Re: OS Stability

ext Mark <wolfmane@gmail.com> writes:

> What I said was that "I've never _heard_" of Windows Mobile devices
> being reflashed like Linux devices.

I would change that to "Maemo" devices. Linux, the kernel, is certainly
not to blame for a clogged up user land, and Maemo is so different from
any other existing GNU-or-not-GNU/Linux distribution that it is solely
responsible for all its shortcomings.

(In other words, I only ever reinstall my Debian GNU/Linux OSes when the
hardware get replaced, and I run 'unstable' on everything.)

Unfortunately, Maemo hasn't had a chance yet to gain real long-term
stability. The life-cycle of a Maemo version is too short for that, and
there is no continuity between versions.

Marius Vollmer wrote:
> ext Mark <wolfmane@gmail.com> writes:
>
>
>> What I said was that "I've never _heard_" of Windows Mobile devices
>> being reflashed like Linux devices.
>>
>
> I would change that to "Maemo" devices. Linux, the kernel, is certainly
> not to blame for a clogged up user land, and Maemo is so different from
> any other existing GNU-or-not-GNU/Linux distribution that it is solely
> responsible for all its shortcomings.
>
> (In other words, I only ever reinstall my Debian GNU/Linux OSes when the
> hardware get replaced, and I run 'unstable' on everything.)
>
> Unfortunately, Maemo hasn't had a chance yet to gain real long-term
> stability. The life-cycle of a Maemo version is too short for that, and
> there is no continuity between versions.
>
Again, I'm guilty of not being clear enough. I was referring to Linux on
handheld devices. Every Linux handheld device that I've been interested
in and followed has *required* periodic re-flashes of the OS, either to
fix growing instability or to flash a new image that increases stability
and/or hardware or software functionality.

As for desktop OSs, I would say Linux is on par with Windows: Windows
may be slightly (but only slightly) less stable, but has much better
hardware support. I haven't had to reinstall Windows (any version) any
more than I've had to reinstall Linux.

...And nobody has answered my question: is it even possible to flash
updated Windows Mobile images to those devices? Is it done routinely as
with Maemo/OpenMoko/etc.?

Mark

Mark Haury wrote:
[...]
> Every Linux handheld device that I've been interested
> in and followed has *required* periodic re-flashes of the OS, either to
> fix growing instability or to flash a new image that increases stability
> and/or hardware or software functionality.

This was true for my old Zaurus, but that was because Sharp basically
didn't have a clue about operating systems and particularly not about FOSS.

I've been very happy with the stability of my N800, and never had to
reflash it. But I haven't been using it for experimental purposes.

> As for desktop OSs, I would say Linux is on par with Windows: Windows
> may be slightly (but only slightly) less stable, but has much better
> hardware support. I haven't had to reinstall Windows (any version) any
> more than I've had to reinstall Linux.

I've only had to reinstall Linux once, and that was because of flaky
hardware. Windows, on the other hand (in the days when I used it) needed
reinstallation 2-3 times a year, and never worked properly even then.

> ...And nobody has answered my question: is it even possible to flash
> updated Windows Mobile images to those devices? Is it done routinely as
> with Maemo/OpenMoko/etc.?

My Windows-toting colleagues say it is theoretically possible but
they've never done it. But then they don't put their devices through a
hundredth of the workload my N800 handles, simply because the apps
aren't there. When I had to edit and reprocess a 200pp XML document into
PDF via LaTeX during the summer one of them watched in awe :-) The most
he can do is open Notepad...

///Peter