I find as time goes on I am less-and-less excited about mobile releases. I’ve had a smartphone since the Google Nexus 1. The desktop experience is always better, and a good book is even more inviting.
Curious what other folks are feeling. A lot of these tools seem like useless frivolity.
Meanwhile, I have family who constantly get confused whether the iOS phone icon is FaceTime or the “real” phone; and I have to do multiple taps instead of one to make a FaceTime call—and Apple is busy making Liquid Glass, for what?
The old mobile OSs used to be hilariously lacking so every update was genuinely game changing. I remember getting really excited when Android Ice Cream Sandwich was adding screenshot functionality to tablets. And hearing people talk about folders getting added to iOS.
Now all the low hanging fruit is gone they are less exciting. The photogrammetry api stuff added to iOS probably took 100x the dev effort of adding folders and copy/paste, but gets far less excitement.
> A lot of these tools seem like useless frivolity.
That's me on a good day; I fuckin' hate smartphones (hardware and software-wise), lol. I have pretty much given up on a slab-style pocket computer (6-7 inch, essentially a deshittified, Samsung XCover-series smartphone on steroids, e. g. S-Pen, exchangeable batteries, audio jack, 1-2 USB-C ports, mSD card slot, lotsa memory, phone-functionality is second fiddle) or a small detachable (8-9 inch, also EMR-penabled, essentially an updated, miniaturized HP ZBook x2 G4 with Nintendo Switch-like capabilities for docking and attachments for a variety of controller options and the keyboard). :(
I got myself a lenovo duet 10" detachable second hand and put postmarketOS on it, it's got standby for days and a pen. No SD but a couple of usb-C ports a fun little Linux box!
So there are at least two of us! I'd be truly excited and willing to pay laptop-tier prices for either:
1) a bare (ala Pixel) foldable with S-pen and without large external displays to get cracked and complicate things
2) a rooted linux-computer-in-your-pocket that can be plugged into a usb-c hub and happens to have a SIM card/cell modem to work as a phone.
...but until then I just get by for years and years on whatever mid-tier phone happened to be the smallest form-factor and best-camera-for-$ at the time my last one became unusable.
The issue with Planet Computer's Linux support is the lack of it. They all rely on custom kernels using Android drivers and libhybris to function. For both the Cosmo Communicator and Gemini PDA they glue together a bootable version of Debian, tick the checkbox for "it runs Linux" and then call it a day.
Well, there's a reason I don't recommend them; my Gemini PDA, rooted on the Android side, was a nicely serviceable little writer's tool and portable terminal, until a poor battery protection implementation bricked it.
Why hate them though? They can be great for some things, like messaging, maps, shopping lists and taking pictures. I never consider them "the ultimate computer", and I wouldn't want them to be, mostly because mobile stuff can break/get lost/get stolen.
> Curious what other folks are feeling. A lot of these tools seem like useless frivolity.
Something I have long said when talking about operating systems is that I consider them tool boxes. The same kind of tool box a carpenter would have.
I don't "use" the OS per se. I use the OS to hold my tools in a manner that makes it easy for me to access them.
So, it's like a carpenter's toolbox where he carries around his saw, hammer etc. and can easily grab them when he needs them. He doesn't need to hear about Hammer v2.0 AI-edition or any of that shit!
I don't need my toolbox doing anything other than holding my tools and fucking right off out of my way!
>>> Curious what other folks are feeling. A lot of these tools seem like useless frivolity.
Personally I feel like phone OS releases need to slow down to a 2-3 year cycle and lock in on bug fixes.
My iphone 16e has some of the most glaring bugs I've seen in an iOS release in quite some time (Slow motion capture crashes the camera app unless you set it to 120fps first in settings, 240fps is broken).
I feel like we could all use a break from the update cycle for software to actually get patched and optimized.
Honestly, I'm happy my phone won't get an update. This way I won't be exposed to new bugs. I'm on Android 13 and the only thing I observed when updating from 12 was that now when I switch apps, the screen blinks for split-second, which is incredibly annoying. Functionality-wise, there's very little that can be improved anyway. It's mostly just fiddling with details of the UI here and there.
I think we grew up with technology advancing rapidly and expensive tech from previous year being outdated, but now we came back to baseline where technological advancement is just small fixes stretched over a long period of time.
They are not that old and we still don’t have proper dashboard integration. I would like directions there rather than on the central console.
Plus there has been nice features trickling to user from release to release.
I like that you can easily use your phone as a clock with a magnetic dock. Translation and text selection in screenshot were nice. Search from picture highlight is great.
Phone screening is nice. Hold for me is nice too. Chat apps have improved by leaps and bounds since Covid. Productivity is now okay-ish at least for joining meetings and reading things.
As someone that plug his phone to a dock from time to time, convergence is nearly there but some things still need polish. I really wish we could get a better version of Office for example.
It’s not ground breaking but meaningful incremental improvements have been there.
>>> we still don’t have proper dashboard integration
The last place I want mobile devs to get their buggy little code is my dashboard. Hell I don't even really want a screen there, but I make an exception for tiny info screens if they come with real gauges on the side. That same shitty little screen currently shows a directional arrow and mile/feet till the next turn passed to it by Carplay/Android Auto. Thanks Ford for getting one small thing right with my E-transit, shitty massive touchscreen radio/AC controls non-withstanding.
Android 12 made it possible to have unattended updates possible on fdroid. I sincerely will not recommend an Android version less than 12 at this point.
At some point, we will have something similar on a newer version of Android that we will want and that we can't have with an older version. I don't know what it is yet but i am sure there will be something at some point.
Curious what other folks are feeling. A lot of these tools seem like useless frivolity.
Meanwhile, I have family who constantly get confused whether the iOS phone icon is FaceTime or the “real” phone; and I have to do multiple taps instead of one to make a FaceTime call—and Apple is busy making Liquid Glass, for what?