So it turns out the new killer app for your Android
smartphone is….Ubuntu?
That’s right, Canonical--the organization that brought you the Ubuntu
Linux distribution for desktops and notebooks--is betting that you’ll want to
leave your full-size computer behind if you can use your dual-core Android
smartphone to dual-boot between Android and Ubuntu. Why? These pint-size
devices are already reasonably peppy handheld computers, and turning your
Android phone into a dual-boot device will allow you to do everything you need to
do with a single pocketable device.
Are you sold? Because I’m not. Looking at the bullet points,
it seems like it could work: a lot of these Android devices have pretty good
processors in them already…after all, dual-core processors WERE the sole place you’d
see dual-core CPUs not too long ago. Your smartphone or tablet often has a
reasonably power graphics component. And let’s be real: with the introduction
of LTE into handsets, it’s possible that you may just have better network
connectivity with your phone than you do at home.
That said, and I don’t think I’m speaking out of school
here, anyone who’s spent any time with an Android smartphone knows that the
platform has some drawbacks that could make it frustrating as a full-on
computing platform. Even with dual-core processors onboard, many phones can
become fairly unresponsive with only a few apps running. And because of the
wide variety of hardware configurations and vendor-specific kernel
modification, they can be…well, crashy.
Other potential drawbacks are easily addressable. Phones
with limited onboard storage can often be supplemented by either removable SD
storage or cloud-based storage. And while having this kind of a dual-boot setup
will mean carrying a dock around and finding a monitor to hook up to, that
still may be more convenient than toting around a full-sized notebook
everywhere you go.
Ubuntu is pointing out that a smartphone that can dual-boot
is a pretty good driver for more powerful phones incorporating newer, faster
and more capacious technology, and fair enough. That’s the same basic
underlying engine that’s driven both desktop and laptop innovations for decades
now.
Ultimately, anything that makes the Android handset more
powerful is an okay thing in my books. So even though I’m not going to be
holding out much hope that the mix of Ubuntu and Android is going to be much
more than a novelty at the beginning, I’m going to be one of the first in line
to try it out.