Re: iPod Touch (threads merged)
 

Repeated covers is my fault. Tagging is not right. My UKMP works all the time... Ok I don't use it that much because most of the time I'm using Mediastreamer....

Re: iPod Touch (threads merged)
 

There is no problem with code quality where it comes to legibility of the source (apart from maybe knock on effects for its quality as a product. it is the quality of applications where the concern is.
People, as in normal people who have no interest in computers other than they need to use one to do their job, really need consistancy.
The reason I have always despised linux for use (and I used to have to use it for a living) was that you get a key sequence that means print in one application, and it means delete document in another. At the time (mid 90s) it was even worse in that the mouse buttons didn't even do the same thing in all applications.
Like the java problem on macs. Not only do they make crap user interface, the basic commands like copy and paste are wrong.

Also, it is a pain to use an app that crashes all the time, regardless how good it is.

One thing that nokia needs more than anything though, a simple, easy to set up development environment that anyone can use!

Re: iPod Touch (threads merged)
 

If you use Ubuntu or say OpenSUSE with no extra repositories enabled you don't have crashing apps. You might not have the newest version but they will work most of the time. That's the main problem with opensource software. Testing. A hobbydeveloper mostly only tests on his machine and his installed distribution. So many oss-software is released and a week later comes the bugrelease...

I agree. I wasn't able to setup the Chinok SDK on my linux because some shell script didn't work because of syntax stuff. That's not how it should be.

Re: iPod Touch (threads merged)
 

Yes, and it's a matter of *law* that Microsof achieved that dominant position through a series of canny business decisions, borderline unethical business practices and downright illegal abuse of any power it did have.

And it was this lack of belief in the product by the rest of IBM's business that led the "PC" to actually becoming a success. There was a need for a respectable desktop machine, and the IBM name gave it that level of acceptability.

The openness of the design, caused by it being thrown together on a shoe string using off-the-shelf parts, allowed the clones to rise up; and the non-exclusive deal MS had to allow them to provide the same OS to these clones.

I think Nokia's Internet Tablets will be Psion to the Hildon Symbian. Lots of people will use Hildon, as it's now spun off to its own GNOME upstream project. It's being used in Moblin and Ubuntu Mobile, as we know - and more are bound to follow.

However, these guys using it are customising it, designing UIs around it and recognising that good UIs sell devices and get users. Ubuntu Mobile is already more open than Maemo: you just have to follow the mailing lists to see that there's no talk of keeping such-and-such closed to "protect their IP". Nokia are open: but they're not open enough. They design a UI based on that on the failed 7710, for market continuity. That's as crazy as Sun thinking people want all Java apps to look the same on any platform with their god awful Metal PLAF.

Nokia may well have recreated the PDA market with decentish web browser and coolly hackable devices. But Apple, Ubuntu and Intel will rule the roost with consumer devices we won't worry about recommending to friends or colleagues.

This is a strawman. In this forum we don't care if Nokia as a phone company go bust, do well or anything else. We only care about Nokia's Maemo devices. Which, if you're playing the numbers game, have a tiny percentage of the market compared with the iPhone, iPod Touch - probably the abysmally selling UMPCs - and, inevitably, the MID-style devices.

1) Again, who's talking about Nokia's phone range? Who cares? The point of the Internet Tablets, according to Ari Jaaksi et al is that you have a small phone which you can use to make calls (oh, and manage your calendar, apparently ;-)) which you use as a gateway out. The brand of phone is as interesting to me as what make my ADSL modem is.

2) That's one too many time you've suggested people who disagree with you aren't capable of discussing such topics rationally and intellectually. Please stop that.

Cheers,

Andrew

Re: iPod Touch (threads merged)
 

I don't see why any (normal) computer user would have to go through the hassle of pirate-copying Windows: It's still bundled with practically every pc on the market. In fact, those that buy a pc without Windows preinstalled, are the least likely people to want to install a "free" copy of Windows. And as for the real pirates (the ones that produce the "one dollar DVDs" you can find in every supermarket bin in SE Asia), they laugh heartily (with a lot of "Arr! me matey!!" thrown in for folklore's sake) at Microsoft's anti-copy measures, as they've usually cracked them within hours of their implementation.

It's even worse than that: I've had several instances of Knoppix and Ubuntu live CDs where a number of services weren't working, but upon full installation everything worked flawlessly. IMHO, live CDs are way overrated as hardware testers.

Re: iPod Touch (threads merged)
 

It might be interesting to know that Windows (with its DOS predecessor) is practically the only software product Microsoft has ever managed to make money on. Even Office doesn't generate money. And the only reason Windows makes money, is because pc makers are still practically obliged to bundle it with their stuff, a position Microsoft achieved by simply breaking the law and "coercing" governments to do nothing until any legal action was too late to make a difference.

Now, before people accuse me of being biased against Microsoft: Their mice are nice.

Re: iPod Touch (threads merged)
 

Are you sure, I thought it was office that made money and windows that didn't?

I prefer logitech, but I am quite fond of their keyboards.

So for a non-hardware, software only company they are doing well here!

Re: iPod Touch (threads merged)
 

Yes.

It's the other way around. Even worse, Microsoft hasn't produced a single money-making software product since Windows 3.0 (obviously not counting the follow-ups of Windows; and even there they lost a bundle with ME and are on the same path with Vista).

Although copies of BOB might be antiques of the future. Given what the average user did with theirs, there can't be too many left...

Re: iPod Touch (threads merged)
 

http://www.microsoft.com/msft/earnin...rel_q3_07.mspx

At the bottom the Operating Income thing is what they actually earn? I don't know. But there bussiness division (That's Office) makes huge profit? I don't know anything about finances :)

Re: iPod Touch (threads merged)
 

Ummm no.
Office for Mac makes MS a nice piece of change.