Trolltech Qtopia Greenphone and SDK Review

An anonymous reader writes "The Greenphone comes at a time when there are countless mobile Linux platforms, but not many of them are open for easy development. This little device aims to fill a niche for a community-oriented mobile development platform. How does it perform? Linuxlookup.com has the Trolltech Qtopia Greenphone and SDK review."

Eeek

[Yetihehe]

Yes, it IS open source. But from DULA (Device User License Agreement) "...This device may only be used with Trolltech's Qtopia Software. You may not use this device in any other hardware/software combination other than in the combination of hardware and software that was delivered to you...". So no, it's not going to run (any) linux.

Huge potential, bad licensing

[bonefry]

For more information on licensing, which is a real PITA for open-source developers, see here: Greenphone SDK [trolltech.com].

On the bright side, with projects like OpenMoko [openmoko.org] and OLPC [laptop.org] I think the world will start to realize the power and potential of these little Internet-enabled devices when combined with open-source software.

Can I buy it NOW?

[saikou]

What really makes me mad is there's no big buttun "BUY" with a price next to it. I spent 5 minutes clicking everywhere on OpenMoko trying to find a way to buy it, simple and easy (I remember they used to say somewhere about how/when I can buy it but it's buried in their wiki with no hit on the word "buy" [openmoko.org]). If it can't be bought now it should be marked on the first page as "coming soon/preorder" or something. Same goes for Green phone thing, that doesn't even have a mentioning in the list of the devices.
I think if more linux phones are to appea[l|r] to general public, there should be easy ways to get them :)

Re:Not open enough for me

[queazocotal]

It is.

OpenMoko is the OS, there may be many phones.

At the moment, on the Neo1973 - which is the phone that FIC is releasing first, you talk to the GSM modem via AT commands.

The dialer app is at the moment broken, and you use minicom or something :)

The only closed source bit of code that will ship with the phone is the code that takes the output from the very dumb GPS hardware, and 'cooks' it into an actual position. And there are moves to - when a working version of this is shipped, reverse engineer it, and make it open source too.

You can run _any_ 'normal' linux app on it, with the obvious limitations (no keyboard unless you've bluetooth, 2.8" display, touchscreen, one uncommitted button).

You can even put GCC, and a full normal toolchain on the microSD, and do native development work, if you really want to.

(think of a Pentium 100 laptop sort of speed)

http://wiki.openmoko.org/ [openmoko.org] - the wiki. http://rapidshare.com/files/18781887/rect.avi [rapidshare.com] a 1 hour talk (60M) on OpenMoko, by one of the instigators of the OpenMoko project.