Nokia, Intel Merge Maemo, Moblin Into MeeGo 162
AVee writes "Intel and Nokia just announced a new project called MeeGo. MeeGo is supposed to be the result of merging Maemo and Moblin, bringing together the best pieces of those (already quite similar platforms). Interestingly this means that Intel will be sponsoring a mobile Linux distro which will run on ARM."
Eh? (Score:5, Informative)
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...Whether they choose to focus on that area or not is a different story.
From the summary:
Interestingly this means that Intel will be sponsoring a mobile Linux distro which will run on ARM."
Is there a mobile distro that *doesn't* support ARM?
Re:Eh? (Score:5, Funny)
All Linux distros can potentially run on ARM ...
All Windows distros can potentially run
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Windows Mobile/WinCE/etc. have all been ported to ARM, which Microsoft provides support for.
In fact, you even get the source code so that you can port it to the architecture of your choice; but then you have to support it yourself. That's the catch.
Linux, OTOH, is supported on dozens of processor architectures from the ARM to the Itanium to the Cell, whether you want an 8-bit processor or 256-bit processor. Windows can't do that.
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Yeah, but Intel sold its ARM division to Marvell because they thought Atom was a perfect CPU for phones, TVs and other appliances.
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MeeGo will be ARM/x86, so it's not like Intel is not going to benefit from this.
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Funny names (Score:5, Funny)
MeeGo is supposed to be the result of merging Maemo and Moblin
Who named these platforms, a Lord of the Rings fan with a speech impediment?
Re:Funny names (Score:5, Insightful)
Doh! You beat me to it. (Score:2)
Always seemed to me like these were redundant projects though. 12 flavors of mobile Linux kinda defeats the whole point?
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OpenMoko (Score:2)
Really I don't quite get why OpenMoko exists as an independent project either except that nobody seemed able to agree to all get together. Fragmentation in server and desktop space isn't a big deal and the choices made available to users are valuable, but in the mobile marketplace those considerations really don't apply so much. All that is really left as a justification for various mobile Linux projects has always been no more than technical disagreements about how to implement certain things and a desire
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The openmoko software projects are entirely community driven. The hardware development is only done by educational institutions now I believe. Parts of the software stack will most likely survive beyond the openmoko project. The Enlightenment team are working for Samsung on smart phones for example. For now, I have a great phone which I like using and which I can develop for [glitch.tl], so I am happy.
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More like a Mi-Go [wikimedia.org]
That was my first thought as well...
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Somebody should make a cutesy "Hello Kitty" version of a Mi-Go to be the logo and mascot for Meego.
Nah.. Just give Tux neko ears..
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There may already be one on the Hello Cthulhu [hello-cthulhu.com] site.
Re:Funny names (Score:5, Funny)
A stupid name is a prerequisite for being a successful FOSS product. Nokia and Intel have clearly done their homework.
Also indicating huge potential, MeeGo has already ignited a flamewar between RPM and DEB supporters. Welcome to the community!
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Either that or a Cthulhu Fan [wikipedia.org]...
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Maemo is a mythical figure/creature in Finnish folklore. The name has been made readable for most of western world by ditching the double a.
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Not that I'm a conspiricy theorist, but what if someone at Intel was thinking.. hmm.. maybe we'll sponsor the dominant distribution for ARM platforms but give it a name that non-geeks will think is sissy.
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BISMILLAH!
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MeeGo is supposed to be the result of merging Maemo and Moblin
Who named these platforms, a Lord of the Rings fan with a speech impediment?
Be happy they didn't name it M&M.
Probably a Lovecraft fan
Interesting... (Score:2)
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Or they see no benefit (or perhaps negative effects) to (excessive) software fragmentation.
They have generally shown themselves to be rather pragmatic (as a business should).
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Next version of the n900? (Score:2, Interesting)
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Meego's website lists netbooks, pocketables, in-vehicle, connected TV and Media Phone, so it looks like they're looking at a much broader population than Android is
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Some of the newer Android hardware is quite neat, yet an OS so tightly coupled with Google-Everything is not quite to my taste. I would love to put Maemo/MeeGo on these devices. Sorry, Nokia :/
Name? (Score:3, Interesting)
Meego?
The mobile OS from Yuggoth
Re:Name? (Score:4, Insightful)
Still better than the other way around:
Maggot.
The mobile OS from Yugo. ^^
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Intel IS involved, after all...
Does it run Jar(Jar) files (Score:2)
Just asking...
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Package management (Score:2, Interesting)
The real important question: What package management system will it use?
Re:Package management (Score:4, Informative)
Q Will MeeGo use .rpm or .deb as its packaging system? .rpm format
A: MeeGo will use the
http://meego.com/about/faq
Also Quim Gil of Maemo stated that it will officially support both GTK+ and Qt (original plan for Maemo 6 was to officially support only Qt and deliver GTK+ via community supported packages)
http://talk.maemo.org/showpost.php?p=527251&postcount=87
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Also Quim Gil of Maemo stated that
Quim Gil of Maemo? Even Tolkien would have rejected that name as too preposterous
Re:Package management (Score:5, Interesting)
RPM, says Intel. Can't find a link, but there is much gnashing of teeth over that at work here. I would prefer to keep the repository apt, at the very least. But apt+dpkg would be lovely.
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RPM, says the FAQ [meego.com]
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What's the odds there'll be a fork within the next month or so?
Re:Package management (Score:4, Insightful)
It's really a problem? I mean, package wars are so 1999. I recently switched to a RPM based distro after 9 years using and loving APT. And while there're differences (some advantages, some disadvantages), these days they're pretty much the same thing. I'm using KDE 4.4 from Fedora rawhide in my Fedora 13 base system, just as I would have done in Ubuntu. There're things far more important in this merge than using RPM instead of DEB. Like, for example, focusing on QT instead of Clutter.
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RPM 4.8 (included in Fedora 13) is insanely faster [laiskiainen.org].
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RPM, says Intel. Can't find a link, but there is much gnashing of teeth over that at work here. I would prefer to keep the repository apt, at the very least. But apt+dpkg would be lovely.
I don't get why people say this. I use Debian and Archlinux but I find Archlinux's pacman much more comfortable than the apt(-get -cache -search itute) + dpkg* mess
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I use Arch too but there are some things that stack against it for consumer devices this will run on.
Pacman lacks a stable/polished gui and has no built in downgrade support (you have to manually install an old package from /var/cache which you hopefully didn't clean out). Apt also has other features like the gpg keys that though you and I may not miss, but I'm sure others may.
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I use Arch too but there are some things that stack against it for consumer devices this will run on.
Pacman lacks a stable/polished gui and has no built in downgrade support (you have to manually install an old package from /var/cache which you hopefully didn't clean out). Apt also has other features like the gpg keys that though you and I may not miss, but I'm sure others may.
Agreed. But I am sure you can create a nice polished GUI easily and also somehow allow downgrading without a dpkg-apt mess. There has to be another way.
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One question... why? I bet your prejudices are based on very outdated information.
I've used yum, zypper, apt, and pacman based systems before, and I don't see any significant differences in the packaging format's power. Repositories are often set up a bit differently, but that's a policy issue. What is this major feature DEB has that RPM doesn't? Or even that apt has that yum doesn't?
Re:Package management (Score:4, Interesting)
I'll bet you haven't used RPM in-depth since before YUM became the preferred front-end. If you had, you would have already known that rpm:dpkg what yum:apt, and there really isn't much of a difference between the two stacks, at this point.
It's funny how little some people can be bothered to know about the Linux world outside their own little preferred ecosystems. Last week, I suggested that a co-worker might want use RPMs instead of tarballs to distribute a patched custom LAMP stack to a server farm. Rather than admit that he didn't know anything about writing spec files and couldn't be bothered to learn, he started lecturing me on the evils of "RPM dependency hell".
In 2050, I'm sure some people who use some kind of Linux on a daily basis will still be spouting these old saws, feebly unaware that everybody is just too polite to whack an old geezer with the clue bat.
No (Score:5, Funny)
No that's not it.
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Please mod that guy up or the parent down. Package management is a completely irrelevant problem.
These are actually important questions:
How long will it take them to cut GTK support?
What does this mean for Nokias Qt support? Many people in the Qt community have been worried that they would cut back on the desktop support in favour of the mobile parts.
Intel controlling a Linux distro? How does this fit into the larger picture? How does this affect the possibility of it getting into the phones from, say, Moto
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It isn't important to average users, maybe, but it is to the nerds on /.
This is the only mobile Linux distro that takes openness and interop with desktop Linux seriously, so I'll still support it, but I really liked the fact that Maemo was Debian-based
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Maemo was Debian-based in the same way that Microsoft is standards-based: buried at some pointless level and entirely irrelevant to users and developers alike. The API and SDK are of far greater consequence.
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That's misrepresenting it completely. Even though the recommended API is Qt and most people will stick to poking, Maemo's Debian base makes everything be where expected when users are in the terminal. For developers, being based on a real Linux distro means that any programming language works, and screw the SDK. A better analogy would be like the engine in your car, but certainly not like Microsoft and standards. Most people don't know how it works, but it's there, and it's important.
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Speaking as a nerd on /., I have to say that whether Maemo itself is Debian-based is not as important as it seems. The Maemo repo isn't really compatible with the "true" Debian repos; if you want to apt-get install your pretty little heart out, what you do is install the package "easy-deb-chroot". In other words: getting access to the Debian software catalogue is orthogonal to the packaging system Maemo apps use. I hope that MeeGo still offers an easy-deb-chroot package, but it's fine if it's packaged as an
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Being a big fan of Debian (see my sig), I have to agree. Some claim that Maemo/Meego "is not a desktop OS, compatibility isn't important", but I'd just like to point out that Debian is the *only* distro I can run as a server *and* desktop OS, on multiple architectures, and not have it give me headaches. Why can't we extend the D
Holy 90s Batman. (Score:2)
Intel + ARM = EEE (Score:1)
Interestingly this means that Intel will be sponsoring a mobile Linux distro which will run on ARM.
Embrace: Check.
Extend: Active.
Extinguish: Pending.
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You forgot the “extend” step.
Just add something to it, that does not directly link into GPL code (and therefore can be closed-source), but that everybody will use and expect from then on. Then everyone who does not offer that function, will be left out in the cold, and called “incompatible” (Which of course is the wrong way around and totally unfair.)
Intel's not going anywhere. (Score:1)
It's become pretty clear that Intel's place in the market is assured. They can't stop people from using ARM in low-power devices, x86 just has too much overhead.
What they can do is make sure that people don't have to worry about their architecture when they're using software. And that benefits everyone, because it keeps the chips we're using at top capacity.
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Gtk RIP? (Score:5, Insightful)
Both Maemo and Moblin started off Gtk-based, using the Clutter toolkit on top of Gtk. Now both have switched over to Qt. Are there any other serious users of Clutter left?
I hear lots of projects starting with or switching to Qt these days, and none that switch to or start with Gtk. Having programmed in both Gtk and Qt, I have to say I understand why. Qt is hands down the better and more elegant toolkit, despite my preference for C over C++. Qt also makes it easier than Gtk to port between Linux, Mac and Windows. Gtk on the other hand is stuck with a horrible dependency hell that prevents using it for anything serious on non-Linux platforms.
I think the way forward for Linux on the desktop is to standardize on one GUI toolkit, and there is no doubt that this toolkit would have to be Qt. It is a bit sad, because I always like Gnome better than KDE, and I see no easy way for Gnome to convert over to Qt.
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It seems that functionally Clutter has been superceded by advances in Qt.. Qt supports OpenGL/ES/VG backends and has a new "declarative UI" for designing animated and custom UIs. In fact since the Nokia aquisition Qt seems to have all but forgotten about the desktop and most new features are squarely aimed at implementing fluid custom iPhone-like interfaces on smartphone/netbook targets.
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I agree, it's weird.
I was playing out with Qt and Qt Creator recently and the framework is very accessible and cross-platform, while GTK+ is somewhat more of a hassle to port. It's also nicer to develop with (much easier to get started and the Qt library has some very nice features, esp. since the 4.6 release).
That said, I perceive KDE as a very ugly desktop environment. I stopped using it a long time ago. Still checking it out once or twice a year, but I don't like it compared to GNOME. I want a desktop th
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Unfortunately, GTK is a huge panopoly of multiple dependencies that simply haven't got easier to package up over the years, and in many ways have got worse. It's cross-platform support is also pretty terrible as a result, especially when it comes to Windows and Mac but for embedded devices I would imagine the pain and maintenance would be worse. Sad, but
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(Un)fortunately, ordinary users aren't graphics designers and don't care about any of that. Else nobody would be using Windows where it seems each application is using it's own toolkit.
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Uh huh. I don't know anyone who has said that anywhere in response to any of the quite meaningless crap that gets thrown.
So provide one as opposed to a bunch of rather crappy third, fourth or fifth hand comments. Gnome just doesn't have the aesthetics or functionality anywhere close to Windows or OS X, which have a gr
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That's funny--I've never had to spend more than 10 minutes tweaking a new KDE desktop. And most of that is usually just adding the plasmoids I like, and setting up a quicklaunch with the apps I want.
It takes a hot 5 seconds to open up the right menu and check the box to turn on Compiz. And all those wonderful productivity effects work basically identically on KDE and Gnome.
There, see how I completely negated every point you thought you just made. Let this be a lesson as to why you shouldn't try to argue poi
Do not say dependency hell... (Score:2, Interesting)
...when it's simple negligence. While package maintainers take care of Gtk for linux, Gtk for windows is in ruins.
There's no installer on official gtk page. C'mon guys, it's 2010, and you still package it in zip archives?
Ok, there is an installer on SF, but wait, there's no Glade support in there!
Oh, here is Glade, but oh, it's shipping with its own Gtk bundle, which is outdated and incompatible with the first one.
Ok, let's install the major Gtk app, GIMP... Wait, I already have two gtk bundles installed, I
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You only need the glade package on windows if you want to use the glade interface editor to create xml files gtkbuilder can read
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Chrome?
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The reason Chrome uses GTK is because the people at Google responsible for the Linux port were more familiar with GTK than Qt. Nothing to do with the merits of toolkits.
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> Both Maemo and Moblin started off Gtk-based, using the Clutter toolkit on top of Gtk.
You would have a point had it been done for technical reasons. And had you known what you were going on about. Maemo was never based on clutter, it predated clutter by several years and the hardware it ships on lacks 3d acceleration. This is corporate politics at work. Maemo is pretty much dead if you ask me, managed into oblivion. Moblin was already a dead horse, being tied too closely to both the x86 anchor and
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Sadly, it seems you're also out of date. Maemo5 features 3d effects [maemo.org], to great use. I'm not sure whether clutter was in the final design, though.
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The whole point of switching to Qt is that porting is often as easy as recompiling, and both are very similar Linux distributions. I don't think what you fear is that likely, especially since you can already write Qt apps even for Maemo 5.
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He does know what he's talking about. He specifically said Maemo and Moblin, and Moblin does use Clutter.
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One of the main issues with GTK has been the lack of any serious corporate sponsorship.
There used to be Sun. Used...
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Doesn't Chromium use GTK?
There can only be one! (Score:2)
How about the handset manufacturers get behind one distro, and make it awesome? All multuple distros, with multiple app stores, and all sorts of crazy interfaces will do is fragment the market. In the end, none of them will succeed!
Re:There can only be one! (Score:4, Interesting)
Well, iPhone is doomed to stay as proprietary garbage, as is WinMo 7. ...
Now what's left: Android, Meego, Palm,
Those 3 could probably work together... Maybe Android is too full of itself and Samsung should join Meego and drop Bada too.
The question for all these is who control the app store, and i think meego allows all of them to control their own while still staying compatible.
This also means open access to an open market of different store for consumers if the platform is to stay open and thus attract people.
Are we seeing the computer software industry transform into a "Label" that distributes apps?
I can't understand this model in a world where everyone can setup their own distribution channel for 20$.
It's only a winning move if you can sell hardware and the only way to compete against the über monopolistic Apple model is this.
So the cycle of proprietary / FOSS reaction goes on ...
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Well, iPhone is doomed to stay as proprietary garbage, as is WinMo 7. ...
Now what's left: Android, Meego, Palm,
Those 3 could probably work together... Maybe Android is too full of itself and Samsung should join Meego and drop Bada too.
There is SHR [openmoko.org] and QtMoko [openmoko.org]. Enlightenment is the desktop environment for SHR and the enlightenment team are working for Samsung now.
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Linux based? meh.
In case you missed it, Symbian went open source this month [symbian.org].
Nokia and maybe GNOME wins... (Score:2, Interesting)
Now it's obvious that QT will evolve for Mobile devices. And GTK will evolve to be a solid Desktop toolkit for Linux. When maemo project started GTK had lost lots of blood because Nokia contribution had no visible be
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Well, Qt (it's Qt by the way) has been available for mobile devices for years and it already is a solid desktop toolkit for Linux. The added development, interest and perhaps new applications and functionality from the mobile direction will be most welcome. I know a lot of people like to crow about the 'Linux desktop', but there has been nothing whatsoever happening on that front for Gnome o
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I don't see why Qt would lose. Its development tools (Qt Creator, KDevelop) are still much better and more polished than anything Gtk has to offer, and much more like what you have in Windows land. Heck, Qt Creator is probably the first real C++ RAD environment for Linux that I've seen, and the second one overall (the first one was C++ Builder).
Also, Qt is preferable if you want better L&F integration - if you write a Gtk application, it will look alien in KDE, but if you write a Qt4 appication, it will
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Qt doesn't need to get any better for desktop usage - it's already better than anything else in Linux land (and, for C++, anything on any platform).
Good move (Score:4, Insightful)
I was recently worried they'd both wither on the vine trying to compete against Android and filling almost exactly the same space. Thus I was thinking I'd have to base a project on ChromeOS, which seemed strategically foolish (at least Nokia and Intel will have divergent interests to keep development focused on solving problems well in the abstract, rather than quick-n-dirty tangents a single vendor can accept).
Especially if they stay with the mainline kernel, which Google isn't interested in doing, together Intel and Nokia are going to be much more successful than competing poorly against each other and Google.
So, here's one developer's intent to go this way rather than Android (for a non-phone project). Congrats to the adults in both camps.
Exactly... (Score:2)
I was recently worried they'd both wither on the vine trying to compete against Android and filling almost exactly the same space.
I've been especially excited about the fact that the n900 runs what roughly amounts to Debian inside. Google's neutering of key parts of the Linux kernel and subsystems really put a damper on people hacking on those internals of Android or porting existing software to the mobile OS.
Especially if they stay with the mainline kernel, which Google isn't interested in doing
It was quite disheartening for Google to make that choice. Google's decision was probably based on some kind of cheapest-bang-for-the-buck calculation, but the funny thing is that Google often goes the extra mile, such as their D [dataliberation.org]
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As a final parting shot, I have the most experience with Debian and Ubuntu system, so I would have preferred that they choose apt and .debs over yum and .rpms, but certainly more important than the package manager is the hope that they'll continue to maintain a free and open system.
Agreed. I have more experience on the RPM side, but I owned an n810 for about a year and found apt to be fine, it didn't really matter. The bad old days of dpkg bitching about circular dependencies didn't revisit during my time
One more Linux "platform"? (Score:2)
OMiGo might've been a better name :-).
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Slashdot would probably save on bandwidth if people would tag "notypoinsummary" on the rare occasion that a summary is typo free.
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Intel sold XScale a long time ago. June 2006, in fact, as you would know if you had looked at the link you posted.
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Because GTK+/Gnome proved to be shite, very few applications were written for Maemo as a result and it couldn't do all the cool stuff they wanted to compete with Android and the iPhone.
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FUD? GNOME/gtk+ is managed by the GNOME foundation, an NPO, and Qt is managed by Nokia a for profit company but that's where the differences end. Both are available through public git repositories, and both are licensed through the LGPL (with Qt also available through the GPL 3 and Proprietary licenses).
Qt is fairly widely deployed as well, even in the 'community' or would you like us to forget about KDE?