. I've seriously spent more time cleaning and cleaning projects, googling for solutions, refreshing, closing, reimporting, changing settings and screaming at the screen than I have written code. The problem is never in my code, always something stupid like r.java not generating or some library has magically disappeared in matter of seconds. This is unacceptable! Biggest mobile platform and the dev tools(eclipse) are absolute ****ing ****. Somehow even an empty line in java code is able to produce an error after multiple cleanings. I think this should be fixed.
Are there any other IDEs or some other things that could help me with this?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think they heard you http://techcrunch.com/2013/05/15/google-launches-android-studio-a-development-tool-for-apps/ .

Oh wow, installed and I... I think I'm in love! Happy coding for 2 hours! The real test comes when I continue the project which got me hating eclipse.
But this is clean, fast, simple: pure awesome! Thanks!

PDABAUS said:
Oh wow, installed and I... I think I'm in love! Happy coding for 2 hours! The real test comes when I continue the project which got me hating eclipse.
But this is clean, fast, simple: pure awesome! Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You mean android studio or normal intellij?
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13th Dev said:
You mean android studio or normal intellij?
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Click to collapse
Android studio.
Sorry about the confusion, I tried to reply to the message which was about android studio, but it contained a link, and new members apparently cant post links? ( or that's what it said when I couldnt reply)

Okay but Don't you feel android studio is in its initial stages and not to stable. For very very early developers like me, won't it be difficult for them using android studio?
I agree with you and development for windows is way much easier with visual studio, great ide. But then I feel android is a way better platform than windows for young developers.
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13th Dev said:
Okay but Don't you feel android studio is in its initial stages and not to stable. For very very early developers like me, won't it be difficult for them using android studio?
I agree with you and development for windows is way much easier with visual studio, great ide. But then I feel android is a way better platform than windows for young developers.
Sent from my HTC Desire S using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, it's very stable for me, everything is working. Android studio is easy.

PDABAUS said:
No, it's very stable for me, everything is working. Android studio is easy.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I experienced some bugs but it is stable. And when it is doing something wrong, a restart of Android Studio solves it most times. Remember that it is just the stable IntelliJ with some extra features. IntelliJ itself is stable. The only things that contain some (not many) bugs are the additional features which you do not necesarily need for development as you can also develop with the normal IntelliJ.
However, for new users I recommend Eclipse. Coding in Android Studio is faster though because of the better code completion and because it is based on shortcuts (which you have to learn first).
A tip: If you do not know the right shortcut, press Ctrl + Shift + A and enter what you want to do.