Android is not just an operating system for mobile phones and it's likely that it will be used for
netbooks, ultra-portable laptops which started to become
popular last year.
Daniel Hartmann managed to install Android on an Asus EEEPC 1000H "with nearly all of the necessary hardware you'd want (including graphics, sound and the wireless card for internet) running". It's also interesting to see that
some Android code references Asus Eee 701, the first Asus netbook.
VentureBeat speculates that we could see the first netbooks preloaded with Android in less than a year, but Android could become a general-purpose operating system for any kind of devices. Installing apps for your car or TV is not too far fetched.
This post details how to install Android on a netbook, but you shouldn't try it unless you understand the process.
said on January 3, 2009 6:42 PM PDT:
sounds interesting...
would love to see more in the future :D
said on January 3, 2009 7:40 PM PDT:
uh pardon me but what's the point?
Isn't Android itself based the Linux kernel?
Why not just use a lightweight Linux distribution?
(Too many question marks)
zplits said on January 4, 2009 12:32 AM PDT:
what are the features?
said on January 4, 2009 4:10 AM PDT:
@ anonymous
the point is, perhaps, which company/organization supports that system, I prefer it is Google.
Guido said on January 4, 2009 9:54 AM PDT:
This is great!
I think android will kick ass in 2009!
macbeach said on January 4, 2009 5:11 PM PDT:
In answer to some questions above, I don't think the point of all this is that it is necessarily desirable to run Android on laptops, but rather just to demonstrate that it is (relatively) easy to do (at least for people already familiar with compiling their own operating systems).
What it demonstrates is that Android, being based on Linux, is a complete OS and can probably be run on anything that will run Linux generally, which is just about every box with a CPU of any kind in it.
Unlike Windows, which at this point is almost hard-coded for Pentium and above.
I don't think it necessarily proves that Google is planning their own general purpose OS, but it does show that they are well positioned to produce such a thing should they decide they want to (and I hope they do).
Graeme said on January 5, 2009 7:02 AM PDT:
It is great that it is now working on Netbooks, but is there any update on playing and watching Web content on the G1
Snaver said on January 7, 2009 4:22 PM PDT:
First signs of the elusive 'Google os' ;-)
henry 9th said on January 9, 2009 5:28 AM PDT:
What about Mobile phone's will it work on my n95?
said on January 9, 2009 7:53 PM PDT:
Is the elusive google OS Linux with a Java desktop manager?
Sally said on January 21, 2009 2:45 PM PDT:
"uh pardon me but what's the point?
Isn't Android itself based the Linux kernel?
Why not just use a lightweight Linux distribution?
(Too many question marks)"
The usability in Android is really fantastic and promises to constantly improve. One always awesome thing about free stuff like Android or Linux is that makes information technology available to lower-income markets. Lower-income markets also have a tendency to be less tech-savvy so usability is HUGELY important. Someone in a developing country who has never seen a computer would be much more likely to be able to use Android than a version of Linux. I got one of those $100 laptops, which runs on a linux-based operation system called Sugar, and the usability is not very good even though it's designed for children. Google is all about getting people access to information, and putting Android on netbooks is a pretty cool development in that direction.
its going to be on the same line with MOBLIN
