Report: Linux to Become Fastest-Growing Smartphone OS

ABI Research has released a new report that claims over the next 5 years, Linux is expected to be the fastest growing Smartphone OS with a compound annual growth rate in excess of 75%. By 2012, a recent study from ABI Research forecasts the Linux-based OS to account for nearly 31% of all smart devices in the market — representing more than 331 million cumulative shipments over the same period.
Read more at Mobile Linux Info...

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also count new PalmOS II

icarus @ 8/30/2007 3:11:57 PM # Q
Well Palm will support this trend by its new PalmOS_II.

Somewhat cool. :-)

(Because I like Linux.)


icarus

Palm III, Palm III, Palm m105, Palm Tungsten T, palmOne LifeDrive, palmOne Tungsten T5, Palm TX

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Timely!

SeldomVisitor @ 8/30/2007 4:11:49 PM # Q
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What does it mean?

theog @ 8/30/2007 8:58:45 PM # Q
Nothing... research like this is meaningless... 2012? Nobody can see that far in the future with tech. Hell, symbian could have some grand releases and take over... guess we could provide research to back that up.

windows mobile could go the way of windows desktop... with the major players getting behind it.

But reports like this will only fuel competition with Microsoft, symbian, linux, and whoever else... good for the customer.

Vote for John Kerry... best man for the job.

RE: What does it mean?
twrock @ 8/31/2007 1:09:22 AM # Q
windows mobile could go the way of windows desktop... with the major players getting behind it.

I'd be surprised if that ends up happening this time around. I would think that the "major players" would not be anxious to "help" MS become the standard OS in the smartphone world as well. (Obviously some companies are looking for "immediate profit" and will jump right in there regardless of the long-term consequences.) I certainly hope that we don't end up with a mobile OS monopoly. It isn't that I hate all things Microsoft, just that I have seen where the monopoly got us in the desktop world, and like you, I'd rather have better options in the mobile world. At least with opensource the "players" can take it wherever they want to without one company dictating all the terms.


Thinking about Vista? Think again: http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.txt
Want an alternative? Try this: http://www.ubuntu.com/ or http://www.mepis.org/
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The year of the Linux Desktop!

PenguinPowered @ 8/31/2007 1:08:46 AM # Q
Er, wait, I mean, Smartphone. Yeah, that's it, that's the ticket.


May You Live in Interesting Times

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The opposite is happening

sgiga @ 8/31/2007 1:29:28 AM # Q
In the real world, the exact opposite is happening. Linux is loosing big-time in favour of Symbian, RIM, WM and iPhone. Scroll down on the page. Linux actually had 20% market share at some time, now it is is 13%.

http://www.symbian.com/about/fastfacts/fastfacts.html


RE: The opposite is happening
joad @ 9/1/2007 3:56:20 PM # Q
Yup - same thing with Apple.

People here probably remember them - they used to sell a desktop computer called the "Macintosh," sales started sliding years ago and I think they just threw in the towel or went over to developing mp3 players or something. If you have a year (or a few bad years) then Microsoft will eat your lunch and you are a goner.

Nothing Linux can do - if the OS isn't being deployed today as much as they were yesterday then they are doomed. Trends are permanent, dontcha know.

Another vote for more RAM in the Treo series!

RE: The opposite is happening
sgiga @ 9/3/2007 6:35:43 PM # Q
I would like Linux to grow instead of shrink, but that is not what is happening. On the other hand, a closed Linux, is that really a Linux (in the correct sense of the word)?

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Don't believe the hype

Gekko @ 8/31/2007 3:26:11 PM # Q

i remember when linux for PCs was going to "rule the world" too.

all of you haters can't stop MICROSOFT.


RE: Don't believe the hype
TooMuch @ 9/1/2007 10:18:03 AM # Q
First, Microsoft isn't under a death threat from Linux OS, Symbian, Palm OS or etc., but they DON'T & WON'T rule them or the smartphone market either. Windows Mobile is visually too complicated. I am sorry it is. The whole MS Windows world is getting more & more like this in the user experience. It seems to me that MS greatest impending enemy is their own programming & design team.

As for the "it won't happen now because it didn't happen then" argument, come on. People who actually believe this kind of stuff have a "singing bass" hanging on their wall. :)

What if the manufacturers of the smartphones choose to put Linux OS in 75% of their smartphones? What if the Linux OS can successfully run old Garnet OS apps? What if the Linux OS can successfully run...?



RE: Don't believe the hype
AdamaDBrown @ 9/24/2007 11:52:28 PM # Q
I have to agree with Gekko. Linux for smartphones won't dominate for the same reason Linux doesn't gain traction on the desktop. You want to talk about complexity? Mobile Linux has no unified UI, no set architecture, no compatibility across brands, and a completely disorganized roadmap. Just look at ALP versus Palm OS II. Two Linux-based OSes, both ostensibly based off the classic Palm design, but odds are very good that neither will run applications made for the other. Same goes for the Zaurus, the OpenMoko, Motorola's Ming, and all the other Linux-based platforms. The only programs which are compatible across them are things like Java.

Linux may accumulate big numbers--nowhere even close to what this report is talking about, though reasonably big--but it will be for the same reason that Symbian has big numbers: glorified feature phones running a "real OS" kernel underneath, particularly in the Asian theatre for Linux. If you pare it back to the devices actually worth calling smartphones, it gets a lot smaller.

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Someone mention ALP?

SeldomVisitor @ 9/24/2007 4:37:41 PM # Q
-- http://forum.brighthand.com/showpost.php?p=1583200&postcount=72

How crazy would it be if Good Ol' Palm, having discarded PalmSource then having bought back PalmOS (or the important bits at least) now will have discarded ALP/Cobalt only to buy IT back, too!

Think it could happen?

Whatta game!

RE: Someone mention ALP?
twrock @ 9/24/2007 10:53:57 PM # Q
having discarded PalmSource

Classic spin there SV.
Here's a new tagline for you:
"History: more interesting the more I revise it."


Thinking about Vista? Think again: http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.txt
Want an alternative? Try this: http://www.ubuntu.com/ or http://www.mepis.org/
RE: Someone mention ALP?
TreoAnon @ 9/25/2007 2:03:45 AM # Q
Best of luck to PalmSource/Access, but I don't see what they are doing to be relevant to Palm.
There is too much history and a different implementation of Linux.
It will be interesting if hardware runing ALP ships with a Linux-based PalmOS simulator before Palm ships their Linux-based system with unknown support for PalmOS.

RE: Someone mention ALP?
SeldomVisitor @ 9/25/2007 6:10:39 AM # Q
> ...having discarded PalmSource
>
> Classic spin there SV.

Uh...you ARE aware of the PALM/PalmSource split, right?

Sheesh - you really shouldn't try to find controversy where there isn't any.

It makes you look stupid.

Trust me - you DON'T need that.

RE: Someone mention ALP?
twrock @ 9/25/2007 7:36:22 AM # Q
So then you are saying that "split" has the same meaning as "discard"? Are you trying to revise your own post now? If you had written accurately in the first place, I would not have commented at all.

Thanks for the heads up, but I don't think I'm the one who needs to be concerned about looking "stupid."


Thinking about Vista? Think again: http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.txt
Want an alternative? Try this: http://www.ubuntu.com/ or http://www.mepis.org/

RE: Someone mention ALP?
Poopie @ 9/25/2007 12:04:28 PM # Q

It will be interesting if hardware runing ALP ships with a Linux-based PalmOS simulator before Palm ships their Linux-based system with unknown support for PalmOS.

Either ALP is entirely irrelevant, or they're making Palm coffin nails.

If ALP devices come out that are in some way better than a Treo, or if ALP is better than Palm's Linux, or if ALP's emulation of legacy PalmOS apps is better, or if ALP comes out first, or if there are more licensees and devices running ALP...

Aside from a bread-and-butter smartphone offering, Palm needs *something* that really captures people's imagination again -- even if it's not a large-scale success. The need to have a "Corvette" for their showroom, even though most people buy the Cavalier.

Maybe something like a personal heads-up display system, or a 'wetware' computer interface, or an update to Palm desktop to make it caldav and ical aware?

USR Palm Pilot 1000 --> Palm Pilot Professional --> TRG SuperPilot --> Palm IIIc --> Palm V --> Palm M505 --> Palm M515 --> Tungsten T|2 --> Treo 600 --> LifeDrive --> iPhone

RE: Someone mention ALP?
mikecane @ 9/26/2007 12:06:03 PM # Q
PIC should post a poll:

If a device for sale in the U.S. runs ALP would you buy it?

1) Yes
2) No
3) Yes, goodbye Palm!
4) No, I'll wait for Palm's 2009 OS

RE: Someone mention ALP?
SeldomVisitor @ 9/26/2007 12:23:50 PM # Q
Giggle - you are NASTY!

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