Category: Mobile Technology

That has been the question running on my mind for so long. I use a HP desktop at work, currently running Windows XP SP2. But I know that, if I want, Linux could be made to run on it with minimal efforts (which involve scouting for drivers).  At home, I run around with a Pavilion DV2000 that came with a Vista but I kicked that out and ran XP SP3 for about 5 months before laying my hands on Windows 7 Ultimate evaluation version(which is as sexy as it gets).

If I so desire, I can run some geeky UNIX variants on the same laptop (unfortunately, I’m not a geek so that wouldn’t happen!). Even Apple, the holy grail of closed system, can dual-boot Windows using BootCamp.

The same can’t be said for any of the smart phones in town today. The laziest smart phone today is probably faster and better than the first PC I ever used (Compaq Pressario. Windows 95, 16MB Ram, 800MB Hard disk) but I I still don’t get that degree of flexibility.

I am waiting for that day when I can swap my Symbian for Windows Mobile. Or WebOS for Android.

Going back the computer memory lane, I can state categorically that the success that the PC had in changing the world (the PC really changed the world) is mostly due to the flexibility and interchangeability of its different components. That kudos belongs to the IBM guys who, surmounting all obstacles, brought out the IBM PC and its standards all within 1 calendar year.

I love Apple products, and they definitely started before the PC but their closed approach to the PC thingy is frustrating and stifles progress including theirs.

Where is my rambling taking me to? Not too far. The mobile phones of these days are much more powerful than PCs of not too far ago. In fact, I believe that sometimes in the near future, there would be a convergence where mobiles would be the PCs. Don’t laugh at me; computers before the PCs were as big as trucks!

However, the mobile guys are following the same route of Apple. They are semi-open and have APIs for guys like me (did I say me?) can write our applications on them. These phones run OSes from Microsoft, Symbian, etc but these OSes are so coupled/glued to the hardware that is it almost impossible to replace it with something else. In the PC world, I can have Linux, UNIX, Windows (and its flavors) running on just any PC happily as long as I can get the drivers. I can even get them to dual-boot! Why can’t I have same on my phones?

I had a Nokia E70. A beautiful phone albeit so slow you would end up smashing it up. I just thought why can’t I dump the Nokia idiotic OS and put in say a Linux?

Google is doing Android, an open platform which would solve some bits of these madness but what I dream about is when there can be 100% interchangeability of phones and the OS running them.

Firefox 2 is hardly sitting tight before the pretty boys at Mozilla started building the third iteration of the best browser in the world (sulk if you like!). You can read about some of the interesting features here.