Purism Shows Off The Librem 5 Linux Smartphone In Action

[cynical]

Why so negative guys? This seems like a major achievement to me. The phone is alive and apparently shipping.

Yes the UI probably isn’t the smoothest, but it’s a start. It’s exciting to see a free software phone since Canonical disappointingly ceased their efforts. I wish Purism the best here, and look forward to hearing some reviews from Phoronix readers who ordered one.

[futuretim]

Also, fwiw, I don't know if it's a bug or otherwise but something is screwed up with the "Likes" on posts. I've got dozens of emails about users liking one of two posts on this thread and yet they have a total of like 3 likes? WTF. Anyway, I don't particularly care as long as it's a malfunction and not something.... else.

[144Hz]

Wijis UBPorts and Plasma Mobile is not proven. They were disregarded after careful evaluation. Both represent a sunk cost and apparently not worth developing any further if you ask Canonical and Purism.

But your reasoning kinda stands. Pick what is proven. Today GTK is proven on Mobile because we got shipping mobile \o/

[NateHubbard]

Instead of using something proven (UBPorts or Plasma Mobile), they decided to reinvent the wheel.

Purism should have done that at the very least instead of farting around with the hot mess that is Gtk.

Having used UBPorts on a Nexus 5, I'm glad they didn't go the route you recommend.
This phone will at least bring something different to the table than the Pine Phone, which will probably be more to your liking.

[Wijis]

It does not run Gnome Shell. It does run Phosh/phoc based on wlroots(used in swaywm) with a mobile Gnome Design

True, it is not running GS, however, much of the stack powering the phone and its apps is based on GNOME. It's a huge reason why the product has been delayed. Instead of using something proven (UBPorts or Plasma Mobile), they decided to reinvent the wheel. As you would expect, it's been a very laborious process.

Ubuntu normally has a bad case of NIH but they did the right thing to go with Qt for their mobile experiment. Purism should have done that at the very least instead of farting around with the hot mess that is Gtk.

[sverris]

Well, why not remove all those words completely then, since true freedom doesn't exist?

This is a very good answer. Taking words literally often just gets absurd.

[Toggleton]

If a quad core i7 or a quad core Ryzen 5 can't run Gnome Shell at 60fps why do you expect the i.MX8 to be able to do that? I would say this is most likely not a problem in the Librem 5 stack, but rather a problem in Gnome Shell itself.

It does not run Gnome Shell. It does run Phosh/phoc based on wlroots(used in swaywm) with a mobile Gnome Design

[sarmad]

OK, so I watched the video... and I have one big complaint.

Where is my 60FPS scrolling?
Are widgets being drawn on the CPU, or is the GPU this weak?
It doesn't look smooth as a 2019 smartphone. It looks like an early smartphone from the 2000's.

If a quad core i7 or a quad core Ryzen 5 can't run Gnome Shell at 60fps why do you expect the i.MX8 to be able to do that? I would say this is most likely not a problem in the Librem 5 stack, but rather a problem in Gnome Shell itself.

[tildearrow]

OK, so I watched the video... and I have one big complaint.

Where is my 60FPS scrolling?
Are widgets being drawn on the CPU, or is the GPU this weak?
It doesn't look smooth as a 2019 smartphone. It looks like an early smartphone from the 2000's.

[L_A_G]

Neither is the Librem 5.

Maybe not, but using components that are still VHDL/Verilog files on a bunch of hardware engineers' computers or ideas sketched out on a whiteboard instead of silicon you can actually go out and buy today isn't exactly going to help.

Yes, I know there are physical chips that already exist, but they're not really usable in this use case. So we'll have to wait until someone starts selling a chip usable for this use case before RISC-V becomes a real alternative. Moaning about not using RISC-V in something that's supposed to start shipping out now/soon-ish is like moaning about a chip still being made of silicon rather than graphene or gallium arsenide.

Sure, it'll eventually be an option, but it's not one right now.