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Comment by AtticusTheGreat | Hacker News Reader

As someone who applauds this pivot, I never saw much value in the whole convergence idea. Why would I want my laptop and phone to be the same device? This seems to follow the misguided idea in software that if two ideas are similar, just make a single generic idea that solves both problems. But then you get into leaky abstractions and have to make lots of sacrifices to get it working well for both use cases.

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I was always under the impression that convergence for the end user meant having the same 'computer' spread across many devices. That your phone has access to the same files as your laptop as your tablet. That identity and rights management was shared and unified across all devices. That your devices natively formed a network, a sandboxed cloud.

I never understood it all looking the same, having a shared UI. The screen real-estate and input are too different to make a unified presentation. My biggest complaint about Windows 10 is that the power user on a laptop suffers for the imagined mobile user.

The funny part is, focusing on shared data and identity brings you closer to convergence than an elegant UI does.

I have to agree that sharing the UI seems like a dead-end.

We saw this in the leap from WinCE to the iPhone, and from tablets that were essentially laptops with the monitor facing outwards, to iOS & android tablets. Besides the hardware finally getting to the right place, designing the UI for the experience was a huge leap.

"Convergence" feels far too much like trying to compromise one to suit the other, right when we've finally learnt not to do that.

I totally disagree actually. With relative position pointing (except for the onscreen keyboard) desktop UIs actually are significantly more usable (not to mention, often more responsive) on my android than the phone centric android GUIs.

The only problem with this is that SDL X11 eats the battery.

My phone is a computer. My chromebook is a screen attached to a computer. My desktop is a monitor attached to a computer. My work laptop is a screen attached to a computer. My tablet is a screen attached to a computer. Why do I need so many separate computers when I have my phone on me at all times?

Because my work computer is owned by work, my phonr by me, and the desktop by my family. They don't want an unused monitor and docking station when my phone isn't there.

Don't they all have their own phones?

I don't really like the one device to rule them all philosophy, a single device would be too compromised for the different use cases I have for computers, but I don't think this is a valid objection in this vision of the future.

Because your phone will never have the raw power that you can pack into a larger form factor? Granted, after a certain point this may only be relevant for specific tasks.

But what if I could plug my phone into a dock that gave me substantially more power, but I didn't have to make a massive context switch i.e. wait for syncing over a network for files etc, or log in again and load up what I already had open?

Pshhhh 768k ram ought to be enough

Computers aren't special, rarified objects. Computers are dirt cheap, and it's simply more convenient to have lots of different computers lying around than to have to move one around.

No one has to worry if the compute core of the family room computer is available, for example- they just use the family room computer, which is its own separate device, and already affordable for nearly everyone.

Portability and duplication. I don't want to have to lug a phone and laptop everywhere. They both can do the same thing and increasing have the same amount of power. You have different interfaces for how you interact with them: on the go or at a desk. But you can just pick up and go somewhere else and pick up without missing a beat.

And who brings the dock in that somewhere else you're going? How's leaving a dock everywhere better than leaving a laptop or even a chromebook everywhere?

Application convergence already happens via the browser; this takes much wind out of the sails of OS convergence. However, it also means that browser focused OSes, ChromeBook and FireFoxOS, will probably be the ones to win, in the end.

Or WebView-based cross-platform toolkits will win, in the end. (Electron, Cordova, React Native)

Given FirefoxOS is also retired and ChromeOS seems to be in the process of being replaced by or merged with Android, I figure the cross-platform toolkits are more likely to win than the browser OSes.

If "winning" means "same operating system on all devices" then I don't think Electron, etc are competing in that contest. ChromeOS (which I understand to roughly consist of a Linux kernel and Chrome, and not much more) is by far the closest in concept.

Imagine, a process per browser tab for all the things! Why should this not be the case? It would be a revolutionary improvement in process visibility, in general. moreover I don't see why there would be any limitations over what you get with ps and dtrace.

Indeed, I suspect there is a quite nice visualization of the kernel itself that would fit nicely in a browser tab. Maybe not a real-time picture, but surely you could do simple simulations at the very least, and perhaps set configuration options if you wanted to change your own kernel.

They share the browser limited performance and bring a load of issues with them, they're at best a way to work around browser -> sensor access and bypass the appstores barrier.

For now, at least. The thing that will happen is that as they continue to "win", they find deeper ways into the platform. Cordova apps on Windows already run "first class" in the UWP app platform's JS stack. Electron apps don't currently, but there are bridges being built there too.

React Native and NativeScript are exploring different tactics beyond the most limited webviews on Android and iOS systems. Crosswalk and others explore yet another approach for bringing better webviews to such platforms.

At some point too, performance doesn't matter so long as the users are happy. A lot of technical folks notice performance, but most consumers do not. WebView-based application toolkits don't need performance to "win", they just need that sweet spot of developer productivity and user engagement that is much easier to do than you think, with or without "performance".

I thought they cancelled FFOS, didn't they?

They did, though of course it's open source and somebody else could pick it up and continue development if they so chose.

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