Guest post by “The first computers were gigantic, filling rooms and requiring constant care and maintenance. […] The computer stayed on the desk until the laptop computer, a smaller, more portable, but just as powerful machine, made it nearly obsolete. And then, the iPhone was released, followed shortly after by Android and the Palm WebOS, and the next step in computing was clear. What we did not immediately understand was if mobile computing was an accessory, or a replacement, for the traditional desktop machines.” Jon-Buys at Ostatic believes the phone-becomes-computer paradigm is the next step.
“Ubuntu phone looks like the future of computing”
God help us all if that is the case.
please, desktop/workstations are far from being obsolete. Same goes for laptops. I can’t imagine ever getting real work done on a phone, be it Ubuntu or not.
Read the story.
What makes your desktop a desktop? If its anything other than the size of the box holding the cpu, then you can’t have much of an objection to this concept.
I have a slightly different vision:
Imagine you walk in the office, place you phone on a charger/dock and … built in projector lights up the wall (or a projecting canvas) and a laser traces a virtual keyboard on your desk …
Same general idea, your cpu & storage is always with you and is adaptable to the best input/out put mechanisms at hand, whatever you define those to be.
But,would you really enjoy the lack of feedback a laser displayed keyboard would provide? I’m a touch typist, I don’t need the letters to actually be ledigble on a keyboard as I never look at them while typing. I think its a terrible idea. Give me a real keyboard anyday. I don’t care if its a projector, LCD, Plasma, CRT, or E-ink as long as the display is crisp, readable and sufficiently large enough for me to work.
I think in terms of ultra portability and desktop clutter removal projected keyboard is the future. Tactile feedback notwithstanding, audio feedback can certainly be provided.
Just because right now there is no proper product in this category, it doesn’t mean there will never be a good implementation of such a product
Clearly, you are not a touch typist. When we say “feedback,” we don’t simply mean the feedback of pressing the keys though that is part of it and is a comfort factor. We refer to the fact that you’re able to put your fingers on the home row of the keyboard and not move your hands from that position until you need to use the mouse. Those of us who can touchtype, we find the home row instantly and go from there. We do not look at the keyboard at all, we type entirely from muscle memory. We know where the home row is, we know where the letters are in relation to our fingers’ default positions, and simply go from there. There is no virtual keyboard of any kind, either with audio feedback or without it, that will allow this. It’s physically impossible to do this without having real, genuine keys until you can find a way to project tactile surfaces with a laser.
Terrible idea. I had one of these back in college, purchased from ThinkGeek. You had to look down the entire time you type (no tactile feedback), and it was slow to respond. It took about five minutes to type a paragraph before I decided to sell it to a friend.
The Mozilla community had a concept phone with such an idea:
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Mozilla+Seabird+Concept…
A projector built in a smartphone ain’t gonna replace a real display for work. For one thing, it just can’t put out the same amount of light, and therefore you’re much more readily at the mercy of ambient light around you. Secondly, you’ll have to place the phone/its doc in rather awkward places so as to keep the image uniform and still not have your head or office tools constantly obscuring the image, let alone the other people in the office!
On a similar note, a virtual keyboard is a lot, lot worse to write on than a real one. It might work for people who have very little need to write anything, but it sure as hell won’t work for codecs, translators, book authors, in general anyone who has to write a lot of text on a daily basis.
I think the author is just trying to be a little too futurist for his own good. I could see a scenario where offices were kitted out with wireless displays (wifi-direct, miracast, airplay or whatever) and bluetooth keyboards and mice. Just no actual desktop tower. Obviously, it wouldn’t be as cheap as the author’s “hologram” solution, but a lot more workable.
It’s actually what many companies envisage in the near future, though I suspect the first models (Ubuntu OS notwithstanding) will probably limit themselves to running a browser and some social apps in desktop mode initially.
I doubt workstations will lose their place for serious work, but the average office worker and “netizen” would probably get by just fine with a device that could handle desktop duties for browsing, office software, games and social apps. Go to office, connect to monitor on desk. Go back home, connect to TV. Maybe a wireless storage (NAS) of some kind (or cloud if they insist) for backups and media, or for when their handset gets lost/stolen.
Edited 2013-01-22 02:44 UTC
I would say first and foremost connectivity: a real desktop can connect to a dozen different devices simultaneously. Secondly, performance. To a lesser extent customizability. Fourth, a desktop-oriented OS.
Only the third one is really something that a smartphone can’t do and won’t be able to do, the other two mostly just come down to time — ie. technological advancements in CPU/GPU – tech — and to making a dock with lots of connectors. Whip up an OS that can transition from mobile-oriented interface to a desktop-oriented interface when needed, fashion a good, proper dock, and make it all work together completely seamlessly and you’ll have no problems substituting a smartphone for a desktop in most areas of life.
Yeah like that..
Edited 2013-01-22 00:18 UTC
Why should you even need the phone? Imagine you carry a smartcard in your wallet, something with nothing more than basic credentials, like a cypher key. You go wherever you want, plug it into the card reader at the local dumb-terminal, and you are instantly back at your desktop.
If this is the reality you want, all you need is a server account somewhere, and a thin client/dumb terminal. Because all your stuff is on the server, you get the benefits of amazingly powerful hardware (out there on the server) and no risk/expense of loss (lose your card? Get a new one for $1. How much is your super-phone worth?) Furthermore, because all your stuff is out there on the server (sorry, it’s called a cloud now, I suppose?) it’s available to you wherever you go.
I think we’re closer to that reality, and in fact it’s not too different from a reality we already had back in the 1970s.
What you described would otherwise be perfectly feasible, but it falls down on its face due to a single issue: bandwidth. Especially outgoing data is still throttled and limited in huge amounts, but even for inbound data you need a very good connection to be able to work at e.g. 1080p resolution with minimal input latency. Now, combine that with ISPs and mobile broadband – operators placing cap on the amount of data transferred and you’ll quickly realize that that just ain’t only unfeasible but downright impossible as things stand.
OTOH the envisioned scenario reminded me about some past predictions… http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Home_computer#The_Home_Computer_.22Rev…
“And then, the iPhone was released, followed shortly after by Android and the Palm WebOS”
Should be:
And then, Palm OS was released, followed shortly after by iPhone, Android, and WebOS
This breathless account of something that is both obvious and has been happening for six years is just too much. Of course smart phones are computers. That has been clear from when the first iPhone launched and was obvious once the App Store launched and took off. And Ubuntu is definitely not the future of anything
Interestingly when Apple was designing the first iPhone they were going to call it the iPad and market it as a computer that also had a phone function built it. In the end they decided not to, but what’s clear is that Apple always saw the iPhone as a computer.
No, it was clear since PDAs came out. Way before iPhone. The fact that mobile computers were combined with telephony wasn’t really a revolutionary breakthrough in technological thought, though it was a breakthrough in consumer market.
Everyone I know who has an iphone (and these days it seems like every American walking the city streets has an iphone; where’s the diversity?) says that the iphone is a pocket computer that happens to have phone capability. Furthermore, most confess as a telephone it’s somewhat mediocre. Interesting.
As for the PDA revolution, I remember well the days when we were asking if PDAs would absorb phone features, or if phones would absorb PDA features. It’s not really important which of those two scenarios actually happened, since where we wound up is the same.
I’m carrying a small Android phone by Samsung, and while I like it, there are still some things about it that make me miss my old cheapie cellphone (dumb phone). Furthermore, I’m not letting go of my desktop for any smartphone+Cloud Schmaboozle for anything on earth.
I see all kind of devices used by people around, and I can’t say that iPhone dominates them. I see Samsungs, Motorolas and other types used along with iPhones. May be my area in US has more diversity. I even saw N900 once recently, though I never saw N9 used in the street yet.
Edited 2013-01-21 21:54 UTC
I’m pretty sure the article is specifically talking about “Personal Computing” as is the modern status quo – desktops with keyboards, mice, and monitors…
You might want to read up on the feature set of Ubuntu Phone before you comment further. Yes, the iPhone is and was certainly a computer, but so was the average PDA that predated it. What it isn’t is a functional replacement for you PC – and it has never in the last 6 years tried to be one…
An Ubuntu Phone device IS trying to be a functional PC replacement. Whether it succeeds or not is a different story – but your cavalier response that this is “obvious” neglects to acknowledge that this is the opposite of what Apple is trying to do with iPhones and iPads.
Apple is either trying to replace PCs with something completely different, or they are content with it being a companion device. An Unbuntu Phone is trying to make one device that fulfills both roles, a portable computing device AND a conventional desktop PC.
Well see how it goes. I’m not saying it will work, and it certainly isn’t a new idea. But neither was a touch screen portable communication device… Just as with Apple’s success, it boils down to timing and execution.
How does the fact that Steve Jobs wanted the iPhone to be a completely locked-down appliance with no possibility for the end-users to install applications on them at all fit in your description? Doesn’t sound at all like what you’re portraying.
Edited 2013-01-21 23:24 UTC
Exactly. Apple explicitly said that they didn’t want to frame iPad as a general purpose mobile computer.
Quickly, bung a load of references to the brilliance of Apple into the conversation! Phew, that was a close one; we almost managed to have an intelligent debate about a potentially interesting new direction for computing without an unnecessary fruity reference.
For what its worth, I think Canonical could really be on to something here. Shame they’re going to be competing with Mozilla for market share though, I’d rather see the two work together.
Why would anyone want Ubuntu on a phone? Not even bashing it because it is Ubuntu, but why would anyone want it? Android is optimized significantly better for mobile devices than Ubuntu. It has a gigantic app selection. It has a much bigger company behind it offering that guarantee that Android won’t go bankrupt. It has massive vendor support. Same goes for iOS, minus the vendor support. I don’t see why anyone would go for Ubuntu unless you just like to tinker with your phone. Android and iOS make much more sense for business.
Moreover, why would anybody want to run it on the desktop?
Ok, that might sound like I’m trolling, but if I don’t want to run it on the desktop now, I sure as hell won’t want to just because it’s on a phone. They are trying to cross over into a market where they might have 2% penetration at best.
Have you seen the new Ubuntu phone mockup?
http://www.ubuntu.com/devices/phone
Its not the same unity interface that is available for phones and tablets. Its actually designed for the smaller form factor. I just assumed this is what the author meant.
You could have said the same thing slightly differntly a couple years ago…
or ..
Very true, but the mobile market was still very young then.
I’m still waiting for the moment when Google will offer Nexus XX, which can be connected to monitor and ChromeOS starts. Everything is in the cloud, so you don’t need much storage, processing power or memory. I would buy it immediately.
Of course I also would buy immediately an iPhone, which can run OSX on a large screen.
This is pretty much what goes around in my head.
Regardless of the OS used, i also think its a great idea to have everything for your computing needs in your pocket. Docking it on whatever you work on (and how about you can upgrade your docking bay just like a regular desktop or have a variant that is upgradetable for our workstation enthusiasts like me).
In all honesty it would be awesome. Ubuntu as mobile OS seems fit for the task in its current idea. I think there is space for improvement. Modern Smartphones have quadcore cpus and enough ram to actually be productive with it.
Why would the desktop environment on an Ubuntu phone have to be Unity, rather than one of the other common Linux desktops? If the phone’s got enough smarts to know it’s supposed to present a full-blown DE when plugged into its dock and connected to an external keyboard, mouse or other pointing device, and display, why cant that DE be LXDE (my personal preference at the moment) or any other Linux DE already available for Ubuntu?
Moreover, since Android already has a bunch of custom ROMs and launchers there is really nothing that prevents Android from being used mostly the same way.
A few years ago Android was absolutely nothing and Google managed to create a product as good or better than iOS for phones.
Nothing will make me happier than having a phone that is both a great phone and a full PC at the same time.
Tablets are great gadgets but I just don’t see them as the future of computing. Multitasking and multipurpose machines like the future Ubuntu phone PC make more sense to me; but then again, only time will tell.
Considering Ubuntu’s track record in system stability (or lack there of) there’s no way I’d ever trust it on my phone. What’s that you say, update-manager? An update for my kernel? clickity clickity, reboot, and my audio is broken (that’d be a real problem on a phone, wouldn’t you say?). An X.org video driver update? click click, reboot, dammit now I have to fix X.org from the console. I’ve had both these things happen a multitude of times, and many other breakages besides thanks to Canonical’s lack of attention to detail. That doesn’t even cover what I’ve seen break when going from release to release rather than just applying minor updates. Yes, I can fix it. No, that’s not the point.
Now, I might very well trust a Debian phone or a Red Hat phone (though not a Fedora phone). I’ve had very little problems with them over the years. But Ubuntu? Forget it! I don’t trust Canonical as far as I can throw them anymore, considering how many times their updates have broken one thing or another. Ask Dell how well trusting Ubuntu’s stability worked out for them, if you don’t believe me.
We have been here before. No, not just the predictions of a replacement of some type, but something much more insidious and stupefying.
Decades ago, computing was not available to the masses. Mainframes and super-computers were available only to governments, academics, and large corporations that could afford them. Then the micro-computer revolution occurred. The Apple II, the Amiga, the Atari, the IBM PC, the Tandy, etc. allowed the everyday person access to computing power once only found on mainframes. People programmed their computers. They were in homes and elementary schools, and they predicted then, like now, that mainframes and super-computers were now obsolete. They were wrong. They are still with us and even more powerful than ever though similarly they often have to emulate the micro-computers that ‘replaced’ them.
Fast forward to the beginning of the 21st century, and now ‘phones’ are the new micro-computer. They are predicted to replace the desktop workstation. They will grow in usage and replace eventually some features and aspects – casual gaming, basic communications through email, texting, Skype, etc., and browsing. They will even replace some of the basic little day-to-day applications. But they will not replace things like application development, audio & video production, and specialized graphics work like CAD & Photoshop for professionals. And just like in the 70’s, 80’s, & 90’s, people will use these at home and on the road and still need desktop workstations at least at work whether that means also at home or only at the office.
But here is the history repeating that few ‘futurists’ seem to get. This won’t give us more freedom or control. It will give us less. Locked down systems with walled-gardens and corporate controlled application stores is in no significant way any different than the beginnings of computing history with mainframes and super-computers controlled by others. Techies yammer on about how we will all be programming in the decades to come on the super computers in our pockets. Bullshit, we will be passive consumers using computing appliances attached to cloud servers (mainframes!) and paying our ‘fee’ for the content they provide. We won’t be creating it so much any more but rather simply consuming it.
So we are coming full circle in the next few decades. This isn’t a linear progression and evolution. The men and few women who started a revolution decades ago have simply grown up and just like their fathers want to conserve and control what they developed. I do not view this development with any soft of joy or anticipation. I have used Ubuntu, and out of all the Linux flavors I have used, it has been by far the worse. Constant breakage when updating, constant changes to the UI, and constant privacy and control measures implemented year after year are more than enough to dissuade me from ever wanting to use an Ubuntu phone as a desktop replacement.
Nice historical overview. A bit … bleak.
Large tablets OTOH (an offshoot of the new phone UIs) …could be great for CAD (return of the drafting table, but now computerised!) and video/audio/image production.
you arrive at work in the morning, sit down at your desk, and drop your phone into the dock
I guess you could use one of these:
http://www.daydeal.com/product.php?productid=67740&gclid=CKSIgpK2-7…
Edited 2013-01-22 07:25 UTC
The funny thing is that Gates, when asked in an interview about OLPC brought exactly that vision as an alternative.
Edited 2013-01-22 08:31 UTC