Fuchsia OS

limegorilla · January 21, 2018

It is a shame that we don't see much, if any innovation on the operating systems we use daily. Other than Windows 8, Windows has kept with its basic layout, one that has been used for over twenty years. Macintosh just refines the same layout each generation. iOS is much of the same - even iOS 7, the "biggest update ever" only really brought new textures. Android has only had one major update in recent years - Android Lollipop, an upgrade from the previous "holo" interface. Yes we get new features in these updates, but honestly none of these are that ground breaking either. Yes, I can now connect my Android phone to my Windows desktop. Yippie - but then I have to replace my much loved Google apps - no thanks. Now I can finally answer a text on my ChromeBook - only if I have Android 8.1, and a Google Pixel - neither of which I have.

So when I heard about Fuchsia OS, a brand new OS from Google, coded from scratch - this time not based on Linux's kernel - made for both phones and laptops, I was surprised, and over the moon. Finally we are going to see a new OS that actually understands the latest devices and actually connects them on an operating system level, showing that we might have ACTUAL continuity, rather than whatever the hell Cortana is trying to pull lately. (I have an entire rant on that too )

By the looks of it, and from many rumours that have surfaced with its recent surface running on a PixelBook, it will run the same OS on both phone and laptop (that already run Chrome OS) and features a very Google interface, cards blurry app drawers, white EVERYWHERE - but it does look nice. Everyone seems to be heading in this direction now, the same user experience wherever you are, which I like. Hopefully we can see some real innovation from software designers soon - I would say a new design for windows, but last time Microsoft did that, well....

To me the division is stale. All we get are a few new features and possibly some new looks, but probably just looks - look at Android (My favorite OS btw) - compare Oreo to Lollipop. Yes we have a new color scheme, and a new settings menu, but in four years? That's all they could come up with? Yes I know, there are MANY more improvements - but that is what they are, improvements. Nothing new, nothing amazing, just tweaks here and there, a new feature here, getting rid of Flappy Android there - you get my point. iOS is much of the same.

So, now you have put up with my rant - sorry about that - here is where I see Fuchsia OS going.

2020 - 2021: RELEASE

Seeing as the OS now, finally, has a User Interface - probably not the final one - I think it will only take a few years yet. I think we will start seeing development of FOS (as I am now calling it) a lot more. I/O 2020 will most likely be the release date.

OCT 2020 - 2021: GOOGLE'S HARDWARE RELEASE:

Google's latest devices will probably ship with it, and the year thereafter will probably see more premium devices shipping with it pre-installed, maybe as an option to an android phone? Samsung's latest will definitely be a big score for Google if they can manage to get Samsung to change to the new OS. I have heard that complete Android support will be included (which, thinking about it, is a given) so rollout should not be hard per-se. It depends if Google can configure it to run on devices that currently run android (I have no idea if this would work, android being powered by linux, this not) as an OTA update, though if this DOES manage to happen I assume that you would need a computer to update to FOS. Chromebooks I do not think will be an issue, probably just needing a USB installer, similar to the current recovery system. Seeing as it runs on the PixelBook, it could support probably devices back to 2016 but I doubt this will happen, more likely for devices sold this year, but I may be wrong as it will be their last year with official software support.

TWO YEARS AFTER LAUNCH:

The end of Android and Chrome OS will be upon us. The end of an era - and the end of my two current favorite operating systems.

But, I would love your thoughts on this - would you switch? Do you think the OS market is stale? Let me know

Thanks for reading, Liam

samcool55 · January 21, 2018

2020, that's a damn long time.

And tbh the issue with UI and stuff is that they all use these "modern" lay-outs but holy crap they are boring and lazy. I don't like them!

One of the main reasons i'm still on W7, the aero looks great and you can tweak the sh*t out of it. Custom themes for W10 are basically dead because microshit broke a lot a few updates ago and since then most of them gave up.

noahdvs · January 22, 2018

11 hours ago, limegorilla said:

It is a shame that we don't see much, if any innovation on the operating systems we use daily. Other than Windows 8, Windows has kept with its basic layout, one that has been used for over twenty years. Macintosh just refines the same layout each generation. iOS is much of the same - even iOS 7, the "biggest update ever" only really brought new textures. Android has only had one major update in recent years - Android Lollipop, an upgrade from the previous "holo" interface. Yes we get new features in these updates, but honestly none of these are that ground breaking either. Yes, I can now connect my Android phone to my Windows desktop. Yippie - but then I have to replace my much loved Google apps - no thanks. Now I can finally answer a text on my ChromeBook - only if I have Android 8.1, and a Google Pixel - neither of which I have.

You know, Linux already has a large amount of customization and layouts. It's far more mature than Fuchsia, so you don't have to wait to try something new. You can also already answer texts from a Linux PC, sync notifications and use your Android phone as a remote control for the PC via KDEConnect and it's easy to use.

11 hours ago, limegorilla said:

So when I heard about Fuchsia OS, a brand new OS from Google, coded from scratch - this time not based on Linux's kernel - made for both phones and laptops, I was surprised, and over the moon. Finally we are going to see a new OS that actually understands the latest devices and actually connects them on an operating system level, showing that we might have ACTUAL continuity, rather than whatever the hell Cortana is trying to pull lately. (I have an entire rant on that too )

What do you mean "actually understands the latest devices and actually connects them on an operating system level"? That's literally what an OS does. If it didn't understand and connect to them on an operating system level, they wouldn't work. Also, Fuchsia uses a microkernel, so it's actually slightly less connected to the hardware "on an operating system level" than a monolithic kernel like Linux or hybrid like Windows NT. No idea what Cortana has to do with continuity between hardware platforms.

I'm not sure exactly what Google plans to use Fuchsia for, but I'll take a long time for it to replace existing operating systems, if it replaces any.

The biggest problem with Android has nothing to do with the UI, but how unmaintainable older smartphones are. So many smartphone manufacturers just distribute drivers in the form of binary blobs instead of contributing drivers to the Linux kernel. That make it very difficult to upgrade to newer versions of Android (or Linux) without breaking support for some of the phone's hardware. This leads to there being many different versions of Android in the wild and none of them being well maintained. If your phone is more than a year old, you might not get any security updates and probably not in a timely manner if you do get any. Unless Fuchsia becomes the next Windows, I'm not sure Fuchsia will be any better in this area than Android. What Google would gain from moving to Fuchsia is total control over development of the kernel, which could be good or bad.