Sailfish OS 1.0 Announced, Sailfish Soon On Android

[Serge]

Just... meh. If I wanted an OS with some parts open and lots of parts closed I would just stick to Android.

We already have to have to put up with closed drivers, now people are trying to just get the kernell and the toolkits and then close almost everything else? Of course one could argue that since Steam and all its games are closed source Valve is basically the same, but the thing is Valve is doing historical stuff for Linux. What's the value in Sailfish? Just "more competition", "choice", and whatever. Bleh.

I don't want to come off sounding like a Jolla fanboy, but looking at that list, juding just by the names of the non-OSS components it seems to me that that's UI stuff, a bit of integration stuff, and a lot of config stuff. The UI stuff is certainly very interesting and I'm displeased that they have gone that route, but the other stuff doesn't really seem that particularly significant in an intellectual sense. Maybe tedious to put together, sure, but not entirely as useful or interesting to other open source developers.

In a perfect world, we'd have fully FOSS mobile systems. Not only would we be able to do as we please with the code itself (the OSS focus), but we'd be able to put our revised code on our devices and enable others to use our revised code as well at our pleasure (the free software focus). We are still far from that world, but what I've read is that Jolla has been doing a lot to improve other projects, like Mer and Nemo, that move us closer to that world. For that reason alone I wish for Jolla's success. Some time in the future, this won't be enough, and I'll desire a complete top to bottom GPLv3 stack to prevent vendors from locking me in. But that's for later. For now, this is a good enough step forward I think.

[GreatEmerald]

Just... meh. If I wanted an OS with some parts open and lots of parts closed I would just stick to Android.

We already have to have to put up with closed drivers, now people are trying to just get the kernell and the toolkits and then close almost everything else? Of course one could argue that since Steam and all its games are closed source Valve is basically the same, but the thing is Valve is doing historical stuff for Linux. What's the value in Sailfish? Just "more competition", "choice", and whatever. Bleh.

Wow, good job taking a slide completely out of context. It was presented as an overview for their open-sourcing roadmap. They are working on putting as many things on the right side to the left side, and this is where they are currently at. Clearly not everything will make it, for various reasons (Jolla-specific, patents, 3rd party code etc.), but they are trying to get as much of this open-sourced as possible.

It's not even on the same level as Android. Jolla is running a complete GNU/Linux stack, with both the kernel and the userland being standard issue GNU/Linux things (including systemd, Wayland and Btrfs). You can run any GNU/Linux program on it (as long as it's compiled for ARM and its dependencies met, naturally; you can also make use of Mer Build Service to create the RPMs). Those proprietary things are also completely optional, nothing is stopping you from installing the Nemo UI on the device. And you don't need to root it, and you can unlock the bootloader with provided tools (so you can probably even install vanilla Gentoo or such on it if you want). And, unlike most phone manufacturers, warranty is not void if you do that (unless obviously you do something that is definitely your fault, like overclocking it until it dies).

Google also contributes back to Linux, by the way.

Anyway - I'm not hating what Jolla has been doing, I'm just really sad. I'm sad that these brilliant people that have been working on this open source operating system/ecosystem for so many years, still seem to be missing the point, I mean, the essence, the most important 'thing' about open source software. That is, collaboration between the individuals (and companies) all over the world, who strive to make a better operating system. Jolla's operating system should have been open source since day one, and it should have been available for people to download, use and develop for ages, way before knowing what a future phone might look like. It should have been on everyone's desks on their android phones and development boards and other crazy devices for all these years(!), and when they finally were to make their first phone available, the operating system would have been in a brilliant shape and had a vibrant ecosystem.

And the phone would immediately sell like hotcakes for being the first 'official' sailfish phone to hit the market, where open source developers would get to see the fruits of their labor.

As far as I understand it, the reason they're open-sourcing things only now is the same reason why AMD took quite a bit of time releasing DPM and UVD, and why NVIDIA hasn't released DPM specs as well: legal and technical review. And, again, those components aren't even that important and you can swap them out. After all, the phone is made not only for FOSS enthusiasts, but for the general public as well ? and Jolla needs to appeal to the general public, which means that nice UI goes first, legal review goes later. That's also why developer mode isn't on by default ? you don't want average joes accidentally deleting the entire contents of their /usr/lib/systemd/system. But the mode is supported and its use by those who are knowledgeable enough about it is encouraged.

Well, I'd argue it's just as distant from an actual Linux desktop. I think it's the use of open source components which makes something closer to Linux distros, not merely the use of kernels, init systems and compositor protocols alone. It's actually quite the opposite: platforms based on proprietary software running on top of an open core are, as a matter of fact, a very troublesome tendency in Linux development. And from the looks of it it's not just me who thinks this way.

It's pretty much the opposite: it's free software running on top of a closed core (the hardware and its firmware). That's one unfortunate thing about it, but Jolla just didn't have much choice there, they had to choose from existing hardware platforms (in a blog it was even written that those platforms were shipped to them preinstalled with Android, even, because the manufacturers seemingly can't fathom why anyone would want anything else).

[M1kkko]

I doubt they have/had the capacity for something like what you describe.

Doing something in the open should require no more resources than doing it behind it closed doors. In the worst case nobody's interested in your code you're not losing anything, and in the best case you get lots of interest in your project and contributions for free.

After all, the phone is made not only for FOSS enthusiasts, but for the general public as well ? and Jolla needs to appeal to the general public, which means that nice UI goes first, legal review goes later. That's also why developer mode isn't on by default ? you don't want average joes accidentally deleting the entire contents of their /usr/lib/systemd/system. But the mode is supported and its use by those who are knowledgeable enough about it is encouraged.

Had they (Jolla) got the 'openness' part right, the general public would already be directly benefiting from all the UI work/optimizations done by the community (which are currently nonexistent, because the UI source code is kept secret.) As it stands, Jolla's "open source" strategy doesn't make much sense. Why would you release your code only after you've done the development and don't actually need the valuable testing/bug fixing/other help any more? That costs you more money and quality and valuable time than making it open source from day 0, doesn't it?

As you seem somewhat knowledgeable on this subject of "legal review", could you explain how is it then possible that every other open source project (say firefox, wine, linux, ... ) is developed as they should - in the open?

[Nille_kungen]

I think some people forget that Mer was almost dead before Jolla, so Jolla rather saved the open source Mer mobile.
If you want something in Sailfish then implement it in Mer or Nemo and you might see it in Jolla.
In short it's Mer+Nemo=OSS Mer+Silica=Sailfish, the closed drivers is out of Jollas control but since it's android drivers you got the same problem with andriod.
I do hope that Jolla will use the open source wlan driver in the future.
In my opinion Sailfish OS is more open then Android.

[GreatEmerald]

Had they (Jolla) got the 'openness' part right, the general public would already be directly benefiting from all the UI work/optimizations done by the community (which are currently nonexistent, because the UI source code is kept secret.) As it stands, Jolla's "open source" strategy doesn't make much sense. Why would you release your code only after you've done the development and don't actually need the valuable testing/bug fixing/other help any more? That costs you more money and quality and valuable time than making it open source from day 0, doesn't it?

Have you read the article you're commenting on? Because Sailfish is still beta, it's not even at version 1.0 yet. So they still need that testing and bug fixing.

As you seem somewhat knowledgeable on this subject of "legal review", could you explain how is it then possible that every other open source project (say firefox, wine, linux, ... ) is developed as they should - in the open?

They don't use anything from third parties and they are not selling products (thus less risk of being sued over patents). It's also funny that you mention Firefox, because it was open-sourced (from Netscape Communicator) as well, not created entirely from scratch.

[GreatEmerald]

I used their slide to point out that right now -- and still for a long, long time at the very least -- Sailfish is a proprietary/open-source chimera, and I'm not even talking about drivers. This is a fact that no context can change.

Clearly my desktop is a proprietary/open-source chimera as well, because I need to use Skype for my work. The point is that it's all optional ? once again, you're free to install whatever UI you want, Sailfish as is is just the default. And Jolla is putting effort into open-sourcing as much as possible under the circumstances.

Nice UI and FOSS are not mutually exclusive.

Hence you can use Nemo.

Well, since a huge part of the closed components lie in the topmost layer of the stack (user interface, configs, etc.) in addition to hardware and firmware, that's a very... unique conclusion.

User interface and configs is not a huge part at all, compared to all the actual software that makes the thing work (once again, systemd, Wayland, Btrfs, GNU utilities, the kernel etc.).

Yes, that might be the case, but that's not a hard thing to achieve, is it?

Care to share any more successful attempts at achieving it? The current state is not ideal, but it's still way, way better than we had just recently, when everything was Android, Windows Phone or other completely locked and controlled platforms. I find your position to be rather ungrateful; Jolla is a big step in the right direction and they seem determined to continue making steps towards it, thus they deserve the credit.

[Chaz]

Why do they need to do legal review on the UI? Didn't they code it all themselves? Also, if they're violating patents then using a proprietary copyright doesn't protect them; I guess it does if you can only spot the patent violation by looking at code.

[KellyClowers]

Oh yeah, no surprise there. This is the Phoronix forums after all.

But if I really wanted to be serious about going that route, I would need to toss in something about Lennart's systemd cabal that is trying to ruin Linux, claim that dbus is terrible, and troll about one of the *BSDs

No, in reality I have just never been that excited about the web or web technologies as an application platform, whether it was from Mozilla or Palm/HP or anyone.
Canonical clearly wants to do their own thing, maybe to someday be to Linux what Apple is to BSD. And that is fine, but I just prefer not to be part of it.

[Nille_kungen]

Why do they need to do legal review on the UI? Didn't they code it all themselves? Also, if they're violating patents then using a proprietary copyright doesn't protect them; I guess it does if you can only spot the patent violation by looking at code.

Why do you think jolla screens are vertical instead of horizontal?
It's not all about the code manufactures can also use design patents for horizontal screens and so on.

Yes, that might be the case, but that's not a hard thing to achieve, is it?

If you want FOSS then use Nemo but you still need to use Qualcomm firmware and some closed drivers, i don't know how much that works with FOSS drivers or how good it works since i haven't tried.

[Chaz]

Why do you think jolla screens are vertical instead of horizontal?
It's not all about the code manufactures can also use design patents for horizontal screens and so on.

That is my point. Closing up the source code does not protect you from a patent claim on that in any way. (Is there seriously a patent on horizontal screens? Shit like that makes me feel that patents should just be abolished wholesale, they are more trouble then they're worth.)

By the by, people have said here before that Jolla's approach to patents is to just not sell their phones in the US, because the US allows software patents and the European countries don't. I can't vouch for that though.