

The Android which really made it: Openmoko reopen now - Create
http://www.openmoko.com/store.html
Openmoko is a project which encompasses two related sub-projects, with the combined aim of creating a family of open source mobile phones.[1] The project was founded by FIC.<p>The first sub-project is Openmoko Linux, an open source Linux based operating system designed for mobile phones, built using free software.<p>The second sub-project is the development of hardware devices on which Openmoko Linux runs. The first device released was the inconsistently-named Neo 1973 or Neo1973[2][3], which was followed up by the Neo Freerunner on the 25th of June 2008.[4] Unlike most other mobile phone platforms, these phones are designed to provide end users with the ability to modify the operating system and software stack. Other Openmoko supported phones are listed here.
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icey
I'm definitely interested in hearing about people's experiences with these. I
had pre-ordered one of their development phones last year, but gave up because
of the constant delays.

I kept up with the dev list for awhile, but there were a lot of complaints
about the hardware - battery life in particular, so I stopped paying
attention.

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pmorici
The one thing I'm a bit weary about is their build environment. Last I checked
they use OpenEmbedded, which to put it plainly, blew chunks last I tried to
use it. After 48 hours of not sleeping I gave up and switched to OpenWRT's new
buildroot-ng which I found significantly easier to use.

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krschultz
I hear you, I spent all WEEK fighting with OpenEmbedded. Painfully, it is
better than LTIB. Actually there is a sub-set of OE called Poky that is really
solid. OE's problem is that the packages vary in quality - primarily in their
ability to compile on multiple platforms - Poky picks the betters ones and has
fewer platforms, it works very well.

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kogir
So wait, does the new device run Android? Their site doesn't lead me to
believe it does, and google searches only return stories of people failing to
run Android on the last one.

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nirmal
The software stack was developed long before Android was around. There's a
good graphic describing the software here:
<http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/Category:Software>

I believe the are enabling android to run "beside" their stack.

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krschultz
Correct, OpenMoko uses the CacaoVM with GNUClasspath for Java - although it is
primarily not a Java device. Android is running the DarvickVM which is not
actually Java, and runs a Java syntax on top of it. Though the code is
compatible, byte code is not, so binary packages for OpenMoko or Android will
not run on each other. Thus the two stacks need to be side by side, or you
need to rebuild all the packages from one for the other.

