Antonio Licon's blog

Tablet OS Battle: iOS, Android, Blackberry vs Windows & Ubuntu

 

It’s apropos that “Tablet” is an anagram for “Battle”.  This is “the year of the iPad 2”, according to a typically humble statement by Steve Jobs.  Motorola’s Xoom wins in specs, but it's real world performance doesn’t exactly leave the iPad 2 in the dust.  In fact when it comes to graphics processing, some results show the iPad 2 totally dominating: (Gizmodo), (Anandtech).  That said, the battle is definitely on.


These wafer-thin devices are beautiful, light-weight, powerful, and have battery life in excess of 10 hours. They are objects of envy, but where are utility, functionality, and productivity?

The iPad is being designed and marketed as a novelty item.  It’s a casual-gaming, app-downloading, media-watching device.  And the Me-Too contestants in the market like Motorola, Samsung, and Blackberry are really following the blueprint that Apple has laid out.  They are not meant to be mobile computers, or laptop replacements.

There are a bunch of basic things I can do on my laptop that I cannot do on our iPad.  Open up Facebook or YouTube in my browser and upload a picture or image, for instance.  I can’t install my favorite browser.  I can’t drag and drop media and files from my device to a network or removable drive.  My list of iOS gripes is too long for this post.

But limited functionality not just an iOS issue.  Android is more flexible, with the ability to install 3rd party browsers and view Flash content, etc.  These features give Android points over iOS for utility, but the OS is still suffers from limitations that seem to stem from similar software design choices.  

I was playing with the Xoom the other day, and wanted to close Firefox.  I couldn’t find a ‘close’ option in the menu or anywhere on the screen.  A fellow engineer here pointed out to me, “You are thinking about it wrong.  That is NOT how they intend for you to use the device.”  Apparently the Android paradigm is to allow you to open as many things as you like, and it will close them for you, magically, when you start to run out of system resources.  That kind of magic I can do without.

The software that powers these devices is VERY different from the operating systems we run on our laptops and desktops.  These tablet-only OSs are significantly less capable, but WHY? Is it the hardware? The CPU / GPU / Ram on the iPad2 and Xoom are easily as capable as some netbooks from 2 years ago.  By the specs, Win XP or Ubuntu Netbook Remix should be able to run on these machines relatively well.

Smaller screens, and touch interface definitely require a different approach to input and layout, but to me that seems like a KVM (keyboard, video, mouse) issue.  These devices are basically portable computers.  In fact, with the addition of a Bluetooth mouse and keyboard, and HDMI out, the small screen and touch interface are non-issues.  With these devices connected, why shouldn't you be able to do everything you could do on a netbook from 2 years ago?

There is an argument for simplicity.  There is an argument for downloading an app for everything you want to do with your device, an app that is represented by a rounded square icon on your home screen that is easily accessed by a single tap.  Yes, this is an interface a 2 year old could use.  I am just not sure the trade-off in utility and features is really worth it.

Right now these devices seem to be stuck playing catch-up with Apple’s i-devices.  And maybe the lure of a walled garden approach to software is too tempting for even Google.  I can’t wait for this sector to grow-up, and feature mature operating systems that support the same functionality we enjoy on our netbooks and desktops.  Kinda like OQO promised (a little ahead of it’s time) to do for us in 2007-9.

Who knows, maybe Windows 7 for tablets will come to the rescue.  Apparently there are already tablets running Ubuntu spotted in the wild.  This guy even got Ubuntu Netbook Remix to run on his Xoom.  I would love to see that on an iPad2!

Until tablets run OSX, Windows, Ubuntu, or similar… my tablet purchase is going to wait.  An iPad 2 would just collect dust on my desk, once I got over the initial, delirious joy of playing Angry Birds.  

How long do you think it will take Canonical to put out a Ubuntu Tablet Remix?  According to PC World, we will see a Dual-Boot Windows  / Android Tablet, selling for less than $400, in October.  Asus also has an interesting stable of devices in the pipeline too... 

 

 

WebGL vs. Flash: Build Once, Play Everywhere

Since the "The late 1970's", programmers have been striving to Write Once, Run Anywhere...

Sun Microsystems is one of the more notable players to tilt at that windmill.  It's a noble cause, and one HTML5 and CSS are striving toward as well.  Both often suffer from the need to Write Once, Debug Everywhere.  Not exactly ideal.

One of the big advantages of developing rich internet applications in Flash is that you know it will look the same on Firefox as it does in Internet Explorer, Mac, PC, and even on Linux. You can pretty much build it once, and it works everywhere.  Of course that means your viewers need to have the Flash plugin.

But the rise of mobile devices is changing the development landscape considerably.  Even on the Xoom, the fanciest flagship Android tablet available right now, Flash just doesn’t play as well as it does on the desktop. 

We tried to visit http://droiddoes.com/ today to see if their cool head-tracking 3D effect would work with the Xoom’s front-facing camera.  No dice.  First we had to turn on the debug option in the settings menu… to do this you type about:debug in the address bar (and hit Enter).  Then you have to visit: browser settings > debug > UAString > Desktop.  Instructions here.  

After jumping through these hoops to keep from getting re-directed to the (tiny) phone version of the site, the Flash loaded but was clearly very broken, and the button to turn on the ‘webcam’ option didn’t do anything.  In fact the viewing area went blank, unless we touched it and held our finger down.  Not exactly what I would call a ‘build once, play everywhere’ experience.  Here's a video of my attempt:

 

In all fairness, even my laptop struggles a bit with this processor heavy site.  But since this was Flash, I had expected to get roughly the same experience… just a bit slower.  Of course this wouldn’t even be an option on the iPad (1 or 2) due to the complete unavailability of Flash on iOS. (Not entirely true, but I am not allowed to jailbreak our iPad) 

So what about WebGL?  So far there is very limited WebGL support in the mobile space.  As of this writing the Nokia 900 has WebGL (I don’t have one to test with, unfortunately), and Firefox on Android devices does too.  We tried (the awesome) No Comply demo  on the Xoom.  It tried… it really did, and some of the graphics rendered, but it’s just not there yet.  For laughs, we tried it on one of our Samsung Epic phones (android 2.2) and it ate all the memory on the phone, proceeding to close all other applications that were open.    

Mr Doob’s Clouds did not render at all.

iOS does not yet have WebGL… and IE9 on the desktop looks like it never will.  So how will we achieve the utopian goal of “build once, play anywhere”?  Will we convince Microsoft to adopt WebGL?  Will Apple play nicely with Flash like all the other kids? (Will hell freeze over?)

For now, it looks like we need to develop at least four pipelines for rich interactive 3d experiences.  We will need a plugin for IE9 (maybe Molehill?) and HTML5 / SVG / WebGL for all the other modern desktop browsers.  And of course, iOS and Android need dedicated code sets.

What do you think?

P.S. Thanks to Giles at Planet WebGL for the links (and the mention!)

WebGL : What Flavor Is Your Engine?

 

Even though WebGL’s official specification solidified just this March, a dizzying array of engines is already available.   

For example:

C3DL

Curve3D

CubicVR

CopperLicht

EnergizeGL

GammaJS

GLGE

GTW

Kuda

O3D

OSG.JS

PhiloGL

SceneJS

SpiderGL

TDL

Three.js

X3DOM

 

Other 3d Engines in JS/HTML5: (Thanks Theo for pointing these out!)

JS3D

Pre3d

 

In January, while working on a web viewer for 3d files, we had to pick a WebGL engine.  It was a tough choice, even then.  Our big contenders were C3DL, CopperLicht, CubicVR, GLGE, and O3D.  

Google’s O3D looked promising at the time, but we wanted an engine that would still be in active development 6 months down the road.  As with any Google project, developers adopt at their own risk.  Like the O3D plug-in before it, there was a chance it could get tossed aside.

CopperLicht is commercially licensed and comes with a tool suite for development, something we really weren’t interested in.

Other engines like CubicVR (a WebGL port of a C++ engine), seemed neglected and under-developed.

C3DL was definitely a consideration, but we found it lagged considerably on the performance front.

While not perfect, we found GLGE to be robust, lightweight, and well supported, and have chosen to work with that for now.  In the meantime, we are keeping an eye on emerging technologies and would be very interested in your experiences!

Do any of these engines suit your needs?  Are you considering just rolling your own?  Send me your demos, stories, and reasons for choosing to use your favorite WebGL engine(s).