My vote goes for ARM with NEON on board.

In Twitter:

"There will be a developer mode that enables hacking"

http://twitter.com/JollaMobile/statu...43721300201473

So that would point to no separate developer device, but all devices can be put into developer mode. But I guess we'll see later.

The second half of that message is "and details will come later", so there's more to it than that. Am I the only one having deja vu?

Linux Mint on desktop computers are a good example of what I'd like to see emerge on mobile devices. The hardware itself is open (more or less), including the possibility to run your OS of choice; even a proprietary one from Microsoft, should you wish. The Linux Mint OS has a UI that would appeal also to almost computer illiterate people, meaning you really don't have to be interested in *how* it works, because it just does, pretty much at least. That's the aim. And Mint doesn't separate "users"/"consumers" from "developers". The owner of the device running Linux Mint is the one with most control over the system, but doesn't need extensive knowledge of computers. Someone who wants the system to "just work" could be happy with Mint. If something needs to be fixed, the person can learn how to fix it, ask a friend or pay someone to do it. You can do that, you're not at the mercy of company x, who may or may not exist in n years.

Why then, would a mobile device, connected to the same tcp/ip network, need to be different? I can come to think of reasons why someone would want that though - but it has to do with control, which in turn tend to lead to opportunities to make more money by (ab)using the device owner. [also; see qole's related post].

Destroying part of the hardware because of tinkering with the device - could be an issue. But how is that different from the situation with desktop computers?

again medfield has not been tested on a mobileplatform and is a heavy risk for a small player success with an untested cpu.

also I dont want to have 35 year bloated architecture on my devices.

But a 29-year old one (ARM was introduced in 1983) is fine? For that matter, if you're going by age, doesn't a Unix (43 years old now) OS on your devices bother you?

Then again, if it was young you'd reject it as "untested"...

ATM I have lost every little inch of confidence for Jolla. The phone will be closed, no hacking possible, a consumer device. A "developer version" will be released, so what? The Galaxy Nexus covers all that - and more. Heck, the Galaxy SII/III can be used for devs and hackers.

I have seen so much just gone up in smoke regarding smartphones, I have no faith left. But now I know why.

The basics, it IS all about the ecosystem. A smartphone is a tool that interacts with the ecosystem. That is all it is. Without an ecosystem a smartphone is nothing, it's just a bloated dumb phone. There is one exception form this basic rule, and that is the N900, a smartphone that is just as much PC as it is a phone. If only Jolla could make such a device (dual/quad core, 4+ inch screen, HW keyboard), but no, they have to **** it up instead.

I have had Palm. Down the drain because Palm just couldn't make a modern OS. Great ecosystem, but when WebOS came it was way too late, and the devices were way too ugly anyway.

Symbian. Dead because Nokia didn't manage to modernize the OS nor the ecosystem. It needed a rebuild all from the core. The death of Symbian is the sadest thing that has ever happened in the mobile industry.

Maemo. Dead. But let's be honest. The N900 was King. The N9 was/is too geeky for the masses and just too stupid to be a replacement for the N900. The N9 can't even be reflashed at will, and this sucks (I mean even Bada and Symbian phones can be reflashed at will, and not to speak about Android phones)

WM. Dead, and thank God for that. Kind of cool actually in a strange way, but the world is better of without it.

UIQ. Dead even before Symbian was gone. Lots of potential and some of the solutions were way ahead of it's time. But too small ecosystem, devices with too little HP, and too fiddly.

Bada. A zombie. Excellent little OS, but ultimately let down by a core not up to snuff regarding UI that is a bit more advanced than a calculator. This shows in Bada 2.0. It should have used Linux or even Symbian instead of this Nucleus sheisse. Can't compete with Android in any case due to ecosystem, so why bother.

RIM. Soon dead, and thank God.

My personal take on things right now is this. WP is the best OS ever for day to day use - period. What it lacks of features (and that's a lot) will be made up for in WP8. WP7 is also continuously improving with added features every week from Nokia. Still, I'm waiting to see actual stuff out there to be certain But the ecosystem is vast and great and deep, so my guts tells me WP8 will be great. Android is great (from ICS), but the ecosystem is shallow and the broadening to PC and gaming is not even in the horizon yet. Apple is apple, I don't like Apple, but lots of people do. Then there is Baidu which I know too little about, but apparently it is rolling along nice.

And in comes Jolla. They want to be an "alternative". Well, I don't want an "alternative", I don't want yet another closed system. WP7 and later WP8 will satisfy my needs for communication, and if not then Android will, I may even go iOS, but not after S40. I don't want a "developer device", I have no need for that. The only alternative for me would be a fully open device, a modernized N900 with HW keyboard (E7 form factor), full HW stack (USB2go, HDMI, FM rx/tx etc etc). THAT is the alternative I want.

Orange San Diego review: Intel does phones, finally
Medfield on Android

ARM1 CPU design is from 1985........

...we do not know things other than from (sometimes ambiguous) translations yet.

Long-time lurker, first-time poster. While I am delighted that someone has taken the baton on developing a true Linux phone, I am more than a little skeptical that we will ever see a product. Here are my thoughts.

Firstly, you cannot ignore the matter of how this company is funded. In the grand scheme of things, a few months worth of redundancy payments that Nokia have offered will easily be exhausted within a month. Anyone who has ever setup a business will know that your initial overheads are massive (rent on a building, rates, insurance, utility bills, office furniture/equipment, salaries, etc.). This start-up will already have gobbled up millions of Euro and if they are expanding their team to over 100, then the costs will go into tens of millions. Nokia won't be providing this kind of cash to a competitor, so there is obviously an unknown backer(s) behind the scenes here. Is the backer capable of sustaining this spending with no revenue? How long will the backer be willing to wait until they see a return on their investment? Whoever is backing this is putting a lot on the line with a pretty high probability of failure.

As for the device itself, you can make a few assumptions about it. Firstly, I would almost certainly say that it will be a touch device like the N9 rather than something with a physical keyboard like the N900. The physical keyboard unfortunately seem to be dying out, so it's unlikely that Jolla are going to try and swim against the tide on this. Secondly, it's unlikely that this device is going to be as technically good as the flagship devices that competitors are making (i.e. the Iphone 4s, the Galaxy S3, the HTC One X). My reasoning here is that the cost for a start-up in sourcing cutting edge cameras, CPU's, screens, etc. is going to be too high. Only the likes of billion dollar companies like Apple and Samsung have the economies of scale to ramp production up to reduce costs. I would hope that Jolla are smart enough to realise this, and that they have enough tricks up their sleeve on the software/OS side that they can mitigate this. Despite all the massive disadvantages that they have going against them, they do have some critical advantages of essentially being a green field project. Firstly, they can be hardware agnostic. It makes no sense for Jolla to try and figure out whether they should go down the ARM or x86 route, hopefully they are smart enough to realise this. Also, Jolla won't have any relationship lock-up's like Nokia have with Microsoft, or the emotional lock-up that RIM has with Blackberry OS.