

Tizen: Open source Intel/Linux Foundation-backed mobile/device OS - joahua
http://www.tizen.org/

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jbk
So, yet another Linux distribution (why do they keep calling it an OS is
beyond me) backed up by Intel... Why?

Why do they think they need a new OS for "Html5 apps" and not make evolve
MeeGo, except for political reasons?

Why do they think they need to restrict the APIs, like in MeeGo (and it took
them quite some time) for desktop or for Html5 applications; why not just
check the requirements at the publishing stage on their appstore?

I might be missing something obvious...

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RexRollman
I don't understand it either. And the constant jumping from project to project
on the part of Intel can't be helpful.

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saurabh
I think they are trying throw new names at the wall of hype and see if one
sticks.

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av500
From a source that was at Nokia/Meego: "Summary: Intel has joined LiMo
project. Samsung has renamed it to save Intel's face. Qt is abandoned and KDE
too is hurt unless . . . unless HTC takes MeeGo!"

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bergie
Yet another start of a mobile Linux backed by Intel, yet another, non-
backwards-compatible UI stack.

Previous ones were: Moblin (Gtk and Clutter) and MeeGo (Qt and QML). Now Tizen
(HTML5, whatever that means in this case). Will be hard to convince developers
that they'll really stick to this one.

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drivebyacct2
Technically they could bundle GTK3 and get Waypoint HTML5 apps for free.

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sciurus
An HTML5 app is an app written using HTML5. A GTK app is an app written using
GTK. A GTK3 app rendered on an <canvas> is still a GTK app.

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drivebyacct2
Right, despite the downvote (what don't we downvote for these days people),
this platform (can and may [if some rumors thus far are true]) support GTK. I
don't know what your reply is supposed to mean. (I suppose it may have been
from my poor use of the phrasing "Waypoint HTML5 apps" although if we're going
to nitpick over it, I would argue a frontend rendered in HTML5/canvas at least
partially qualifies for the moniker.)

My point is that since this will likely ship with the GTK3 runtime support, it
can render to a web app interface. Meaning that the Tizen project maintainers
or consumers can write GUIs that just handle HTML5 "cards" like in WebOS (as
they seem to allude is their goal), and be able to utilize any applications
built for GTK3 without having to shim in new elements to their window manager.

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dave1010uk
"Tizen will provide a robust and flexible environment for application
developers, based on HTML5 and Wholesale Applications Community (WAC)"

I hadn't heard of WAC before. WAC's about page makes it sound like an app
store and a set of APIs [1]. Whatever that actually means, WAC has backing by
a _lot_ of big companies [2].

[1] <http://www.wacapps.net/what-is-wac>

[2] <http://www.wacapps.net/our-members>

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gnaffle
It seems like the Big Telcos attempt at doing what Apple did with the App
Store. Their biggest fear have always been to be reduced to a "dumb data
pipe", which is basically what has happened now with the iPhone and Android
(notice how Apple and Google are not participating members :)

You can be sure that WAC will be prominently featured on any handset where the
operator has any influence.

Maybe it will work, or maybe it will be the next WAP, time will tell.

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dave1010uk
Tizen appears to be replacing MeeGo. The MeeGo blog has a post "What's next
for MeeGo": <https://meego.com/community/blogs/imad/2011/whats-next-meego>

As Samsung are on board, I guess Tizen may be taking parts of their existing
Linux platform: [http://jeffhoogland.blogspot.com/2011/02/samsung-is-
backing-...](http://jeffhoogland.blogspot.com/2011/02/samsung-is-backing-
linux-slp.html)

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mikecane
OK, look, my head is spinning here. This quote from The Verge:

//The MeeGo project is already encouraging its members to make the transition
to Tizen, going so far as to say that it believes the “future belongs to
HTML5-based applications, outside of a relatively small percentage of apps,
and we are firmly convinced that our investment needs to shift toward HTML5.”

I just don't understand how this then differs from webOS! Can someone make
this clear to me? Why reinvent the wheel? Do they feel webOS is now cursed or
what?

From a coder's perspective, what's the real difference here?

[typo edit]

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ra
In a word, licencing.

WebOS isn't open source, and is never likely to be.

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mikecane
Why couldn't they band together, buy webOS, and then open source that? Spread
over the number of members, the investment would be less than starting from
scratch or trying to resolve incompatibilities between all these groups
looking to cut their own slice of cheese.

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MatthewPhillips
Follow the B2G commit logs; they're actually building stuff. Intel is starting
from scratch every other year.

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jaxn
This seems destined for mediocrity. Lacking vision and passion.

"Lets create a linux platform for every single device that isn't a computer."

Bleh.

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plaes
Hum.. the name sounds that it's something that came from Texas Instruments:
"Texas Instruments Zen"

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dongsheng
It's interesting to see Samsung in the dev team, does that mean Bada will be
joining the new OS?

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abrowne
Maybe not Bada, but LiMo, and presumably now Tizen, is not just GTK. It also
includes support for EFL (aka Enlightenment/E17), a project Samsung has been
supporting for the past few years.* The EFL Webkit port is also progressing,
also with Samsung support.

Hopefully being HTML5 buzzword-compliant doesn't mean they're dropping all
support for native apps too.

* As previously discussed: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2495826>

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drivebyacct2
Open source webOS replacement with Web Intents, SSE, etc? Yes, please. Where
do I sign up? I'd like to know how this stacks up to boot2gecko (which
theoretically can already reach all of the Android devices that CM runs on.

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LukeShu
Gecko won't run on ARMv6 processors, which rules out a significant number of
devices CM runs on. But, I get your point.

What does something like Tizen offer developers beyond standard HTML5; why not
just target browsers?

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MatthewPhillips
That's entirely the point. Tizen can't entice developers to choose their
platform, so they aren't even going to try. They're just going to make the
best HTML5-backed phone they can. Hopefully.

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abmateen
I think the development stack should be based on native elements instead of
GTK or Qt or HTML5, it may include have a web based development and native
including C++/Java.Idea , purely, based on WebOS really sucks.

