Re: My solution (was: Car Charger?)
The problem I had was that the FR has it's buttons and USB port at the bottom and the holder comes designed to hold the mobile at the bottom ;) It has two pieces: One that attaches to the car, and the other which holds the mobile. I just flipped the whole thing over, so it holds the FR at the top. But then with the vibrations it would come off so I just glued the two pieces together. It would be nice to ask X11 to rotate everything 180 degrees. Then the top of the Openmoko would become the bottom. Sounds like a good application of the accelerometer to me. md -- Jon maddog Hall Executive Director Linux International(R) email: mad...@li.org 80 Amherst St. Voice: +1.603.672.4557 Amherst, N.H. 03031-3032 U.S.A. WWW: http://www.li.org Board Member: Uniforum Association Board Member Emeritus: USENIX Association (2000-2006) (R)Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds in several countries. (R)Linux International is a registered trademark in the USA used pursuant to a license from Linux Mark Institute, authorized licensor of Linus Torvalds, owner of the Linux trademark on a worldwide basis (R)UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open Group in the USA and other countries. ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: microsoft patent with idea's from this list
Incredible. If I was the person that submitted this patent application, I would have done it under a false name, simply because I would have been ashamed. A great example of Patent System abuse. md -- Jon maddog Hall Executive Director Linux International(R) email: mad...@li.org 80 Amherst St. Voice: +1.603.672.4557 Amherst, N.H. 03031-3032 U.S.A. WWW: http://www.li.org Board Member: Uniforum Association Board Member Emeritus: USENIX Association (2000-2006) (R)Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds in several countries. (R)Linux International is a registered trademark in the USA used pursuant to a license from Linux Mark Institute, authorized licensor of Linus Torvalds, owner of the Linux trademark on a worldwide basis (R)UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open Group in the USA and other countries. ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: microsoft patent with idea's from this list
one or more means that even if prior art exists, it can still be patented. This is different from intellectual property where anteriority prevent copyright. (at least in france) I think the issue here is in your word it. If it is the concept of a docking station, then there is prior art and that concept can not be patented. If it is the concept of automatic detection and configuration, there is plenty of prior art for that, and unless they have come up with something completely novel, then that would be thrown out also. At a cursory glance, I could not see anything that I considered novel. The problem with a patent like this one is that the patent itself is so broad MS would try to apply it to everything if it were granted. A daughter card for a motherboard could conceivably fit under this patent. md -- Jon maddog Hall Executive Director Linux International(R) email: mad...@li.org 80 Amherst St. Voice: +1.603.672.4557 Amherst, N.H. 03031-3032 U.S.A. WWW: http://www.li.org Board Member: Uniforum Association Board Member Emeritus: USENIX Association (2000-2006) (R)Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds in several countries. (R)Linux International is a registered trademark in the USA used pursuant to a license from Linux Mark Institute, authorized licensor of Linus Torvalds, owner of the Linux trademark on a worldwide basis (R)UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open Group in the USA and other countries. ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Linux International and Openmoko
Hello, I understand that there has been a discussion on this list about having a foundation that would represent the community of Openmoko. Fifteen years ago Linux International was created to provide services for the Linux community. It was started as a vendor organization, at a time when there were not many vendors interested in Linux. We handled a lot of legal and business issues for Linux: o Protected the Linux Trademark from people that would kidnap it for various reasons o Helped to start two certification organizations (we funded some of the original testing work for LPI certification) o Helped to start the Linux Standard Base project, which became the Free Standards Group o Helped to form what became Linuxworld o Helped many local user groups start local events, most notably the Atlanta LinuxFest and the Ohio LinuxFest We tended to split off the groups we formed, afraid that one vendor organization would provide too much power in a centralized organization. For various reasons as larger companies started to show interest in Linux, our membership went to form OSDL, which now is the Linux Foundation. Linux International as an organization has been dormant for about five years. I have still been spreading the word about Free Software at conferences, through magazine articles and media interviews. Recently I came up with the idea of reforming Linux International into an end user organization, with the concept that no company could join as a member, nor sit on the board of directors as a member. Only individual end users could hold membership, vote, etc. Of course almost everybody is an end user of some type of software, so the membership would be quite open. I have been working to change the charter of LI to reflect this. Recently I started another project, not a phone, but otherwise similar in its needs to Openmoko. This other project will have a community, be completely open, and needs an umbrella organization to help with legal work, etc. I intend on forming a sub-group of LI for this project. I could offer the same to Openmoko, to be a sub-group of LI. Linux International is already a legal entity. We are a not-for-profit in the state of New Hampshire, U.S.A. There are reasons why LI is a not-for-profit instead of a non-profit (501c3 or 501c6) which have to do with ease of applying revenues, etc. Nothing stops LI from becoming a 501c6 (501c3 is very restrictive), and nothing would stop the sub-group of Openmoko from becoming a non-profit, if that is desired. Likewise the plans for LI are to have country chapters, with separate boards for each country chapter. This was planned way before the current issue with Openmoko, but you could take advantage of the planned structure if you wish. LI would solicit sponsorships to help fund its work which could come from companies, but again the voting membership would be from individuals only. The things that LI does would be Open to all. We do plan on having some things we charge for, to cover costs. If the Openmoko community is interested in pursuing this, I would be happy to discuss LI's plans further with you, and how Openmoko could fit into this. Warmest regards, Jon maddog Hall -- Jon maddog Hall Executive Director Linux International(R) email: mad...@li.org 80 Amherst St. Voice: +1.603.672.4557 Amherst, N.H. 03031-3032 U.S.A. Cell: +1.603.943. WWW: http://www.li.org Board Member: Uniforum Association Board Member Emeritus: USENIX Association (2000-2006) (R)Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds in several countries. (R)Linux International is a registered trademark in the USA used pursuant to a license from Linux Mark Institute, authorized licensor of Linus Torvalds, owner of the Linux trademark on a worldwide basis (R)UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open Group in the USA and other countries. ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: how dangerous Freerunner could be?
Hello, koolu.com wrongly sent North American variant of devices to our European country in a pack. I contacted Elaine Turner in our sales department about this, and she told me that the only issue she had ever known about was a person who ordered the units to be delivered to the United States as 850/1800/1900 phones, and then had the units shipped to Europe. When they contacted us to complain that they were not 900/1800/1900, she showed them the order form where they had specified 850/1800/1900. If this is not the case with your order, and if Koolu made a mistake with the order, please send email to sa...@koolu.com and I am sure that Elaine will straighten it out. Otherwise you should have said I wrongly ordered the North American variant... Warmest regards, maddog ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: how dangerous Freerunner could be?
Nikita, This was caused by mistake by pregrad.net service we used, not by our side. But due to quite hard import process (it lasted for months), it was next to impossible to recover :(. I am sorry for your issue, but unless the mistake was caused by Koolu itself, I do not know that Koolu can address it. However, you might consider trading your FreeRunner with someone else on the list. People move, and someone who bought a FreeRunner in Europe may have moved to the United States and would be willing to trade you to get one that is 850. If you are going to DebConf, this might be a good place to do a swap. 900s work fine in the USA (for the most part), but we have the same issues as you dorural areas tend to use 850. md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
The University of São Paulo's intent to join Openmoko development
Dear Openmoko Community, In light of the refocusing of Sean's company on consumer items, there has been a perceived vacuum created in the Openmoko community's efforts to create next-generation open cellular smart phones. I happened to be working with Dr. Marcelo Zuffo, a full professor and the head of the Laboratory for Integrated Systems at the University of São Paulo, Brazil, on an unrelated project. I asked Dr. Zuffo if the university would be willing to join the Openmoko community and to provide critical resources to the task at hand. I subsequently have met with Dr. Zuffo several times on this matter, have seen his facilities (which include a very modern and state-of-the-art SMT line) and have discussed the goals of the community to design and prototype a completely open design for a cellular phone. Dr. Zuffo and the university understand your issues, understand free and open source software and hardware and are willing to assist the community with this project. I might add that the university can bring several new capabilities to the community: First of all, Dr. Zuffo has discussed the Openmoko project with the Minister of Telecommunications of Brazil, and the Minister is very enthusiastic about the concept. Having the support of the government of the twelfth largest economy behind the project might really help us with various negotiations with vendors. Secondly the University has been working on several aspects of telecommunications for a long time, and therefore has expertise in telephonic security and codecs (among other things) that could be of use to the Openmoko community. Third, the university has the ability and expertise to design new integrated circuits. Recently they designed a a range of analog-digital chips. Therefore the possibility of developing, manufacturing and freely licensing new chips to help reduce the cost of the phone is possible. Forth, while the facilities I mentioned are capable of producing up to 10,000 units at the rate of one circuit board every 30 seconds, the purpose of the facilities is research, developing and support projects that can lead innovation, the lab's charter does not allow them to manufacture more units then the 10,000 because that would be commercial production. Therefore the university has a goal of freely licensing the design to companies for manufacture. Fifth, the university would be happy to host the mailing lists and forums of the Openmoko project. If some of the software projects need hosting and can not find hosting services other places, the university will consider acting as a primary hosting facility for these projects. Sixth, personally I would like to see this concept extended, of inviting more universities and their facilities to help with this project world-wide. I hope that the leadership of the University of Sao Paulo will help create the structure and inspiration for this to happen. Finally, the university has a non-profit legal entity, LSITEC, which can easily do the type of paperwork that Sean's company did (NDAs, certification) so the community can leverage off that. I know that there will be a lot of questions and considerations to take before the community is comfortable with this relationship. Dr. Zuffo has asked that I help coordinate the joining together of the university with the community, and in the interest of seeing Openmoko continue to do the fine work started by Sean and all of you, I will be glad to help in this capacity. I am monitoring the community mailing list, and people are also welcome to email me directly (mad...@li.org) with questions that you do not (for any reason) wish to post to the list. A copy of Dr. Zuffo's letter of intent is below. I have the original PDF if anyone would like to see it, but it was too big to make it through the community's standards on mailing lists unmoderated, and I thought you might like to see this as soon as possible. Warmest regards, Jon maddog Hall President, Linux International CTO of Koolu, Inc. == São Paulo, 8th July 2009, Mr. Jon Maddog Hall The Executive Director Linux International. Dear Mr. Hall, according our conversation LSI-USP the Laboratory for Integrated Systems at the University of São Paulo, Brazil, is interested in hosting the OpenMoko Community to design innovative cell phone designs. We would like to offer the community the following facilities: ‐ State-of-art facilities for SMT (Surface Mounting Technology) prototyping of complex electronics boards; ‐ State-of-art facilities and expertise for design HW and SW in telephony and communications; ‐ Expertise in testing and certification; ‐ A new building located at a Center position at USP São Paulo, to host community meetings, as well as computational infrastructure for email , WEB servers and project databases. -LSI has a long term expertise in designing complex electronics
Re: The University of São Paulo's intent to join Openmoko development
David, I would appreciate the translation. Perhaps you can put those on your web site. As to the other universities, let's see what model we can create with USP, keeping the other universities in mind, then we can extend that. I do believe that growing the community through university involvement is important. md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: The University of São Paulo's intent to join Openmoko development
If it works out - the free phone will live on - and grow! I will say that I have been saddened and angered lately (and people who have seen my anger in the past know what that is) about the questions of is the FreeRunner dead. I do not blame the people who asked the question, just the fact that the question was even considered. Let me tell you that even if (for some mysterious reason) that the University of São Paulo (USP) does not work out, I have at least two other plans that could be invoked. Warmest regards, md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: The University of São Paulo's intent to join Openmoko development
Brenda, Brenda Wang wrote: +1 It's really great to hear this. In Taiwan, Tsing Hua university also has a OPENlab. I would like to work with the community to engage various universities, but as I have mentioned before, with limited resources and a press to get the Openmoko program stable and moving forward again, I think we need to do this systematically and directly. In the meantime, do you have a contact name for the OPENlab at Tsing Hua University? Warmest regards, maddog ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: The University of São Paulo's intent to join Openmoko development
Harry, Nice to hear good news from maddog, but I am curious how many Freerunner that Koolu will buy from Openmoko? I have no idea what this has to do with the conversation, other than Koolu (of course) having a business interest in seeing that the Openmoko is successful as a project. I do not think that Koolu being a for-profit company is any secret, and I was careful to acknowledge my Koolu contacts. How many phones that Koolu buys to distribute is based on Koolu's business plan, distribution models, software Koolu chooses to support and other business considerations of Koolu. Do we want the Openmoko project to be successful? Stellar? Something that people talk about in the news and on the street? Absolutely, and without hesitation. From my conversations with Dr. Zuffo I can promise you that the designs coming this liaison will continue to follow the philosophy of the Openmoko community and will be equally available to all manufacturing agents that wish to participate. The factor that the university can only produce 10,000 units, and *has* to license out the design to have more produced was a *BIG* factor in this path. It forces the university (and the project) to treat manufacturers equally. My other two plans did not guarantee this equality, and therefore were less desirable. Warmest regards, md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: The University of São Paulo's intent to join Openmoko development
John, I made some contact with Openmoko regarding joining their Openlab programme a while back now and need to follow that up. We have created an MSc in Network and Mobile Computing which has a module designed to specifically use Openmoko. The MSc starts this September so I am very interested to share ideas and help spread the love. Sounds goodand the university's program to use Openmoko in the MSc sounds great. Are you then the contact for Openlab? Can you speak for them? One of the issues of lining up USP was to get to the right people (Dr. Zuffo) who went to the right people (the administration of USP), who influenced the right people (the Minister of Communications) who then let it all trickle back down again, making Dr. Zuffo's job a lot easier. I admit to talking this over with a few community members ahead of time to get their initial reactions, but I did not want to raise people's hopes before I had confirmation from the university. There were many reasons why I considered the University of São Paulo: The university is the largest in Brazil (86,000 students, 12,000 PhD candidates). It is where I saw my first Linux Beowulf supercomputer, in 1996. They consistently win awards at the supercomputing event held every year. http://www.usp.br/internacional/home.php?idioma=en I can not stress enough that the building that Dr. Zuffo talks about is rather large and brand new, and that even way before the switch in strategy of Sean's company (just about a year ago) I had discussed the Openmoko phone with various members of the faculty: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9dVch2nSuBA I do not want to be perceived as shoving this down your throats. This is the community's project. I am only trying to help. Warmest regards, md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: why openmoko is so slow? Is it a joke?
Hello mobiphil, They found a very cheap solution, they sold the devices for lot of money, practically they fooled lot of people. I can imagine the company manager behind smiling about all the complain emails and naive users still hoping their freerunner will display nicely one day. Having worked in corporate management for a system vendor for sixteen years and being familiar with the costs of bringing a hardware and software platform to market, I doubt that the company manager of Openmoko was smiling about this project. While I have not seen the books of Openmoko.com, I doubt that the company made any real money in working with the Openmoko community, and may have lost money. This project was, and is, about an Open Phone, one designed by a community of people. The community made a decision about the Glamo chip. In retrospect it does not seem to have been a good one. and use those phones as reference...Again, M800 has keyboard, very usefull for a linux phone. Only drawback, it has only 64megs memory, but better have less applications running smoother, than several slower... So ... whatsoever would be the device... Stating this you show that you completely misunderstood the goals of the Openmoko project. Porting the Linux kernel and having the upper levels of software interface available on a phone designed and manufactured by Samsung is completely different than having software running on hardware platform that is completely community driven, open in design and manufacturing specification, changeable and freely licensable to many manufacturers. As to the final performance of the FreeRunner, I am not sure that any of us have seen the final performance. My experience in the past has been that tweaks to the kernel code and libraries often get 3-10% performance boost in the final days of profiling and tuning. But this is typically done after basic functionality is obtained. I am sorry that you paid your $400. to join the project. Perhaps you can sell your phone to someone who understands and believes in the Openmoko project and recover some of your money. As for myself, I will continue to push for the vision of the Openmoko project. Sincerely, maddog ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
RE: The University of São Paulo's intent to join Openmoko development
Brenda, I am sorry to make you guys uncomfortable. While Paul was right about the convention, and following convention may make it easier to read your email in the future, I (for one) was able to determine what you meant. I am really sorry for that. If that is the worst thing you ever do, you will certainly have a wonderful life. Thank you for the email. Warmest regards, maddog ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: community Digest, Vol 140, Issue 8
Christoph, Thank you for taking the time to write. My answers are in-lined below. I am curious how many Freerunner that Koolu will buy from Openmoko? I have no idea what this has to do with the conversation You are working with the company Koolu. This could be in conflict with the university project you mention Yes, I am the CTO of Koolu. Yes, Koolu has a commercial interest in the FreeRunner phone. I have been very up-front about that. I am also one of the very first people who understood that the Linux kernel, with the addition of other Free and Open Source Software, would have a commercial value. My involvement with Linux allowed Linus Torvalds to create a 64-bit kernel eleven years before Microsoft had a 64-bit offering. Did Digital Equipment sell a lot of Alpha systems with Linux on it? Yes. Did the Free Software community benefit from that? In my humble opinion, yes. Later I headed up a vendor organization called Linux International. We formed certification groups, standards groups (The Linux Standard Base, also known as LSB was started and funded by LI in the beginning), and protected the Linux trademark so everyone could use it freely. I am not intending on running the Openmoko project. Quite the opposite. I am happy to use my contacts to facilitate it, and will be happy to act as an advisor, but I want the community to step up and run it. This will take quite a bit more work from the community to do this. (I personnaly do not believe in the sucess of it, I sold a lot GTA02 to a lot universities all over Europe, they never come back with any further big interest). Perhaps the lack of interest you saw was because the universities saw this only as a platform for their own use, as opposed to helping with the actual construction itself. However, the University of Sao Paulo is an established university in Brazil, and has started a program to do such projects as this. They have started a non-profit as I have mentioned that could help with legal and technical issues. As I said, Dr. Zuffo and I had been working on another project, and I saw an opportunity for the University to supply some of the mechanisms that Openmoko needs to continue as a community project. Besides, last year Koolu offered me 270 units Freerunner to buy, which they did not really had in stock. I made prepayment to their partner Truebox and never received full refund from them until today. I am the CTO of Koolu, and as such I do not deal in the day-to-day ordering and sales of systems. I have no idea about this order. I have just sent some email to our sales manager asking them to comment on this. Likewise while Truebox is a partner of ours, they are their own company. I am not sure what the issues are behind their order with you. In any case, the issues you have with Truebox, Koolu or even me still do not have any bearing on this potential partnership of the University and the Openmoko project. I suggest you use your energy to solve MP3-patent licence issue, the Openmoko sword of Damocles. Thank you for your suggestion. I am aware of the mp3-patent issues, and I have been speaking out against software patents for 20 years at this point. The only reason why I have not been speaking out longer is that software patents were not perceived as an issue before that. I have written articles about them, and talked to governments about the evils of software patents. I just returned from a conference of 4000 (mostly) high school and college students in Colombia where I ran a contest requiring them to put the output of their submissions in Ogg Theora format, licensed under Creative Commons. Most of them had never heard of Creative Commons, nor knew about the multi-media tools available in Free Software, nor knew about the issues of mp3 and mp4 codecs until they started to work on the contest. Now they do. I buy only players that play Ogg format. All of my music (all 400+ properly purchased CDs) have been stored on my players in Ogg Vorbis format. Unfortunately software patents are a fact of life in some jurisdictions. As I am guilty of being a pragmatist, I pick the battles that I can win, and compromise from time to time. Koolu supports the use of open formats and open codecs. But we also recognize that there is inertia in the world, and in order to have a useful phone we will need to support patent-bearing codecs. As a company we would hope to make this as painless as possible for all of the software stacks, in every jurisdiction. However, none of this has any real bearing on the university offer. If you have some real issues, please let me know. Christoph Warmest regards, maddog ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: The University of São Paulo's intent to join Openmoko development
Dave, Hi Maddog, [added cc to gta02-core list] Thanks for looking into this - it certainly sounds like an amazing opportunity, almost too good to be true - what's the catch! :-) I hope that you will find there is no catch. If you do think there is a catch, please tell me. Do you know how Dr Zuffo sees the universities involvement with, and relationship to the rest of the community - i.e. do they seem themselves driving the projects, becoming 'sponsors', or as contributing members of the wider community? I will copy Dr. Zuffo on this, but I will also give here my perception of where the University fits in. Dr. Zuffo's LSI organization has been quite active in the past couple of years in designing set-top boxes for over-the-air broadcast digital TV, different types of solar-powered WiFi routers and other electronic devices. He showed me quite a few of these when I have visited him in the past. From this he formulated the idea of having the LSI organization formalized, and has been finishing up the creation of his state-of-the-art facility, including an SMT line that mirrors the one used by a large cellular telephone handset company who will go un-named at this point. Trust me, the cellular telephone company has nothing to do with this project, and the only reason I mention them at all is to allow you to know that the SMT line is eminently capable of doing this type of work. I might also add that Dr. Zuffo's set-top box used the ARM architecture, so he and his students are very knowledgeable about it. His group also has knowledge about Intel's Atom processors and other chip sets. Many months ago I met Dr. Zuffo, showed him the GTA02 and mentioned to him the work the community has been doing. I believe he bought two phones from iSolve, Koolu's Brazilian distributor, to do additional software work. Recently, when Sean's company changed direction, I approached Dr. Zuffo to see if the university would be willing to host the project. I certainly see them joining as community members, and I think that Dr. Zuffo might encourage some of his students and professors to join our ranks even outside of this arrangement. I certainly see the university as sponsors of the project, in the fact that it does cost money to run such an SMT line, to do some of the legal work, etc. I would like to find a way to help compensate them for this work, to make the project truly self-sustaining. Dr. Zuffo and I have discussed government grants and other funding ideas. Please see below. But in the end, I would like to see the community drive the project, and from my conversations with him, I think that Dr. Zuffo is on this page too. However, I will warn you that he is serious about this, and will expect capable leadership. From my experience with FOSS groups, I believe that that the community is capable of giving this leadership. From my point of view, it sounds like they've got a lot to offer the projects (both in expertise and facilities), and I think our community would be stronger with them as members. I'm assuming from your messages below that (initially at least) they are happy participating in the kicad / CC-SA licensed community process gta02-core has adopted so far? While I have not discussed these issues with him in depth, I think he would embrace the use of kicad and other FOSS tools. The University of Sao Paulo has had a leadership position in Free Software use. As to CC-SA, as I mentioned above, I would like to see the project self-sustaining. Under Openmoko there were a series of things that were paid for by Sean's sponsoring company, and when they shifted direction things started to get a bit dicey. With regards to my other project with the professor, we have discussed a model where the design will be fully open, designed openly, and licensable by manufacturing companies. However, as the project moves from prototype and pilot to full production, the design has to move to manufacturing companies who would pay a royalty of 1-2 dollars (probably with a cap on total amount) for the design. This would go back into the design process at the University. Small quantities (for hobbyist, researcher and universities) would be licensed gratis. By small, I am probably talking 1000-2000 units, with other licensing available for special cases. In order to fund the Openmoko project, I would like to suggest that *all* the things that Openmoko made open *up to this time*: o circuit design o case design o circuit board layout o testing issues. o plans for future, etc. be completely open and published as before. But (for example) the gerbers be licensed with a small royalty (1-2 dollars per phone, with a cap of 500,000 to 1,000,000 USD) only if the party will make *over* 5,000-10,000 phones. This way universities, small companies, etc. can get started, but if the producers start to make and sell large numbers of phones, the university will make some money in royalties to
Re: community Digest, Vol 140, Issue 8
Mr. Pulster, As I promised, I have looked into your issue on your order with our sales department. Again, I know only what I am told by them. The issue with the money from you was that you and Truebox made a deal for the purchase of phones in either Euros or Pounds Sterling, Koolu is not sure which currency was used. Koolu had insisted that the transaction be in USD from beginning to end, but this was not followed. You had placed the order and half way through the transaction requested a delivery date that could not be met by Koolu due to a shipping delay from OpenMoko. Koolu believes the issue arose when Truebox refunded the money and the exchange rate had dropped. Koolu did not receive any of this money either from Truebox or you as the purchase did not go through. At that time Koolu was placing the order through Truebox as you specified, so the order would be shipped through the UK to avoid additional taxes. Koolu did not claim that the shipment was already in the UK. As with the first order Truebox placed it as being shipped to the UK from OpenMoko and then forwarded to you. Pre-payment of the orders is something that was business practice of Openmoko, requiring pre-payment of the orders by most resellers and distributors. Changes in International exchange rates also occur. I am sorry that you apparently got caught in the exchange rate shift, but from my viewpoint this was not Koolu's fault, and is a cost of doing business. Your viewpoint may be different. On the other hand, as I said before, from my perspective this has nothing to do with the University of Sao Paulo and the Openmoko project. Regards, Jon maddog Hall ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: The University of São Paulo's intent to join Openmoko development
Levy, and would like to know if is something that I could do to participate on this new effort opened by you. First I want to say that I do not consider this a new effort, but a continuation of the effort that the Openmoko community started. If I opened something, it is only a door to help the community move forward. This, by the way, is one of the things I do, and I have done it many, many times before. I think we need to give the community time to absorb the proposal, to comment on it, and to satisfy the concerns and issues that may be brought up. In the end I hope that people will see this change as being a positive one, and the project will be more open than ever. For right now, please continue to work with the Openmoko community on moving forward. There is a lot of work to do in getting the various software stacks onto the phone and stable. There is also a lot to do in moving the hardware documentation forward, as well as adapting the documentation of the software to the actual hardware itself. Turning in well-documented bug reports on the software will also help, as well as promoting the Openmoko project inside your own university, getting them to understand the true value of the project. This will move the Openmoko project forward, even if a match with the University is not accomplished for some reason. Warmest regards, maddog ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: The University of São Paulo's intent to join Openmoko development
Michal, Could you clarify a bit what exactly is the goal of this effort? Hmmm, I wrote a lot before I realized that you probably meant by this effort the effort of having the university join the Openmoko project, but originally I took it as the greater effort of bringing out an Open Phone that people could use and extend and wrote a lot on that topic, so please bear with me: I can only give my impressions of the Openmoko project, where it is and what I think the community desires from it. I note that I have already answered one person who seemed to think that putting the software stacks on a phone from Samsung was a better use of time and energy than designing open hardware, so apparently there are (as in any large community) many different ideas and goals. Please bear with me. Some of these goals may be personal to me, and not shared by others. Is it just designing a line of open hardware mobile devices (that's what it sounds like), and selling them to manufacturers? I have always hated the word just, particularly when it is applied to a person I am 'just' a documentation person or I am just an end user has always irritated me, but in this case I equally hate the word applied to this effort. And while I know that you did not mean to offend, Just designing a line of 'open hardware' mobile devices grates on my nerves a bit. I do not want people to understate or underestimate what has been done by the Openmoko project so far. As to selling them to manufacturers, the concept of having a design freely licensable to different manufacturers so they can compete to produce the lowest cost hardware is something that is good, IHMO. Having many manufacturers producing Openmoko phones means that the quantities go up and the number of platforms that can run any of the software stacks increasesalso good in my estimation. Chip producers respect you and pay attention to you when your design sells 50,000,000 phones a year instead of 12000. The handset manufacturers I know are not interested in one-offs. The investment they make in bringing out a line of hardware would not be paid back until 100,000 or more units are sold. Or do they also want to help improve the software, like kernel, fso, x11 drivers, etc for the Neo? I assume by they you mean the university? I have invited them to join the software effort, and I think they are interested, but they could have done that at any time. They could participate in the software activities, just as the rest of the community has joined. One slight issue, however, is the cost of the phones in Brazil. Due to Brazilian import duties, which can (with both federal and local duties) range up to 94% of manufacturing cost and shipping) make the phone *cost* a minimum of 550 USD FOB Taiwan. This is without any of the expenses or profit made by the importer. By having the phones designed in Brazil, with the import duty on the parts being 6% the finished prototype phone prices might be reasonable for a Brazilian to purchase even given the higher prototype costs. Through a university resale program we might get a considerable number of USP (and other Brazilian university) students helping with the software. Shipping phones out of Brazil to other countries should not cost any more than shipping from Taiwan (with, of course, the possible exception of shipping to China itself). I do think that if/when the university starts working with the community full swing that there will be a lot more of the university students getting involved, simply because of the university's involvement. And Professor Zuffo has indicated that they have various software skills (codecs, security expertise) that they can add to the effort. One of the issues here is that the project has not exactly been focused on one stack of softwareergo the number of cycles that it is taking to get any one stack ready has taken a long time. IMHO this is both a blessing and a curse. A blessing because the hardware and kernel are tickled in many ways, making the kernel more robust in the long run and a person has choice in the software stack. A curse because instead of one intense effort we have several somewhat coordinated efforts. My feeling is that the GTA02 device itself is in pretty good shape compared to the software it runs. So how will the community benefit from a GTA03? Yes, I agree the GTA02 is in pretty good shape compared to the software it runs. However, it is in good shape for the middle of 2008.not necessarily for the year 2009 or even the end of 2008. Eventually the tide will turn and the software will be in good shape while the hardware is perceived as being long in the tooth. If you pay attention to the hardware lists you will know that the Glamo chip is not the best in the world, so removing it and doing a bit of redesign will both save manufacturing costs and may actually give better performance and/or battery life. The GSM unit, I am told, is no longer being
Re: The University of São Paulo's intent to join Openmoko development
that are on it. Koolu prefers the Android distribution. I know that some of you do not like that stack for various reasons. Koolu believes that Android running on FreeRunner will generate business and interest in the FreeRunner that will help every distribution. For those who were at DebConf 8 last year in Argentina, you know that I actively marketed Debian on FreeRunner, and I have been quietly working in the background encouraging David Reyes Samblas Martinez, of Tuxbrain, to set up a program for selling FreeRunners to additional Debian developers during Debconf 9 at a good price to help attract more Debian developers to the platform. I tried to make the same offer to the 6000 FOSS developers that attended FISL 10 this year through our Brazilian distributor, but the import duties made the cost of the phone too high. I am still working to fix that problem of import duty on the phones in Brazil. Yes, I can reach into my sleeves and try to pull out another ace or two. Please tell me what you need. I will be glad to give help and guidance. But I want this to remain the Openmoko Community Projectnot the maddog project. I think that is what you should want also. So organize your needs. Reach out to your own universities and software usability development groups. Get them to join the project. Don't give up. If you look closely, you can see the light at the end of the tunnel. It may be faint, but I have seen similar tunnels before, and I can see the light now. Warmest regards, Jon maddog Hall CTO, Koolu -- Jon maddog Hall Executive Director Linux International(R) email: mad...@li.org 80 Amherst St. Voice: +1.603.672.4557 Amherst, N.H. 03031-3032 U.S.A. Cell: +1.603.943. WWW: http://www.li.org Board Member: Uniforum Association Board Member Emeritus: USENIX Association (2000-2006) (R)Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds in several countries. (R)Linux International is a registered trademark in the USA used pursuant to a license from Linux Mark Institute, authorized licensor of Linus Torvalds, owner of the Linux trademark on a worldwide basis (R)UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open Group in the USA and other countries. ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: Anti-Whining: Happy Moko Moments
and we managed to fly clear of the ship just before it exploded, and thus we saved all of humanity with a Freerunner. I had wondered what happened to that ship! md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: Anti-Whining: Happy Moko Moments
But I could sit in the train in peace. And while on that train, did you see the light at the end of the tunnel? md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: New Open Hardware company
#2 Not only do we 'announce' products that are not for sale, but in addition we have an open roadmap and design the products based on community feedback. A comment on this: Of course designing a product with as much input and feedback from your community of customers is important. But when I say customers here, I speak in the broadest possible terms: - developers - end users - Channels (VARs, Distributors, Resellers) Wolfgang has announced several goals of Qi, a main goal being that of openness and the support of Ogg formats. This may be in conflict with goals of his channels, to be able to support both Ogg and mp3, and therefore reach a large enough marketplace to justify selling the product. This may mean that the product sells in the tens of thousands instead of the millions. That may be fine as long as it meets the other goals of Qi and the people that invest time and money in Qi, including manufacturers and distributors. Fortunately the mp3 issue (as a continued example) can be met other ways. Since the designs are open, the addition of an mp3 codec by a VAR (and payment of that royalty in jurisdictions where it is required) is something that could be done even without any effort by the open community or Qi. But the issue has to be communicated and understood, the solution has to be planned. IMHO the creation of an add-on package by Qi for mp3 and other royalty-bearing codecs would be something useful for their customers, and would call attention to the fact that these codecs are not free either as in Freedom nor as in Beer. I have seen lots of people communicate congratulations to the new company and I too wish them success. Part of that congratulations should be the honest appraisal of their plans so they meet their goals. Part of that is helping them get feedback from the community of their true customers, whoever those true customers are. Warmest regards, maddog ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: [CU] voting required
V1 with table underneath left-hand picture md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: [CU] voting required
V1 with table underneath left-hand picture Sorry maddog, i do not understand. I assume you would like to modify V1, but could you explain how more precisely? Sorry, I tried to take a short cut in my description. I like the over-all look of V1, but I also like the working hardware box. By putting the working hardware box in a column by itself, making a three-column layout, you reduce the amount of space for column two, which makes the page longer showing the same amount of information. I suggest that the working hardware box of V3 be moved to the first column under the left-hand picture of the application/distribution. Then the home page, Image, Tested on Hardware, etc. which is now at the bottom of the page could also be listed in the left hand column beneath the working hardware box. This would allow the right hand column (of what is now a two-column page) to be just text on a white background. md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: Fwd: New Open Hardware company
Christoph, Thank you for a very thoughtful email. I appreciate your inputs on this topic. This is my outing, that I never really understand the concept of open(moko) :-) From my observations of this list, I do not think you are the only one. 2. Considering this, you have to arrange with a compromis. Life is full of compromises, but you can still have goals and (as you have mentioned) a vision. A vision and the goals (both short-term and long-term) to meet that vision move you in a direction and help you to reject side-paths that might distract you. IMO any device which you can put free SW on it, is a acceptable one. But what is the definition of Free Software? And at what level? Is it Free Software to have a GSM module that has binary firmware, but a firm programming interface for kernel engineers to write against? Is it Free Software to have a binary-only kernel module, but allow GNU libraries and applications above that? Is it Free Software to put Open Office on top of Microsoft Windows? I will argue that (working backwards) every piece of proprietary, closed-source software you eliminate is getting closer to the goals and vision of Free Software. So I personally advocate to people who want their friends to try Free Software to start them out with Firefox and Open Office on top of Microsoft first, and then work with them to replace more and more of the rest of the proprietary software. Is this as good as having them use an entire distribution of Free Software? Perhaps not, but it gets them going in the right direction. What we need is high-end-hardware with a lot of options. THIS is what attracts an active community. I tend to agree with you on this. But since I am not infallible, I think there may be room for a simpler piece of hardware that people can do things with. Even if the GTA03 was available today, assuming we could get enough parts to keep producing the GTA02 I might advocate the continued production of the GTA02. The GTA02 would be a less expensive phone for those that might not be able to afford the features of the GTA03. And as new software features get integrated into the pool of software for the GTA03, they would be available for retrofitting to the GTA02. Another issue is volume of units in circulation. There has to be a sustainable volume to support a community of developers, even for backports. And the effort to backport has to be easy enough. I do not think that the GTA01 (for example) had reached that volume, nor was the ease of backporting and maintaining the kernel and distribution easily justified. 3. The way to create a 100% open parallel-world (as it seems your vision Steve), is to establish a GSM-independent network. (eg. as Sean mentioned once a WLAN-peer-to-peer network) IMO it's too late for it. I am not sure that it is too late to create a WLAN-peer-to-peer network. It might exist as an alternative network for those that wish to use it. But, that was your opinion, and you are welcome to have it. 4. The idea of community works fine with software, but not with hardware modifications. It has to do with missing knowledge, capacities and money. I heard the same arguments about the ability of a community to create a complex project like the kernel of an operating system, or a distribution of an operating system back in 1994. People were still saying it can't be done although distributions like Slackware, Red Hat and SuSE were gathering steam. Most of those people who said it can't be done to me now work for Red Hat. Certainly hardware has different needs, and you are right about some of them. But I think these needs, once recognized, can be addressed. Once again, I honour everybody with a vision. And I am aware my comments are from a very banal money-earning point of view. Actually there is nothing wrong with a very banal money-earning point of view. In fact, I think that more attention to that point of view is necessary for the Openmoko project to succeed. When I first joined the Linux community I saw a project that was being worked on as a hobby or for technical people, and what I perceived was a project that could have huge commercial impact to the computer industry. I thought to myself that the project would continue no matter what, but if people were allowed to make money on it then it would move forward much faster. If the community resisted those commercial efforts, then the people who had those commercial interests would fight Free Software, slowing its spread. I approached the Linux community with this idea, and there were some people who said I do not want people to make money off the software that I write for free. Those people (unfortunately some very good people) soon left the Linux project. Others, such as Linus, understood what I was saying, and embraced this model. I might argue that some of the issues of the first round of Openmoko was that banal money-earning issues were not addressed fully. Perhaps
Re: [CU] voting required
Patryk, Now i get it :). Excuse me but my English speaking skills fails sometimes. It was entirely my fault for not being clear enough. V8 made and ready for review. I Like it - particularly the one with two columns (not three) and the 1px orange border. I agree with David. md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: [CU] voting required
Either 8a or 8b. md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: The University of São Paulo's intent to join Openmoko development
Rask, Government will also want some return. I don't see clearly (yet) how a project like ours can give them that (like OLPC and portuguese's Magalhães). A phone that's more difficult to sneak spyware into than a closed one such as an IPhone or Blackberry. How do you know it isn't secretly being wiretapped? How do you *know*? With open hardware, there are no secret power supplies or audio inputs to the GSM/UMTS chip. With open hardware, you also decide what software to run on it, such as to deselect back doors, or implement encrypted conversation over GSM data calls, which AFAIK isn't available in any of the closed phones. All of what you said is true. On the other hand, perhaps the twelfth largest economy (and the sixth largest user of cell phones) http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0933605.html [Note that the European Union is counted as a country] would just like the chance to have its largest university (and their students) participate in designing an open phone that could be freely licensed and manufactured by any one of its high-tech companies. A basic phone design that could be changed to meet various needs in the country. Manufacturing jobs? Werner is in contact with the professor, working on the logistics of GTA02-core. I am working (in my copious spare time...yeah, right) on a plan for financing. We are moving forward. md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: [CU] voting required - VOTING RESULTS
Patryk, Speaking as one of the unclear voters, I thank you for all your work on this. For myself, I saw very little difference between 8a and 8b, so applying my vote to either was the correct thing to do. And your plans for addressing these types of issues in the future look spot on. Warmest regards, maddog ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: One second Openmoko boot?
Maybe this might be possible in some future of Openmoko Linux? Yes and no. Of course and not. :-) Depends on what your definition of cold boot is. There are trade-offs here, as always. As I understand it, the read-only text of the kernel was in ROM (could have been Flash), so did not have to be read in off a file system and loaded. On the other hand they were loading and initializing device drivers, and on a fixed system like the Openmoko you probably could cut down on that process quite a bit. Issues like memory bandwidth to the processor, processor speed, etc. etc. But the real question is, what was the customer need that drove the work? Probably a lot of engineering work went into that one second boot, but what would a one second boot (versus a two second or three second boot) really gain the FreeRunner unless you had a boot on incoming event, and a way to capture that event until the phone had booted and could handle it? IMHO what would be more useful is even more power management work to make the battery last longer in normal running mode, suspend and deep suspend, rather than shortening the (hopefully) once per year boot cycle. Warmest regards, md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: One second Openmoko boot?
Once per year? :) Up until recently was once per day (minimum), but since 8-8's SHR-U I haven't returned to that sad average! /* gentle rant on Which is *exactly* my point. I have a friend of mine who's multi-user Linux system was recently up for thirty days before a power failure caused it to go down. I had a Digital Unix system on my desk up for an entire year without rebooting. We had cases of VAX/Ultrix systems up for over three years without a reboot. IMHO the only time you should have to cold reboot an operating system is when there is a change to a critical section of the kernel, or perhaps a hardware failure and with loadable kernel modules and loadable device drivers (to say nothing of user-mode device drivers), those sections and failures are relatively few. Sooo, while booting in one second is a neat stunt, and nice for automotive needs, or deep space probes that have a master controlling module that turns another module on and off; for a phone I would rather have it function like a real phone for four (or even three or even two or even one) days without rebooting or having to be recharged. On the other hand, there is the source codego to it. gentle rant off */ ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: One second Openmoko boot?
i've never understood the fascination of linux users with keeping systems up for days and months on end. sure, it's great for a server hosting web sites, or in a corporate environment, but for a home system? it comes across as nothing more than who's the most '1337', which is really lame. add to that the power wasted and it's verging on the pointless I turn my systems off at home to save power, lifetime on fans and disks. That is not the point. The point is that *I* turn them off, versus some instability that causes the system to crash. The fact that a multi-user, network-connected, resource-limited system *can* stay up that long is (IMHO) desirable. as for phones, there are many reasons i turn mine off - not least because there's no way i want to be contactable at night, and when i'm doing other things where i don't want to be interrupted. it gets turned on and off at least once a day. my phone exists to serve me, not the other way around Ahhh, the difference between a phone and a portable computing device that can make telephone calls. I want my phone to be an alarm clock, a calendar, a music playerand I want it to have the *capability* of running twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, efficiently, and without me having to futz too much with it, or to worry if I have to find its electric fix three times a day. Or to *have* to turn it off because I am not near an outlet for a long enough period of time. do you realise the effects of the 'always-connected' lifestyle? they're not good at all I do not typically give out my cell phone number. I consider my cell phone for my convenience and not others. Again, that is not the point. You are welcome to turn off your cell phone any time you want, or leave it on and make it silent, ready to receive messages and let it save them for you. Turn it off, and it is a boat anchor. Worse than a boat anchor, because at least a boat anchor is heavy enough to hold a boat in place. As to the power wasted, the always on, connected cell phone uses less power in a day than my laptop uses in an hour...and if it goes into deep suspend, a lot less than that. Power management in servers, desktops, laptops and netbooks is also necessary, and can help cellphones too, in the long run. anyway, the point i'm getting at is: a quick boot time, it doesn't have to be one second, is definitely an advantage Granted. But if there is a choice of where to put engineering talent? ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: project customer
Hello Christoph, Good luck. Maddog made a lot words about the Brasilian universitary which should continue the Openmoko project. Nothing happend. As far as I know the University still stands ready and willing to help with the GTA02-core project as soon as that is ready to move forward. Professor Zuffo has not de-committed from that project as far as I can see. As to going further than that, the University is still interested in working on an Open Phone. But as I have seen here over the past several days, there does not seem to be much agreement as to how to move that forward. From my viewpoint a bit of this comes from a tacit disagreement in the project as to what is open, and even less of a plan as to how to finance a project that requires real money. Openmoko's financing always seemed to be on a shoestring, and never (for example) included the money to fix problems. Other companies might do a recall and fix the issue at the factory. I think it was by good luck that the different issues that happened with the phone were able to be fixed with a capacitor here and a resistor there..and people stepped up to the bug fix parties...but there are still a lot of people out there with unfixed phones. Also he cooperate with silly companys like Koolu, who bargain Openmoko down to blood and damaged all the project. Koolu had its faults, and I will not say it didn't, but after several days of you writing and lambasting everyone about everything (other than yourself, of course) I think blaming Koolu for damaging all the project is a bit harsh. I had a company in Brazil that was all set to license the designs from Openmoko and manufacture the phone in large quantities. They had a good SMT line, channels to distribute the phone in Brazil, and from Brazil throughout Latin America, and we had a good business plan to market to the VARs that were mentioned in another email. Even though the phone's components were a little dated, we felt we had a good market in people who had to change the OS to create the applications they wished to have for small and medium business. An example of that can be seen here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9dVch2nSuBA The licensing of the design would have generated money to create the next design. Then we tried to find out where to buy the parts, and how many parts were still being manufactured, and for how long. That was when we began to realize that the marketplace for Openmoko parts was very limited. As several people on this list have mentioned, to create a market for cell phones that is profitable takes hundreds of thousands, or even millions, not tens of thousands. By the time that the company in Brazil ramped up to produce the phone, did the manufacturing and certifications and testing that were necessary, and did the certifications, built the channel, did the advertising, they would probably run out of parts. It would have been unprofitable for them. In the end I recommended that the company not try to produce the Openmoko V7, even though I had spent a lot of time and money helping them evaluate the possibilities. So from my viewpoint, if there was one thing that killed the Openmoko project, it was lack of a thorough, over-all, realistic business plan that showed how the project was going to be sustainable into the future. And the lack of agreement among all of the people involved as to what the marketplace was for the phone. md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: project customer
Rasterman! We do go back a long way, don't we? And don't worry...even though I know a bit about the X Window System, I bow to you for the real bit-jamming. all the players are closed with no signs of going open - unless you (maddog) can convince them? It won't be me who convinces themit will have to be their customers who buy in large quantitiesand customers who say I won't buy your stinking 3D unless you tell me how to program it so I can maintain it into the future. that's the biggest issue. financing. And here is where I saw a lot of disagreement, and could never see the path forward to a sustainable design business plan. Everyone wanted everything in Openmoko to be completely gratis (other than being willing to buy the phone itself). From my viewpoint the circuit diagrams should be open and free so people can comment, improve, etc. I also liked the fact that the case's cad design was open so you could change the case. However, printed circuit board layouts, gerbers, etc. are grunt work and could be licensed out with a decent license that would allow universities to make phones for free, hobbyists could make a phone or two (or even ten) for free, but companies that wanted to manufacture or sell it would have to pay 1-2 dollars a unit license fee. Then by the time a mega-unit of phones were made (and it could be small factories each making 100K phones) you would have the money to design and test the next phone. i'd call koolu misguided. to me they were just uninteresting. why a freerunner when i can get a android g1 dev phone that was signficantly better hardware (though by todays standards its totally shot and useless). A hobbyist/developer might have been interested in getting an Android G1 Dev phone. Unlocked and Unsigned. But each person could only buy one. Imagine developing a kick-ass SMB application that could not just be delivered as an app on top of Android. You have to change the OS. Do you tell each of your SMB customers that they have to sign up to be an Android developer just so they can get one of those phones? Now the Nexus One...different story. It sells unlocked and unsigned. The factory in Brazil was all set to completely buy out Openmoko's inventory (if Openmoko could have told them how much inventory they had), but then they started looking beyond that andno one could tell them how many GSM modules were out there, and how much they would cost as the quantities available dropped close to zero. the suppliers will be happy to talk to you and provide you with those. Sometimes. Other times they have simply gone End Of Life with that part and they don't want to tie up their engineers and lines with old, obsolete partsbecause they are selling too much of the new stuff and they are short on capacity to make both. But if you are making your phone out of beginning of life components that other people are also using and that have a bit of life to them, you can sometimes get some components without having to buy 10 million of themparticularly if you are a university...and particularly if you have a business plan to license out the design to lots of small companies for manufacture. For example, it can cost one-half million dollars just to get TI to talk to you as part of their partner program. That half-million buys you some TI's engineering consulting time, etc. but what it really does is get rid of the kids and lets the big boys play. From what I saw, the FreeRunner was EOL, with EOL components.and its software was still a bit undercooked in places more than a year after its design was done. Everything else you said I agree with, and we both agree that it takes lots of up-front moneyor a smaller amount of money and a track record of success. By the way, I think that both the hardware team and the software teams did a great job given the circumstances, and I have the greatest respect for most of the community members. So Rastermannext time we meet we can have a beer. md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: project customer
What I'd aim for are mature chips. They're not brand-new, their quirks and shortcomings are known, documentation may have leaked, someone may even have written drivers for them already, you can get them in small and large quantities, they still have many years of life in them, and you can already get a glimpse of the roadmap beyond that chip. I might agree to early maturity, but in this day electronics age fast, and the chip has to be both early mature and popular to keep in production. md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: project customer
sorry for this. I am just a typical German being always a bit on the negative-criticising side of life ;-) Some of my best friends are German. I am sure we can have a beer together, Maddog, I am really not the idiot as it may sound here. I recognize that. Thanks for your status report about the Brazilian university etc. I agree with you, it's no good idea to invest any more time or even money in the re-production of GTA02, I honor you give such a honest advice. I still support the GTA02-core project, but for the goals that Werner has advocated, to get a tool-set that is completely FOSS so that people around the world can design with itnot necessarily to produce a phone for mass production. If we can find a way to finance the design, and to make sure that it would be finished and go to market, I think the University would be more than willing to help with the project, including using their influence with vendors to get parts. Be aware that even getting parts takes a lot of time and effort. The university has an office with people in it that makes contracts with vendors, submits grant proposals, signs NDAs, etc. Sometimes they even have to take money out of their budget to join vendor's programs. But they have a lot of things the project could use, even more than the SMT line (which is the same type of SMT line, by the way, that LG uses to make their phones). Ovens to do thermal testing, vibrators to do vibration testing, machines to do certification testing, and expertise in all of these fields. The university also has the ability to make integrated circuits, and has made wifi radio chips in the past. md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: Videos of OpenMoko in action
Cristian, With Professor Regis Rossi I made a video of his application Open Audience: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9dVch2nSuBA which used the Openmoko to control the sound channels of recorded sound to place the listener inside the music. If you had a number of microphones positioned in the sound scene, you would move the listener throughout the placement of the microphones by using the FreeRunner. It was a pretty cool application that would have been difficult, if not impossible, to create as just a layered application without changing the underlying OS. Here is a fun video I made while running Debian on the FreeRunner: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGjzm6hzXaAfeature=related I pretended I was a Systems Administrator on vacation, and indicated that from my FreeRunner running Debian I could have access to many, if not all, of the tools that I would use on my notebook and workstation, therefore fix a lot of problems. You are welcome to point to the videos, or even copy them and distribute them. md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: GNU/Linux Wrist Watch
Back in 1975 one of the watch companies made a computer watch that you could play a weak form of asteroids on it, and program the watch in BASIC. It had a stand that contained a keyboard and printer, and the watch communicated with the stand through inductance (you had to put the watch on the stand to program it, input data or print). I don't know if someone is producing such a wristwatch, but there was a research project by IBM: http://www.research.ibm.com/WearableComputing/linuxwatch/linuxwatch.html showing that it is (was) possible and how it could look like. BR, Nikolaus Yes. I have seen the prototype several times, the last time at IBM's research labs in Austin, Texas (sitting in a display case) and it even made it to the point where Citizen was a potential manufacturer (mentioned on the web page) BUT the battery life was pathetic, and it was rather clunky looking, and it still could not make a telephone call, so it was never produced. BUT technology moves forward, and someday. md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: No more FreeRunners in the USA? (was: community Digest, Vol 194, Issue 6)
Joshua, My experience with the 900 Mhz phones is that they work most of the places that people go. The 850s seemed to be in places where you wanted large physical coverage or in hard environments. 850s seemed to be used by companies at the seashore, in mountains, etc. 900 phones worked fine for me. Remember you also have the 1900 frequency which handled most of the work. md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: WikiReader sales and the future of Openmoko
Hi, I have been watching the conversation about Android and its openness, and I think that Timo's answer is the closest. You should also remember that while Android is associated with Google, and certainly they had the greatest say of it, that other companies of the Open Handset Alliance also had input to Android and how it unfolded. Finally, Android is a sample implementation. The ones who last touch it before it goes on a device are the handset manufacturers. They are the ones who really determine what device drivers are used. And they, in turn, are affected by the component manufacturers and what they will allow to be released in the way of sources or even information on the devices. Finally, the carriers also have a hand in this. The carriers really do not want to see an open phone, where people can change the OS. They fear it, and perhaps for some good reasons (or what they think are good reasonsbut are really not so good reasons) such as network security. This is why most of the phones not only are locked, but also use only signed binaries. I doubt that the manufacturers care about signed binaries (although it might cut down a bit on warranty support costs) and they definitely do not care about locked phones (other than unlocked phones might piss off their favorite customers, the carriers). Looking at the original OHA, you see the unholy alliance: o component manufacturers (some infamous for how closed they are) o handset manufacturers (HTC) o codec manufacturers and licensors o carriers and finally Google (one ring to bind them all) the drum-beater. But like a lot of drum-beaters, they could only beat the drumthey were bound by contracts and agreements to do things. Even the mighty Google can not do everything they want to do. Google's (and the OHA's) methodology in engaging the community was not the best IMHO, but also can be explained by the way that the project evolved. I think that Chromium OS is going along much nicer, and I still hope that Android will eventually evolve into a real Open Source project.assuming that Oracle does not kill Android at the same time that they try to kill JAVA. Of course some people may still argue that Android is not open. I am not going to waste my time with that argument, but I just wanted to put a few more facts into the evaluation. Warmest regards, md P.S. for those of you who might be interested, I am typing this from the Amsterdam airport on my way to the FrOSCon 2010 conference in Bonn, Germany this weekend. Perhaps I will see some of you there. ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: Someone is trying to patent Quickwriting
btw, in this page I read also: Then several things happened. Microsoft got interested in it and licensed it from NYU (thereby helping to support our research!) so, I think it's not free :P Not necessarily. There can be dual licensing, like in MySQP, which would allow for a not-for-profit or open source licensing. You really have to contact the copyright holder or their agent, who in this case seems to be NYU. And whether an implementation transcends their patent is an issue for technologists and lawyers. md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: Article: What happened to real open source phones?
Balint, I think it is just a waste of time. Actually, I disagree. What the article's author is saying is what a lot of people outside the project have said, and with the GTA04 on the threshold of moving forward, I think it is time to start putting down the naysayers again. From my viewpoint there was never a clear agreement (or even a clear statement) as to what the Openmoko Project's real goal was. I think the first person to comment on the article, Jason, echoed what I heard a lot of people say on the mailing lists over the years: o I bought a phone (in his case a Neo 1973) o It was never even functional as a phone o I am stuck with it (or perhaps they sold it) The FreeRunner suffered a better fate overall, but still fell short of various people's expectations. Obviously Jason never bought into the concept of the phone as a developer's tool...he actually wanted to make calls with it. If the goal of the project was to create a platform for people to investigate developing code for a mobile in a free and open way, then you could make the argument that Openmoko was fairly successful. If the goal was to create a complete Open Source software stack that would successfully compete with the iPhone to the iConsumer, I think that the project was not successful. Using Android, which was mostly developed in a closed manner, does not really count. If the goal was to create a commercially successful Open Phone platform or to show that such a phone could be a success, I think it was less than successfulbut not necessarily because of its Openness. I meant what I said in my response to the article. I had a manufacturing company all set to license the necessary designs from Openmoko, to buy the spare inventory and to make the business relationships to buy new components. They had the facilities and expertise to make the phone, but they needed to make a certain volume just to make back their tooling costs. We had many customers standing by to purchase the phones, and these customers were not price sensitiveonly there were no new components to buy, so the whole business plan fell apart. We could not make the volume necessary to break even from tooling. I hope that the GTA04 will be positioned so that every purchaser will know why they are buying it, and what they can expect from it. Then perhaps we will have fewer disappointed customers. Perhaps this is too much to ask, but it could be a goal. md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: Article: What happened to real open source phones?
Unfortunately, I feel the struggle for a Linux phone is pretty much submerged by the Android phenomenon, which is in my opinion, too bad. Phone hardware that ran linux out of the box would be wonderful. It depends on what you mean by Linux. Personally I would like the GTA04 to run a Linux kernel with two personalities, one of them being Debian and the other Android. Just my preferences. md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: Phoenux, Phoneux, Phonux?
On Mon, 2012-06-11 at 15:30 -0500, Harley Laue wrote: On Mon, Jun 11, 2012 at 1:15 AM, Dr. H. Nikolaus Schaller h...@goldelico.com wrote: Linux is pronounced in english as Line-ugs (/ˈlɪnəks/ [1]). I.e. it should be phon-ugs. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux Just as an FYI from a native speaker, /ˈlɪnəks/ would be lin-əks With lin which sounds like bin or the proper name Lynn Except that Linus' name is pronounced 'Lee-nus', not Lin-us or Lie-nus. Therefore if the kernel was named after him, it would have been pronounced Lee-nux. As the various groups went back and forth with the pronunciations of Linux, Linus created a .au file (Ogg had not been developed yet) and put it in the kernel sources. You can listen to that audio file, converted to .ogg, at the Wikipedia site. Seemingly one of the vast numbers of people could say Lee-nux even with the audio file, so most either called it Lin-nux or Lie-nux. After a while Linus said I do not care what you call it as long as you use it. and things settled down for a while. One day, after Linus had moved to California and was working for Transmeta, I phoned him, and he answered the phone Lye-nus. I said Lea-nus that is not even your name. He said 'I know, but nobody in California can say Lea-nus, so I am Lye-nus'. And so it goes. While it is nice that everyone pronounce the name correctly, the most important thing is that they use your project, including being able to find it using a search engine. Warmest regards, maddog (all lower case, one word) ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
Re: Phoenux, Phoneux, Phonux?
I concede that you're right about Linus and Linux. The fact remains for phoenux would still hold since it's pronounced with the same long e sound as in Linus' name. So fee-nəks (or fee-nux) and not phon-ugs. I think the group should be more concerned about the ugs part, since the word ugh in American slang: Ugh Ugh ([oo^]), interj. An exclamation expressive of disgust, horror, or recoil. Its utterance is usually accompanied by a shudder. [1913 Webster] md ___ Openmoko community mailing list community@lists.openmoko.org http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
