On Wednesday, 8 November 2017 at 22:28:32 UTC, Ola Fosheim
Grøstad wrote:
On Wednesday, 8 November 2017 at 21:36:58 UTC, Joakim wrote:
I don't know why you go back to Apple, when you clearly cut
out the part of the above excuses quote where I pointed out
that _google had none of the advantages_ you think were
necessary to win mobile, yet created the OS that now ships on
the most mobile devices.
Android wasn't all that great in the beginning and most
manufacturers didn't make much money off it. Samsung was more
the exception than the rule, and no, not only Google is making
Android happen. For a single company to go that route alone you
better have a good starting point. Microsoft had it, obviously.
Apple had it. Maybe the owners of BeOS could have done it, not
sure, but there are few companies that actually could have
produced a high quality OS + application frameworks + hardware
in anything less than a decade. Apple could focus on hardware
and drivers and a little bit of fickling with their existing
OS-X frameworks. That's a major difference.
Google pretty much did it on their own in around five years, as
all indications are that Android is mostly developed in-house.
Yes, the Android hardware vendors add polish, some drivers, and
their own skins, but most of the source comes from google.
belied by the fact that google had much less. You talk about
OS expertise, all while HP has long had their own OS's, HP-UX
That's only a generic Unix with X11 on top. HP had WebOS, but
gave up on it!! I can only assume they realized it would be too
time consuming and too expensive to be worthwhile.
The point is that HP had plenty of OS expertise. As for WebOS,
HP didn't buy it till 2010, when mobile sales were just passing
PC sales and it was getting too late. WebOS was not only a dumb
idea, just like ChromeOS, it likely had major technical issues,
judging from the reviews I read at the time.
Just take a look at how difficult it is to build something as
simple as D or C++ standard library. Then multiply that by the
challenges when create complete application frameworks. Nokia
bought up QT (which isn't all that great) for a reason, and for
_a lot_ of money!
And yet google, much smaller than MS or HP and without the OS
expertise you say is needed, did all that mostly by themselves.
I think you underestimate what it takes to get it all to work
together in a reasonably manner. Anyhow, with Android out there
as a possible contender it basically wouldn't make a whole lot
of sense to invest in rolling your own OS. I assume that is the
reason HP let WebOS stagnate.
I think you greatly overestimate what was needed to compete in
this mobile market at that time. I'm not saying it was easy, but
the PC and mobile giants before iOS/Android clearly didn't have
the vision or ability to execute what google, a much smaller
search company, did with Android, leaving aside Apple because of
your silly claims that their existing software gave them a
headstart, which is why those former computing giants are all
either dead or fading fast.
