Still waiting
for a totally obvious design featuring x86 CPU that can run desktop OS, preferably Windows, while docked and mobile phone interface overlay when not.
Samsung's shown a little more of its plans to run fully-fledged Linux desktops on its 8-series Galaxy smartmobes. Samsung teased the idea of Linux on its flagship phones in October 2017, promising that Linux would run in your hand or, if you use its DeX dock, in full desktop mode on a monitor. Now it's released the video below …
Ok forget Windows.. Has there ever been any real work done to port anything like BSD, or a proper Linux to those Atom powered Devices.
Hell it's depressing as Hell that Canonical ended up going with some no-name brand, and only sold their Phones in some British DIY Shop that traditionally doesn't sell those types of things (e.g. Phones). Thus further insuring their utter failure.
Knowing Samsung they'll make all the right noises about it coming out in some future update. That everyone will end-up hanging on their Phones for the next 6 - 8 Months for. Only to learn that this will be an exclusive feature of the Galaxy 9 Note. (And, that will be if someone in Seoul actually gives a toss about a feature, that arguably 99% of their userbase couldn't give a rats behind about.
While I don't think Samsung gives much of a toss about Linux on their phones, they're very keen on DeX because it's something that nobody else has. And I think they're also smart enough to see that the developers market is big enough to keep the proof of concept going. If they get the volumes then they can expand the DeX eco-system.
If they pull this off then Samsung will be the company that killed the company laptop.
Replacing the Company Laptop? Yep talking of a real slice of Pie in the Sky stuff here... Implying I want to use a 5lb re-education tool to hammer up a Nail to hang my Pictures on the Wall. But, in this case it would be in reverse..
Just 'cause you might be able to replace your Laptop wit a Phablet... It's probably still not entirely desirable to actually do it.
FYI - The DeX dock has a fan on it to prevent overheating the docked phone. I got one to just play around with. Turns out, for normal (non-dev) usage, it can already replace a laptop in an office setting, even without Linux mode. BUT - undocking closes apps, so re-docking doesn't go back where you started. That gets annoying when you redock after taking the phone out for a quick coffee run or bio-break. As a result, I'm back to the laptop until that gets fixed.
As far as I can tell from the reporting, it is not running Linux as a base OS, which would be the only reason for me to be interested. It appears to be running Linux in a sort of VM-alike shell, but that means it still starts from an Android foundation - the exact thing I am *not* interested in because that's building on quicksand.
I hope I'm wrong.
They had IntelliJ IDEA installed as well (icon on desktop).
Would have been nice to see it started in the video and demonstrate some editing in a bigger project with lots of Java files to see how well it runs.
Eclipse looked like snappy though for the bloated shit it is.
Those ARM SOCs are becoming pretty powerful.
I have a Samsung Z3 Tizen phone but in reality you get all the worst bits of Android and none of the good bits of a TRUE Linux. Even Android apps which it claims to run, have to be re-packaged in a special wrapper to make them run on an App Compatibility Layer which locks you in to getting everything from the Samsung Tizen store. I still haven't found a single useful app which has survived more than 3 weeks before I removed it because of bugs/unwanted annoying "features". Some apps, once installed are impossible to remove and keep insisting there is an update available, but, on clicking update report "service unavailable".
One of Samsung's justifications for having a severely locked down version of Linux is that it makes it more secure. They seem to use this supposedly heightened security as a reason for not updating any of the core parts of the OS.
I loved my old first gen nokia communicator....but when considering any device such as this ?I apply two criteria:
How does it compare on price and function to my phone and my Think Outside Bluetooth keyboard, and my circa £200 Acer S3?...and.....Under what circumstances would carry it in preference to those?
I've not bought any of the various options I've considered, yet.
I'd love something that compared with the Acer s3 at that sort of price point, but suspect I'll have to buy at least one new battery before that comes to pass.
I have like nine computers. From a phone, laptops, desktops, tablets (multiple), an Android projector computer for presentations. Who needs to use the same work computer for home? They are so cheap now a days. I watch TV on a 55 inch screen plugged into my MacMini. I do not want to use my phone for that. I have a MacBook Pro for work. I do not want to use my phone for that either. Multiple computers is fine with me. They are so cheap now a days.
While hobbyists (which include a lot of IT people) might want to tinker about with Linux on a small device, most people want to use their phone as a communications device. Linux to them is a big ho hum. But it just shows that Samsung want to pander to the IT hobbyist people, probably because lots of people go to them and say "you are a computer expert, what should I buy", "Oh Samsung because it runs Linux". But that is a silly answer.