[ale] [OT] Cell phones

[DJ-Pfulio]

On 08/18/2016 01:13 PM, Solomon Peachy wrote:
> On Thu, Aug 18, 2016 at 12:21:22PM -0400, DJ-Pfulio wrote:
>> ... it is far from end-of-life to me, but google disagrees.  "Major OTA"
>> updates for 2 yrs and security patches for 3 yrs is their rule. Found
>> these EoL dates:
>>     Nexus 5X: September 2017
>>     Nexus 6P: September 2017
>>     Nexus 9: October 2016
>>     Nexus 5: October 2015
>>     Nexus 6: October 2016
>>     Nexus 7 (2013): July 2015
>>     Nexus 10: November 2014
> 
> 3 years of support is pretty damn good for consumer-oriented gear.
> 
>> Heck, even Ubuntu LTS provides 5 yrs of support. Google can't do that?
> 
> If you could just install Ubuntu on a random phone, the comparison would 
> ve valid.  There's worlds of differences between supplying software that 
> runs entirely on commodity hardware (ie not having to write your own 
> drivers for anything) and the reality of consumer ARM gear.

I'm not asking google to support all ARM devices, just their own with OS
updates. A $350 device isn't meant to be replaced every 3 yrs, IMHO. The
Nexus4 was sold for about 1 yr thru Google's website - available until
11/2013. It has been less than 3 yrs since the last N4 was sold!

Ubuntu LTS supports thousands of different possible configurations with
a tiny company (privately funded w/ about 500 employees). Redhat
supports for even longer periods.

Google (HUGE corporation w/ 500+B market CAP & 45k+ employees) can't
support ... lets count ... 1, 2, 3,  ... 9 devices that THEY designed
and sold?

BTW, my Nexus4 (purchased in mid-2013) was $100 more expensive than my
Ubuntu white-box Core i5 PC - built in 2010 which is still supported and
running.

Google is definitely low on the support timeframes. We should expect and
demand better.