Omar Rizwan
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@omar,
feel like there would be much less of a role for Raspberry Pis/SBCs if smartphones were actually programmable and reusable, but they just... aren't, somehow
Omar Rizwan
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@omar,
Omar Rizwan
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@omar,
smartphones solve a lot of the problems that every Pi project seems to encounter, where it's really hard to keep a Pi powered (especially higher-end boards that have more compute), the Pi is kind of bulky, no case or sensors or display out of the box, etc
Omar Rizwan
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@omar,
"you can write any robotics application you want, but you'll have no control over whether the application gets stopped for an automatic update, or paused for energy saving…" https://old.reddit.com/r/robotics/comments/18vwhp3/using_an_android_smartphone_instead_of_a/
![[–][deleted] 9 points 3 months ago
In general, mobile phones would be the absolute best hardware for robotics.
Unfortunately the hardware itself is very much locked down (especially iPhones) and it's really hard to install an operating system you can control on the device.
Therefore you can write any robotics application you want, but you'll have no control over whether the application gets stopped for an automatic update, or paused for energy saving, or paused because some other app that comes preinstalled with the phone decides to create a popup with a prompt for user interaction, and your app will never know that the device is stuck waiting for user interaction....
tldr; great devices, terrible OS.
savereplyskip](https://social.omar.website/fileserver/01PG4R73NMJC888MJM2KBM4CFF/attachment/original/01GDQGB4185R3D3BN0VS7PMEE2.png)
Omar Rizwan
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@omar,
problems with smartphones remind me of problems CDG had with using Mac minis or iMacs for physical computing/kiosks, or problems I've had trying to do interesting stuff on the Web platform
where you can theoretically make it work, there often is no *big* barrier, but there is a pileup of tons of little barriers from the consumer hardware and software (it always wants to autoupdate, there are modals, it has security controls on peripherals and persistent state, etc)
Joël Franusic
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@jpf, @mastodon.social
@omar I honestly struggle to think of any system that is immune from this pileup of barriers. Every system I use requires some level of ongoing maintenance that gets in the way of what I really want to do. I wonder if this is part of what people find appealing about retro gaming? You plug in the cartridge, power on the system, and play the game.
nika
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@nonnullish, @indieweb.social
@omar maybe the answer is more dongles
somehow i stumbled upon this abomination just now: https://redpark.com/usb-c-serial-cable/
i wonder if it works
gabrielbezerra
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@gabrielbezerra, @mastodon.social
@omar Termux was the best discovery for me on this subject in the past years. Using it was the first time I felt like phones as a platform with freedom in a long while.