Is All Hope Lost For Non-Android Linux Tablets?

[DanLamb]

I love desktop Linux for the shells and the repos and its open, customizable nature.

Android seems much better at everything related to GUI than Gnome/GTK.

The thought of a Gnome/GTK tablet/smartphone sounds terrible. I'd rather see the Linux shell environment and repo culture combined with Android GUI capability.

[e8hffff]

There isn't. Moreover, it was perfectly predictable that Ubuntu Touch would fail. I have every reason to gloat but in all seriousness it's sad. Mark did a huge mistake back in 2009 when he chose to become a Steve Jobs wannabe. And now it's too late to turn back. People have moved on to other distros.

So you'd have Mark being Steve Ballmer, ignoring the mobile market till it's too late

The fact is Ubuntu-Touch is a big achievement as it is, the problem though is that it's not ready for market. It needs polish and for someone to harmonise the Core Applications to their initial project designs that got everyone excited for a good reason. Those designs were impressive.

[e8hffff]

Here are some of the original designs.












This is the current design



It's like the Art/Design Team went on holidays.

[johnc]

Holy crap that's amazing. It's like taking the flat look to a whole new level of boring.

[AJenbo]

What about full windows 8 x86 tablet? You should be able to boot and install any linux distro on those.
Something like the dell venue 8 pro or the Asus T100.

They are digitally signed to only boot win

[amagnoni]

android was not a success at beginning, but after many years, its starting to make a mark.

these companys forgot to wait and expend their own money on the projects.

ubuntu without mark didnt have become this huge. but he didnt like expending without return.

[oliver]

I thought signed secure boot has to be disable-able on x86 so you could in fact install other distro's?

[verde]

It's like the Art/Design Team went on holidays.

Totally agree. I want to hope that it design is not finished (too).

[AJenbo]

I thought signed secure boot has to be disable-able on x86 so you could in fact install other distro's?

Most tablets are ARM

[nitroflow]

All hope is lost for non-android tablets in the same way all hope is lost for non-Microsoft PCs. In terms of hardware there's simply no competition spec and price wise with the big manufacturers. Maybe it will be better after Intel d?buts it's low power processors targeted at the arm market and only if they maintain the same openness they do on their desktop/server side. Otherwise expect mediocre hardware at best for a custom device. The only alternate solution is converting an android tablet.

As for the software side, there's Tizen and there's mer and all the UIs built on top of it like Plasma Active, Sailfish OS, Nemo and Seadot. I don't really know where Ubuntu Touch will end up but I don't see it bringing anything relevant to what Tizen aims to be, except for it's brand. I'm also interested to see GNOME 3 on a tablet since that will be more familiar to what's already on the desktop.