1. Battery life is a joke and that's not going to change.
2. Tiny screen is still tiny. Big screen is more useful.
3. Finger is not the best pointing device.
4. 90% of mobile is games. The market has spoken, smartphone is a toy. Only people that can't afford Internet access (kids & 3rd world) use their phone for everything.
5. Privacy/security is bad from so many angles. Still waiting for an Ubuntu phone.
6. Android is a Linux OS that blocks Linux applications--what BS. If you work at Google, shame on all
of you.
7. Processing power is weak. As we're seeing with cryptocoins, don't forget the value of raw computational power.
8. Limiting keyboard. Pressing alt-function to get something simple like an "=" sign is a huge waste of time.
(6) No, it doesn't. I'm running ssh, git-annex and other Linux applications on my Nexus 7.
I won't disagree about the privacy problems and poor processing power, but I doubt those are real impediments for mobile devices to become the standard, even if it means I'll keep my desktop.
(EDIT: Of course, the "death" of the PC is a silly idea. But I can see it become a professional tool with a small hobbyist market, instead of the consumer market we have now.)
As far as ssh, I bet it was already installed on the device when you got it. Can you uninstall ssh and install it again without rooting Android? If you downloaded some ssh "app" from Play you probably just downloaded a cute interface to the real ssh--which must place nice with the Google proprietary JVM in order to work. Does the real JVM work on Android? Why not? There was a presentation posted on HN recently from a Python developer explaining why he can't code Python apps for Android. He explained it pretty well--you must use Eclipse, you must use the Google Virtual Machine. If you do a few searches for "code Android app" the only way is to download Eclipse and compile through the Google Virtual Machine. I'd rather pluck out my eyeballs.
No, ssh wasn't installed, yes, I can install it again without rooting Android, it's a matter of copying the binary to a directory with executable permissions and running it using at terminal.
f you downloaded some ssh "app" from Play you probably just downloaded a cute interface to the real ssh--which must place nice with the Google proprietary JVM in order to work.
I didn't need an SSH app, and no, Dalvik is not proprietary. Also, you don't need to get apps from Play, you can just download them from the web or use another repository.
Does the real JVM work on Android? Why not?
For the same reason it doesn't work on Glendix - nobody ported it to that userspace.
There was a presentation posted on HN recently from a Python developer explaining why he can't code Python apps for Android. He explained it pretty well--you must use Eclipse, you must use the Google Virtual Machine. If you do a few searches for "code Android app" the only way is to download Eclipse and compile through the Google Virtual Machine.
That's fascinating, especially the C compiler, maybe I'll try it. But how to get C applications into Play?
Still the "Allow UNSAFE Binaries?" setting is BS "WARNING: You are about to open your device to hackers! Are you sure? Y / N." You were more patient than I was. I downloaded F-Droid, researched the APK format, almost got an Android emulator working in Debian, even looked at "PhoneGap" yuck. Call me crazy but I prefer Debian over Android. Millions of people rooting their phone I think proves my point--people are willing to risk destroying their device to get root access. Maybe Android would be better if Google had not sold out to the carriers? I don't know.
1. Battery life is a joke and that's not going to change.
2. Tiny screen is still tiny. Big screen is more useful.
3. Finger is not the best pointing device.
4. 90% of mobile is games. The market has spoken, smartphone is a toy. Only people that can't afford Internet access (kids & 3rd world) use their phone for everything.
5. Privacy/security is bad from so many angles. Still waiting for an Ubuntu phone.
6. Android is a Linux OS that blocks Linux applications--what BS. If you work at Google, shame on all of you.
7. Processing power is weak. As we're seeing with cryptocoins, don't forget the value of raw computational power.
8. Limiting keyboard. Pressing alt-function to get something simple like an "=" sign is a huge waste of time.