The Open Source Cell Phone

My 100th blog entry discusses OpenMoko, FIC, Linux, Sun and more

By Ian Darwin on 2007-05-30 00:21 in Category: java telephony oss

I've wrtten here before about Asterisk, the open source PBX telephone system that runs on generic PCs (among other platforms). Now there's an open source cell phone! OpenMoko is the software project (see their wiki page first; the home page is kind of restricted); the hardware is custom-made by FIC. The phone runs Linux, has GSM, GPS, and a nice UI. It will be shipping soon to developers and aims to be on sale in a retail products in September of this year. US$350 gets you an unlocked GSM phone.

Interestingly, at JavaOne sun showed this same phone running (presumably) the same Linux, but a totally different - and all-Java- UI called JavaFX Mobile, based on technology they got by acquiring Savaaje. Sun have said they will GPL this code.

Looks like this phone is going to be very open; maybe mine will have a boot-up option to choose between OpenMoko and JavaFX Mobile. How much more open can you get than having multiple free interfaces?