I always wanted a developer's N950 back in the day. Are the offerings from Fxtec and Planet Computers not good enough for you today?
The PinePhone Pro is back in stock, and I'm tempted to get excited about Linux smartphones again.
The Nokia N900 was the pinnacle in smartphone Linux, not because it was an open source operating system (it wasn't), and not because it spawned off so many mobile open source operating systems independent from $oogle, but purely because it had a fantastic keyboard.
That keyboard would slide out smoothly from the back of the phone, click into position, and though it looked ultra-compact, you could hammer out entire essays on that tiny thing using just your thumbs without needing to look at the screen. Hell, towards the end I was even using the *edges of my thumbs* to reach specific letters it was that smooth of an experience.
When Nokia got "Elop'd" by micro$oft, a few of the original devs who had ported a lot of Linux codebase into ARM (at the time I think not many libraries would build for arm cpus) forked off and started their own company, Jolla.
Jolla released their Sailfish phone, which was for the most part open source barring the UI which was (weirdly?) closed. This phone was sadly aimed at a general audience, so a hardware keyboard was not built with it, however there was a hobby project of one guy who had a magnetic click-on extension for a 3D printed keyboard.
It was kludgy, the keys were super sticky and there was none of that fluidity that the N900 keyboard had. I eventually shelved the phone, despite it being a pretty good phone, and went with an old android (LineageOS) phone as my daily driver.
The PinePhone was released, but the specs were so underwhelming that I saw no need to switch over to it from my current android.
The PinePhone Pro was then released, and the hardware looked decent. My ears pricked up. The RAM was a bit lower than I'd hoped (my current phone has 6 GB) but maybe that wasn't such a problem, since only android phones have this tendency to pre-allocate large amounts of compressible ram (zram) even when the phone is idle.
The cherry on top is that the PinePhone devs were aware of the reputation of N900 keyboard and 2 years ago were genuinely thinking of making one for the PinePhone that would follow a similar form. Sadly, they changed their minds, and instead implemented a larger keyboard that one can most likely sit on a desk to type with, instead of typing from your hands.
This is the closest that I'm going to get to a true successor of the N900 I think, and maybe I should just swallow my expectations and try the phone, and hopefully the merits of the phone itself (multiple OS's on decent pocket hardware) outweighs the one feature that I feel is still missing.
I always wanted a developer's N950 back in the day. Are the offerings from Fxtec and Planet Computers not good enough for you today?
Wow, good shout. The Fxtec pro is exactly what I want (though sadly sold out).
The Pinephone guys seem to be dead against using LineageOS on their devices since they see it as "enabling Google" still, which I kind of understand.... though at the same time I still want to have the choice of a stable OS on their smartphone.
Thanks for this recommendation!
I use my phone (ancient Motorola G5s (I think) associated with "Republic Wireless"), oh, prolly something like 99% to play "spider solitaire"....
Semi funny - and almost related - story:
Just a couple nights ago I started running a minimalism fever, leading to deleting apps off the phone right and left, and unbeknowst to me managed to delete whatever was providing the phone's keyboard... didn't realize it until the next morning at work, leading to degrees of hysteria to figure out what of many keyboard providing/related apps may have delivered whatever the OS, because for a while there the only way I could enter text on the fucker was via whatever Google app provides voice to text... and thankfully it's possible to install play store apps from browser tabs, because I couldn't use the play store app at all anymore without a keyboard... ay yi yi....
It actually felt like cruel "reaping what a dumbass sows" punishment. Without it, any app/field needing text input led to some kind of transparent screen overlay showing just the word 'Penti'. :-)
I apparently needed some "penti chorded" keyboard, but installing the one app with that in its name didn't do the trick (even after reboot)... so I left that installed, fucked with some Microsoft "Swiftkey" app.. and I think one more.. and suddenly things were back to how they were.
But, you know... I'm just so fucking tired of being pseudo-chained to such a device. I've been a typist since high school (graduated - brace yourselves - 1979), so to me even an improvement over hunt/peck like "swyping" feels rather "happy horseshit" - and, yes, that *does* imply I detest text messaging. Not a fan of voice to text either, as words are invariably wrong, and having to proofread for and correct those fuckups still feels let's... call... it... "very Fisher-Price"....
I find these devices very empowering if used constructively
If its just for web browsing, then yes - there are definitely better things you could do with your time - but if you use to learn things, to communicate with your immediate neighbours (who might not speak the same language), to read books (z-lib is fantastic...), to practice learning drills (anki is amazing), I can't help but feel that these devices are a marvel to behold, albeit only when they are devoid of all bloat or spyware (which is a hard thing to accomplish in this day and age)
to read books (z-lib is fantastic...)z-lib
Oooh!
to practice learning drills (anki is amazing)Anki
Ahhh!
I can't help but feel that these devices are a marvel to
behold, albeit only when they are devoid of all bloat or
spyware (which is a hard thing to accomplish in this day
and age)
Ditto for humans. ;-)
i'm starting to feel like a chump for backing the librem 5 instead of going for a pinephone. i still have no idea when mine will arrive, 3.5 years later.
It's people like you who made the Librem 5 USA possible though. Maybe I'm not one to talk as a DragonBox Pyra hardliner.
I like using my desktop as much as possible.
My phone should be a utility more so than a convenient and comfortable entertainment device. It's very good at the latter though much to my attention span's demise.
To be a truly useful device on the go, it *must* run an AOSP (I use Graphene OS now) so as to be compatible with
Things like these can't be done on a "dumb" phone unfortunately, so I'm stuck using a smart phone which comes with the unfortunate side effect of also having a wealth of distraction at my finger tips.
I'd like to try using a phone as a computer hooked up to a monitor someday, but that day is not today.
i have a lightphone that i really want to use but i can't seem to get any cellular network to support it properly. it's tiny, with an eink display. it does: voice, sms, podcasts, gps navigation, and lte hotspot. the touch keyboard is just enough to type in an address or a query or a quick response. the battery lasts weeks. it's perfect for me because i hate to use my phone and i don't want to use it more than necessary. i've usually got my laptop with me anyway, so my phone is just for things my laptop can't do.
at&t don't seem to offer compatible sim cards. verizon insists it's a "wearable" and won't give me a full cellular plan. on the wearable plan, sms doesn't work.
Yeah, I don't think I could ever truly "degoogle" myself, as I have banking/travel apps dependent on the GSF, as well as whatsapp which my family continues to insist on using.
So what I do is I have an old phone handed to me from my mother, running LineageOS with some microg apps, loaded with the above apps so that I'm not disconnected from the world. That phone lies on a shelf and never leaves the house. I just check on it from time to time.
Then I have my daily phone, this is completely just LineageOS + F-droid apps, no GSF, no tracking (afaik). I love this phone, it has my Anki, Element, Orgzly, Syncthing, PianoOli, OSMand, and other apps I love. I take this phone everywhere, such is my trust in it.
But it *is* a google phone still, it *does* still phone home to base, as do all phones based on the AOSP. That's why I'm trying to move away from it. I will likely lose the mentioned apps in the process, but maybe there are alternatives on the openapp store that are decent-enough alternatives.
As far as I'm aware, you can still emulate beloved GSF-free android apps on the pinephone with Anbox, though I've heard its super slow. Nonetheless, maybe its usable enough.