Maru turns Android smartphones into portable PCs
maruos.com
maruos.com
If it ever does appear as more than a product pitch, I'll be really keen to find out more. But for now it just seems like someone's put the cart (a beautiful website) in front of the horse (an actual product)!
> If you can dream it, you can do it.
Yes, the website has giant images and minimalism and everything that's all the rage recently, but in the end all it does is make me scroll endlessly and hunt for the tiniest bits of information. There are multiple full-screen-spaces that only show fancy monitors and marketing speak.
I really like the idea of this small computing device that basically turns into whatever you need it to be, but I'm still not sure about what's the use case exactly with phones that turn into desktop PCs. I could have a big screen and bluetooth peripherals at home, fine. But when I'm traveling there's no way to know where I'll be able to switch to "desktop mode" again. At the hotel, hoping I can attach my HDMI cable to the wall-mounted TV? At a friend's house - and then what, maybe they only have a laptop or they'd rather not have me rip out their cables and use their monitor. At work where I don't get to use my own hardware?
I think that ASUS Transformer concept makes more sense on the hardware side. I remember this one device where you'd have a phone, put it into a tablet, and then attach a keyboard effectively turning it into a laptop.
The only interesting thing about this is exactly what you said, the execution. It's a custom Android (with Debian added to it somehow... containerized maybe?) so they'll either need to make their own hardware or partner up with someone. Or maybe it's just someone's Android custom ROM project.
I suspect there are some people who could make great use of something like this, but I don't think it's for me. If it truly solved the multiple device problem in a perfect way, it'd be a different story. As it is, I suspect it's a lot more niche than the marketing says.
Debian chroots on Android are nothing new -- whether this is anything new depends entirely on the execution. Autodetecting when to spin up the container, handling the external display, safely suspending the container somehow, those are all nice new things, if they work as promised.
Here's one app called "Complete Linux Installer" (looks outdated) that does this: https://goo.gl/5ryu5x
It certainly works, though there has definitely been limitations caused by the speed of the hardware and the latency that vnc introduces. I've never tried this on an external monitor and external input devices. There's also a gap because you need a separate vnc client.
Maru, if it exists, seems to work off the same concept, but with some polish. They have an install of Debian that can run on your phone. The Maru app will run in the background and detect when an external display is connected. This tells it to spin up the debian OS. Then it must do something to connect to debian's desktop (vnc, nomachine, or proprietary solution), and output that solely to the secondary screen.
This last bit seems the most magical to me (and probably device dependent), but then again, my experience with android and secondary displays is somewhat limited to the mirroring that happens when you attach a monitor. Alternatively is the chromecast concept where your app turns into a control and the content is sent to the chromecast. Maybe the concept of running an app entirely on a second display is a native android concept these days.
[1]: http://developer.android.com/reference/android/app/Presentat...
[2]: http://www.slideshare.net/ph0b/develop-for-miracast-on-andro...
I'd welcome something like that for Android, especially as Google is experimenting with support for windowed Android apps with mouse support.
Unfortunately, Maru is not that. It appears to only run X11 apps on the desktop, and only Android apps on the phone. I don't think there's enough value in that. It has the inconveniences of needing to dock/undock your phone plus all of the hassle of having to maintain 2 separate sets of apps, settings, and state.
Oddly though, despite this being a distribution of Linux and Android, it seems like it's aiming for a commercial/closed-source release. I wonder how that's going to work?
Also looks like something that OQO had in mind over a decade and a half ago.
It tried to be a text message/email/personal assistant that was also your PC. There were mobile phones back then, and even PDA/phone mashups, but the iPhone wouldn't be around until the 7th year of the company.
(despite negative reviews, I had one when it came out and plugged it into hdmi monitor or webtop to use like a computer quite often...although primarily useful for watching netflix on big screen and browsing internet.)
Although, I would have liked a generic standardized keyboardscreen interface so could use any hdmi+usb cellphone with any keyboardscreen.
Looking back, the present mobile device market feels so boring in comparison.
Ubuntu did not deliver their 'Convergence' yet, but apparently they're working hard to do it. This was on HN just yesterday: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11034516
http://www.amazon.com/Motorola-Atrix-4G-Android-Phone/dp/B00...
And there's a laptop dock sold separately
http://www.amazon.com/AT-Laptop-Motorola-Retail-Packaging/dp...
I had the phone but had never used the dock. Not sure about the experience, but it's a cool idea to me.
Idea is absolutelly great, HW reall OK, but in software was never completly done. It felt like was more like a PoC.
I was pretty dissapointed by Motorola not following this idea. It was kind of ahead of time.
Like others commented, very few phones have a HDMI interface.
It could be interesting in a school setting or maybe in the developing world. However, the product seems a bit paradoxical: use your phone as your main/only device, but meanwhile, you have a monitor available to use.
Most people who only own phones probably don't own monitors, right? A mini projector seems more inline with the "mobile only" use case since monitors aren't portable.
What is the difference between your laptop, desktop and phone? Mostly it's screen resolution and the apps that run on them.
I'm sure at one point somebody was asking "why would I want to plug my laptop into a monitor?"
Eventually, the technology disappears and it just becomes different I/O.
All your apps, all your contacts, all your content in one place. No matter what monitor you sit in front of, it is YOUR computer. Not signing in under this account or that account, it just goes with you.
I believe the technology still has a way to go. This is for early adopters now.
Contacts, calendar, email, documents all goes with me. As a developer, git is the transport that does the same. Apps can generally be installed in multiple places.
I often find myself working my laptop in the office, then my desktop at home, picking up right from where I left off.
I don't really have an answer here, though I suspect that if my laptop becomes essentially a dumb terminal to my phone, I may upgrade it less often.
For those not aware, the keyboard in some of the surfacebooks have a better gpu than what is in the tablet part.
I'm also imagining someone like my parents. They prefer a bigish monitor for most tasks but those tasks are relatively straightforward. Mail, Office stuff etc. Currently they have a cheap Linux box for that, this could be removed and a bit of maintenance would go away.
+Assuming for arguments sake a setting in which most kids are expected to own a cell phones.
The mini projector didn't worked. Expensive. Hard to carry from one place to another and it needed lots of time to setup.
When we demoed the desktop-in-your-pocket and the user reception was great. Women loved it (they already carry a lot of stuff in their bags, plus a laptop).
Remember: If do something that improves people lives, there's a market. If you improve women lives, be sure there's a market.
I know, the target was initially a monitor, but everyone has a HDMI enabled TV ( ok, unless it lived under a rock in the last 5 years ).
This display is one of the few mainstream monitors one can not just plug an HDMI cable into.
It is easy to go MiniDP/DP/Thunderbolt -> HDMI but not the other way around.
Using anything but a display port source on it requires an expensive adapter.
Did anyone have a look? Do they distribute the kernel, or run on top of Android? At a glance it appears they're playing a bit loose with the licenses - but maybe they have a link/offer of source in the download?
That's what they say on thei rlegal page.
I mean, I know there is an open source argument and I get that, but... Continuum is a really neat feature and if nothing else deserves at least a little recognition).
http://www.amazon.com/Fosmon-Slimport-Micro-Female-Adapter/d...
Anyone know if you can wipe debian and stick another distro on it? I have a fetish for gentoo, but chromiumOS would be cool too.
I wish that when I plug in my Android to my computer using a usb cable, I get a popup on my computer for the desktop version of the Android operating system.
Had MS implemented this, Continuum would have been far more relevant. Because as of now, you need far too much new hardware to make it work. Maru is also the same thing.
However, it becomes more exciting to experiment different things with a versatile phone running Maru or something similar.
What would really like to see are tablets running non-Android linux, and iPads with OSX instead of iOS.
...but, with much better industrial design.
As it's been noted, there are a handful of other projects like this, so I don't mean to say it isn't special. But a big criticism for Continuum is that it's practically not very useful...when are you ever going to have your phone, monitor, and keyboard available but not a laptop?
What's a practical use for these things?
While it doesn't seem aimed at this market: there are a gigantic amount of people in developing countries that have a smartphone, and no computer. It is their computer. Peripherals are available, but computers themselves are far too expensive, this idea works with the concept of "smartphone as your primary computing environment".