Ubuntu Tablet to Compete with Android, iOS

There is always market for a good product…
The problem is, is that ubuntu on a tablet is not a good product, yet….
(due to not everything is touch friendly, and “no” apps)

Mr. Cobb NAILS IT!!!  As a 2-year old linux newbie, my desire to migrate away from Windows was presented as an argument of “Windows or Mac”.  I did not know Linux existed and I certainly didn’t know any Linux users.  I became aware of Android as a Windows Mobile Phone alternative.  Upon learning that Android was a Linux kernel wrapped in Java, I soon learned what Linux was and sought out the info to create my own “migration path.”  It would’ve happened SOONER if I knew the product existed, and it would’ve been easier to find the information, tutorials, forums, and mentors to make it happen!

Ubuntu/Canonical is correct in identifying the market with regards to consumer disdain for “closed ecosystems” or “walled gardens.”  Microsoft practiced this on the desktop; Apple now practices this on handheld devices and seems to be trickling upstream to desktops/AppleTV, etc…consumers want the connectivity, but without the exclusivity of the ecosystem.  However, they tolerate the exclusivity to get the connectivity.  Ubuntu & Linux is the ANSWER, but the connective ecosystem MUST be built QUICKLY, or Apple standards will become de facto, rather than open standards.  We DESPERATELY need an open standards ecosystem with inter-device connectivity; it’s the “glue” or the “bridge” that makes everything work the way consumers want!!!

While Unity may be preferable on handheld devices, I couldn’t care less if my devices “look familiar” with similar interfaces, as long as they communicate with each other without configuring every detail.  I want my Ubuntu desktop, my Android (or Ubuntu?) smartphone, my Archos Android tablet/mp3 device, and Ubuntu TV to sync seamlessly and share a common ecosystem, perhaps with UbuntuOne as the HUB of the system, so I don’t have to worry about what Google does with my online storage.  I’m doing my part with word-of-mouth, but that only goes so far, especially when the reaction is “never heard of it.”  PLEASE CREATE THE BRIDGES to link them together, and advertise to let people know the alternative exists, or Linux will have missed the opportunity again!

Well, if they’ve got the dev cycles available why not. But they’d better do something about battery life. 11.x on laptops is barely usable as it is …

Anyone else notice that Unity looks infinitely better with a decent wallpaper?

I’d honestly love to see an Ubuntu tablet. Both Unity and GS have the ability to be highly intuitive on such a piece of software. I fear though that not only are they late to the party but that they don’t have enough of an identity to cause a huge splash in the tablet arena. Then again, the Apple renaissance hadn’t exactly re-established itself before they dropped the Ipod and OSX so we’ll see. Eagerly awaiting a finished product though. 

Maverick is EOL in April this year. If you use XFCE in Oneiric or even Precise, you won’t have Unity. Gnome is not the only desktop. Try some others instead of digging in your heels. You’ll appear smarter

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5cW8WQ1pAM&context=C39b1c77ADOEgsToPDskLPqjbubMO2bgiCtQsaWaLk

So, uh, all the the UI bugs will be gone? You can’t expect people to open up a terminal and start hacking away like it’s a PC when something goes wrong.

This has to be as tight as iOS to work. Even Android isn’t there yet.

Well, we had the UbuntuTv announced just about four days ago, and now a tablet today. Im guessing a phone will be announced four days from now

haha dream is always nice, but it won’t be easy to break into market now, ubuntu should off done it 2 years ago then it would be a different out come…. any way good luck

Well, I will definitely buy a Tabluntu!

If this opens up the Mini Games and apps to Ubuntu I am all for it, Linux has been missing out on all the fun stuff,  it’s always too serious.  Unity can do the job, but if Ubuntu can’t offer Pinch, Multi Touch and Face Time type apps it will not compete at all.

I hope someone make HTML5 based games able to run without having the browser controlling it, looks so slack having the Browsers controls above your HTML5 games and once you go full screen you still have some issues of it only being in the browser, eg Alt Tab shows the Browser not the game/app.

I hope Ubuntu can begin to compete, it’s come to far to give up now. They just need to offer some quality standards and packagers, .deb will not cut it, it’s out dated, missing features and slow, yeah they can still use .deb but they need to package them in a .uba (Ubuntu Binary App) or something, that gives user control, deb’s only offer super user still and that’s useless on a tablet (and even the desktop). User mode sandboxing is the best way, catchup Ubuntu ;)

Every time I look at my laptop I want to use it as a tablet. I perform gestures on my touchpad even though they don’t do anything, that’s how much I’m used to them. If the price is right, the tablet will succeed

We have a very strong foundation with GTK, Qt, and the applications that use them (at least for tablets). If we get the core design right, I think we can have a compelling experience that will attract more developers and companies.

Either way, no matter how ‘late in the game’ you are, the important thing is to be functional, easy to use, and fun to use. I think Ubuntu has a chance to get the simplicity that we require from a phone right, especially since the Unity interface is essentially quite stripped down and minimalist in comparison to other environments.

Just as it has been with Linux users on the desktop, I’m fine as long as I have a good option which can preserve my freedoms. I have put up with using Android without any proprietary additions, but it is quite painful and definitely not ideal. Either webOS or Ubuntu may be our choices in the future, but if there is a phone or tablet that can run Ubuntu, it can run GNOME 3/KDE and whatever else you want, too, with GTK and Qt applications.

Alien Dalvik for Qt as they had for MeeGo would only make things that much more interesting. Honestly, since Android is open source, you’d think someone might’ve tried to create a free Dalvik implementation on X11.

I have found this discussion interesting. A lot of people seem to think there is little point going against Android/iOS for a tablet because they are already victors in the mobile world. But actually in the tablet world Android has pretty much bombed so far. Android tablets emulate the iPad big phone approach and do not do a fantastic job of doing so. I think there is room in the tablet world for a tablet as a laptop replacement (most iPAD users still have a laptop). When on the road I would like a tablet in which I could prepare presentations and create and format documents effectively. A fast Linux true OS on a tablet is very appealing. But there is still the Office compatibility problem, until Libreoffice offers true compatibility there is no one that can compete with Office and therefore Windows will have a huge advantage with ARM-based Win 8 tablets. Oh yes and Spotify running natively (still does not work for me on Ubuntu)!

waiting to preorder…

I think Canonical are doing it right. This would be a lot more equal to iOS rather than Android, however. Why?
See it like this:
Android is made up of a Java core/Dalvik which is the ground. You get some default apps, and that’s where EVERYTHING, I mean EVERYTHING called consistency falls apart. Sure, you have the top/bottom bar and the colors and some menus, but that’s all. It can’t be called a unified experience, because everyone make the UIs of applications different, because Google don’t certify apps, they just poor ‘em all in their pool called “Market”.
Apple provide iOS developers with a unified, polished SDK where the devs can have some slight modifications, but Apple need to approve the quality of your work, so the end-users become as happy as they can be. And because the apps are tested for quality, a lot less sad faces apart from the geeks, who lose on this.
If I worked for Canonical, I’d suggest making a dedicated repository with only certified apps for the tablet and mobile editions, and still leave the opportunity of adding more repositories. Why? It’s the best of both sides: If you’re into having lots of apps that are less mainstream and you don’t care for quality, just enable some repositories, and you get the whole bunch. If you want the polished selection, no need to do anything special, just use it. The option for adding and removing these repositories shouldn’t be hard to change, either. Making a plugin for the control center would be a great idea: just toggling it off and on. I’m sure that users would appreciate this. I’d certainly do.
What would be important would be a unified way of developing apps, so that future developers will have something to start with. Then I mean both in terms of code and user interfaces.

I think Canonical are doing it right. This would be a lot more equal to iOS rather than Android, however.
See it like this:
Android is made up of a Java core/Dalvik which is the ground. You get some default apps, and that’s where EVERYTHING, I mean EVERYTHING called consistency falls apart. Sure, you have the top/bottom bar and the colors and some menus, but that’s all. It can’t be called a unified experience, because everyone make the UIs of applications different, because Google don’t certify apps, they just pour ‘em all in their pool called “Market”.
Apple provide iOS developers with a unified, polished SDK where the devs can have some slight modifications, but Apple need to approve the quality of your work, so the end-users become as happy as they can be. And because the apps are tested for quality, a lot less sad faces apart from the geeks, who lose on this.
I think that Canonical should approach this similar to Apple. Ubuntu has the foundation for this already.
If I worked for Canonical, I’d suggest making a dedicated repository with only certified apps for the tablet and mobile editions, and still leave the opportunity of adding more repositories. Why? It’s the best of both sides: If you’re into having lots of apps that are less mainstream and you don’t care for quality, just enable some repositories, and you get the whole bunch. If you want the polished selection, no need to do anything special, just use it. The option for adding and removing these repositories shouldn’t be hard to change, either. Making a plugin for the control center would be a great idea: just toggling it off and on. I’m sure that users would appreciate this. I’d certainly do.
On the tablet platform, Ubuntu should run more controllable kinds of user interfaces, like GTK and Qt. What would be important would be a unified way of developing apps, so that future developers will have something to start with. Then I mean both in terms of code and user interfaces.