The next Nokia OS: Android or Windows? | Hacker News Reader

The next Nokia OS: Android or Windows?

fabcapo.com

14 pointsfosk15 comments

Not a week goes by without some blogger speculating that Nokia will just give up on MeeGo (or is completely oblivious to the existence of it in the first place) and start making devices with Android. And not a week goes by that they seem to be mistaken by how much Nokia has put into MeeGo, Symbian and Ovi and how much their PR is trying to remind people of that fact. It's clear that Nokia want their own separate ecosystem for content, software and services and not share it with anyone else, and they aren't going to have that on either Android or WP7.

This time around is different though, given that the speculation is founded on the heavy-handed hints from Nokia's own CEO during an earnings call. They didn't come out and outright admit it, but it was hard to interpret the comments in any other way than using another OS in the US while keeping at least Symbian and probably MeeGo around for the rest of the world.

Seems like a totally insane strategy though, whether that other OS is Android or WP7. Announce some new models with a new OS, admit that your own software development processes have totally failed, undermine your own developer story totally by further fragmenting the platform and by making the future of Symbian/Meego/QT uncertain. And then probably ship that phone 9 months later, when nobody cares anymore. I really hope they're doing something else.

Nokia in Berlin are hiring quite a few developers at the moment, mainly for Ovi & Maps, but also for their Meego platform:

http://www.coderstack.co.uk/jobs/155-nokia-senior-c-engineer

http://www.coderstack.co.uk/jobs/154-nokia-senior-qa-enginee...

http://www.coderstack.co.uk/jobs/153-nokia-senior-frontend-j...

Which would seem to suggest that there's no immediate plan for a change in direction.

One of the added benefits of running a developer job board is you get a very good feel for tech trends :-)

I interpreted it as giving up on symbian (and the low-end) for the US, but launching Meego there earlier than the rest of the world with some high end devices i.e. be like Nokia for the rest of the world and be like Apple for the US, then let it trickle down.

As the parent post notes, much of this speculation doesn't even mention Meego. If HP can launch WebOS and expect sales, there's no reason Nokia can't do beat the low bar it's set for itself in the US.

Nokia makes a lot of phones. I think it's going to be Android, simply because of the hardware requirements imposed by WP7 would mean that Nokia's large amount of phones worldwide would all have to meet a fairly high bar, which isn't going to happen. They're going to choose Android, which is basically Symbian with buttons in saner locations. If they do some Android some Windows, they're probably doomed, because they're right back to where they started.

I really hope its Android and not Microsoft. WP7 seems more like a side or backward step compared to Symbian. Taking advantage of all the good things about Android would seem a smart move to get Nokia back in the game. Look how far Apple has come by building OSX on top of Unix/BSD...

WP7 for sure. Microsoft wants as many devices as possible to run WP7...they'll probably pay Nokia to use WP7. I don't think Google will care either way since they're selling so many Android handsets as it is.

What would stop them from supporting android apps within meego? There's rumors that the RIM playbook is going this route.

Where did you find these rumors? Everything I've read indicated that only DOM applications and Flash+friends applications will be possible on the Playbook.

The rumors come from a BGR[1] post saying that the playbook may or may not use the Dalvik VM, without bothering to look into the rest of the SDK and if it would work with QNX or not.

1. http://www.bgr.com/2011/01/26/exclusive-blackberry-playbook-...

That would be pretty neat - if they could have an implementation compatible enough to only require cross-compiling, we'd be going somewhere darn cool.

Many APIs have had the promise of multiple implementations (and some have succeeded in at least making them, ie OPENstep's many implementations, and Java) but it seems to have not been widely used.

Except, well, unix. Heh, I suppose it has been done successfully.

I think the best is following the HTC route: Going for both. But with Nokia behind the decision, who knows?

Pure speculation.

I really hope none. Or both.

Imagine nokia selling devices that work just like pcs. You could buy with windows, android or even install the latest hobie OS on your own.

Just have to open all the hardware interfaces to kernel devs

That seems unlikely to be a good plan for the mass market. Phones are judged by the standards of consumer electronics, and people expect it to just work. They don't want to fuss with it like a PC. Integration seems to be the more effective strategy for delivering a smooth experience.

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