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Comment by CthulhuOvermind | Hacker News Reader

Currently working in this company, I guarantee you Huawei is working on its own version of everything. Any tool we use is always considered as something we should aim to replace with a version of our own.

A custom OS does not suprise me in the slightest, considering there are custom ARMv8 CPU's in development as well

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This just seems like a smart call. Some of the largest companies have made the mistake of making themselves dependent on another company for their business model, which can leave them in a bad place if the relationship sours or the platform changes. The old example of course, is Facebook games, where companies like Zynga pretty much exist or don't at the whims of Facebook's policies.

Samsung of course has Tizen as a fallback. I wonder how many other manufacturers may have fallback plans in this regard. Because if Android goes away, the only other slightly popular OS they can license for their own devices is Windows, which of course won't let them customize the platform as much.

Other manufacturers can and should use Tizen as well. It is open source after all.

But then someone like Huawei just puts themselves in the predicament of being subject to Samsung's whims. Android is allegedly open source too, but the reality is, the platform's creator decides it's development direction, and if you want the apps to work, you have to follow it.

Hopefully it's better than their own calendar app they install on their Android phones.

My sister was missing the "task" view in the calendar app. Found out that this is Huawei's abysmal own calender - it worked in the Google calendar.

A friend of mine (using a Huawei Android phone too) had problems to view multiple calendars at once. The solution was to install Google calendar on the phone.

So I'm not too thrilled with their Android apps.

It's not great that the icon is the exact same for the native and the google calendar app.

Yes - this doesn't help at all.

I wish some good manufacturer stepped in and went the direction Nokia was going with Maemo, sans the stupid marketing decisions.

Also, with ChromeOS being able to run Android applications soon, it might be easier to get a new OS populated with decent software before native things get some traction.

Is this an Asian thing? Like Juche?

It's a "we have no idea when these companies OR our own government might suddenly screw us out of the software we need to sell our hardware, due to changing geopolitical winds" thing. A bit like avoiding your whole startup being only a third-party Facebook or Twitter developer. :)

Or when some foreign government might suddenly screw you hard:

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2014-08-07/chinas-hua...

The US has no problem purchasing foreign telecom gear from foreign companies - Ericsson(Swedish) and Alcatel/Lucent(French), just Huawei. Selective economic protectionism. Free market what?

Pretty much every Android OEM has a plan B. It would kinda stupid not to. Samsung has proudly shown off Tizen and even releases products with it. Actually, its the fourth largest mobile in term of market share. Sailfish is reportedly used internally in several companies as well.

The more the merrier. I would love to see Android be a Nexus-only product where there's a high level of quality, fast updates, and years of security/platform updates opposed to the excessively skinned Android phones that maybe get one major update in their lifetime and then get tossed into the landfill.

edit: I should note Tizen isn't a Samsung product, they are just one of its biggest users and contributors. Its an open source OS managed by the Linux foundation.

>Pretty much every Android OEM has a plan B. It would kinda stupid not to.

I am genuinely not capable of understanding this logic.google is not a small company and they are not going to destroy Android with these kind of stupid decisions.

So why Samsung and etc does spend billions on new softwares when they can simply fork Android (in most extreme situations to respond to Google, just like what Amazon did).

The concern is not that Android "goes away", but that google enslaves the hardware companies like good old MS of yore enslaved the PS clone makers.

That ship has sailed. Learn how to prosper in that role or do something else. If you think you can do an OS, go for it. I would like to see a third successful mobile OS.

>If you think you can do an OS, go for it.

It's not about competing with Android. It's about bargaining power. If you depend on Google, they can dictate any terms they like. Having an alternative to Android, even a crappy one, sets an upper limit to how hard Google can screw you over.

Google might not kill Android outright, but there are huge parts of the API that depend on their proprietary software. So far they haven't abused that power much. If they decide to change the their terms, you want to have an alternative that's ready to ship in under a year.

Have you ever seen Tizen APIs?

They already went through Meego, BADA OS, and now EFL reboots.

I wouldn't bother to code for it, not even as an hobby.

And I do code as an hobby for Android and WP.

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