Re: Is Android Intended to _Create_ Fragmentation?

[Tim Bird <tim bird am sony com>]

David "Lefty" Schlesinger wrote:
> An interesting article, with a direct quote to that effect from Sanjay 
> Jha, COO of Qualcomm (a proud member of OHA), in The Register, at 
> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/04/03/android_qualcomm/
>
> This supports my thinking about Android, and maybe even exceeds my 
> estimations of Google's cynicism toward the real open source community. 
> It wasn't that the existing efforts "weren't good enough", as Google's 
> been claiming, nor that the existing initiatives "weren't moving fast 
> enough". It's that they weren't _Google--controlled_ enough, and they 
> didn't create enough of a situation where only web-based approaches (a 
> strength of Google's) could really thrive.
>
> So much for "Don't be evil", I guess.

Call me naive, but I didn't get the same sense from the article.  To
people steeped in Microsoft, "enhancing fragmentation" can just as well
mean "avoiding a Microsoft monopoly."  This seems to me to be the
sense of Sanjay's quote.  From the Linux side, Android looks like an
attempt to fragment Linux offerings, but viewed from the wider context,
Android looks like another push for Linux to balance the overall
mobile OS playing field.  Of course above the kernel and up into
the stacks, the whole philosphy of Android - of avoiding native apps
completely - is interesting, and competes with other open source
offerings.  Whether it will fly is a different question. (My 2 cents
is that I don't think it will.)

I think we're already well on our way to another Unix war with Linux
in the mobile space, and Google doing it's own thing is another nail
in the coffin, but there was massive fragmentation already before they
joined the party, so one can't lay all the blame at their feet.

Everyone who's started a Linux mobile initiative in the last 4 years
(CELF included) bears some responsibility for the current situation.
 -- Tim

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Tim Bird
Architecture Group Chair, CE Linux Forum
Senior Staff Engineer, Sony Corporation of America
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