Hi All,

I was playing with my n900 yesterday when I messed up with something and it hung (downloading/installing some app while playing with few others side by side), at the same time one of my friends was trying to reach me over my phone for something very urgent. As the device was hung I did not receive any incoming call on it, however my friend could hear my phone ringing, he kept on trying but in vain.
Finally he called at my Home number (and to his luck I was there....) and only then we could talk. He told me that he was trying to reach me for long but I was Not answering his call, I tried to explain him what was wrong with the phone to which he replied---"What good is "Smartphone" when one can't make or recieve a call on it....when one may need it the most".
This has left me thinking....with all this "Apps, Games, OS...etc." have we completely Compromised on the Basic Telephony utility of these "Smartphones".
I agree that these phone are "More than an ordinary phone", but what I want to point out is that doesn't the word "More" here means Add on or more in terms of capability, performance etc. over an ordinary phone???
Instead what I see is a "Compromise" under the disguise of "More", and that too on the very basic and primary qualification criteria for any device that claims itself to fall under the category of "Phone/Communication Device", i.e. being a Phone first (and Smart later)...
I often find some apps use so much of CPU and memory that the "Phone UI" is sometimes very slow to pop-up and even when it does one finds it buggy most of the times.....

Any thoughts on this guys...................

Regards
Ak
P.S.--I still Love my n900 though

What you describe is not just a problem with the N900, this is absolutely an issue for all modern mobile computing platforms (aka mobile phones)

The telephony aspects of the N900, and others, are handled by separate processors. In simple terms this means that Maemo can crash out completely, but in the depths of your device the IC's responsible for network connectivity are still functioning just fine. Obviously maemo has died so it's simply not able to notify you of the incoming call.

This does not mean that your device can't acknowledge the call on the network - it explains why your (forgive me) ignorant friend rants about 'smart' phones not being so smart after all. The same thing does happen with <insert any brand you like here>

If you want a modern device to notify you of calls no matter what, then you'll need to go a bit retro - Nokia Series 40 or older : )

n900 has left me very frustrated with its phone function. and thats exactly what the phone feature is - another function. it usually has high priority over all other runnins apps so you dont miss a call but this hasnt always worked.

recently my screen has started to go all grey when a call comes - regardless of what im doin. or the screen doesnt light up so i guess where the answer button is. although a fun game its not great when you miss urgent calls.

yes i know - have i tweaked my phone? but of course. thats the reason n900 exists. i still love it to bits.

Interesting thought.

You see, the thing is, which one is bolted onto the other - is the phone a bolt-on to a the mobile computing platform or is the mobile computing platform a bolt-on to the phone?

I suppose ultimately you have to consider what you wanted when you got hold of your (and I hate using this term, it's pompous, but) "device" and what the primary function you thought you would use it for. I got mine to act primarily as a phone, with secondary functions being portable music library, internet, Sat-Nav, films and camera functions. On this basis I would have to say that potentially, yes, the basic telephony aspect has been compromised as sometimes call quality is a little dodgy (though this is mainly in part to my laziness in not sending it back to Nokia to sort out the incessant buzzing).

However, if all I wanted out of it was the phone aspect as dchky above said, I would have simply gone for a trusty 6310i as it was amongst the best phones I have ever had.

Because I also want the additional benefits of internet connection, WiFi, camera, movie player, media centre, etc ad nauseum, I have to accept that the telephony aspect may be, not necessarily compromised, rather more of a secondary function.

There are plenty of people on this forum who probably have never taken a call on their N900 - developers and linux gurus who wanted the benefit of a portable linux platform in their pocket. Writing scripts and apps is their primary requirement and therefore the telephony aspect is somewhat a non-entity to them.

It depends what you want. And what you are prepared to compromise. I want a phone but I also want everything else that modern microprocessor technology has to offer and on that basis alone I am prepared to deal with the occassional system hang, freeze, lag, reboot or whatever other event I have to to have the convenience of all the above.....

I am using telepathy..

hummmmmm

you have screen protector in your device, correct?

and you should also know that when tweaking you might break something important....

I have had mobile phones hanging before they became "smart".
There's nothing new here.

I personally see phone calls as the annoying thing that pops up on my computer lol. But yeah on the N900 the phone process is just another process. Android smartphones do task killing i think while the iPhone just limits what you can do to make sure you have enough resources for a phone call.

LOL.
Yeah. Who is that person thinking he is allowed to interrupt me anytime he wants?

IIRC the phone functionality is implemented in DSP code and is not running on normal CPU. CPU is running only the GUI frontend showing you who is calling and allowing to answer.

So, in OP case, the phone was fully functioning and signaling there was an incoming call. "Only" the UI was frozen and unable to handle the signal.

Question is whether there might be some possibility of having a setting\profile regarding the priority telephony should be getting. That way someone might be able to decide at different times what is more important. In windows, FWIW, there was a setting "boost for performance" or "boost for apperance" (or something like that).
I would love to have the ability to decide what priority my phone gets at different times. If i'm only listening to music, but left my browser on so I wouldn't have to look for the URL again later, I would want telephone to have high priority. Or if I was waiting for an important call - I could boost responsiveness to the phone. But if I was just working on something important like an install of some new app I didn't want to get screwed up - I would say, let whomever, call again later.
Or maybe, there could be some sort of "responsivity notification" that tells you - how responsive your phone would be given all the things that are open - so you could see - hey my phone is gonna miss calls unless I close things down.
I don't know if this is possible - but just a constructive thought rather than say "well, what did you a get an n900 for - not for the phone..." .

That's one of the things the closed policy system on this tablet is for. Look at the file /usr/share/policy/etc/current/syspart.conf.