Nokia and Intel make unlikely bedfellows in oFono
Published: 19 May, 2009
The operators may be begging for fewer software platforms, but the mobile open source world only gets more complex and fragmented. The latest twist is a collaboration between Intel and Nokia - more commonly on opposite sides of the fence in recent years - on a Linux-based operating system geared mainly to low end or midrange webphones.
The oFono project brings together two giants which should, logically, have plenty of synergies - both need to dominate and drive the move to the mobile internet, and bring different expertise to the table. Previous attempts to pool their resources and so wrongfoot other challengers for the mobile web crown, like Google, have foundered on commercial conflicts of interest, and Nokia's truce with Qualcomm seemed to make it less necessary to work with Intel. oFono may go the same way, but it is another sign of both firms increasing their interest and investment in open source, and in Linux in particular, despite Nokia's commitment to open Symbian and Intel's to its Moblin architecture.
OFono seems to fit into a different slot, targeted at lower end devices and services than those smartphone/MID platforms. The companies describe oFono.org as a "place to bring developers together around designing an infrastructure for building mobile telephony (GSM/UMTS) applications". It aims to define a mobile stack that is highly efficient for resource constrained devices and would probably aim to stimulate the emerging market for integrated mobile web services and handsets in the developing economies, where cheaper devices are needed and there may be little or no 3G coverage, let alone true mobile broadband. Nokia is increasingly focusing its web software efforts on the "next billion" and this week released its lowest cost 3G handset to date.
Like most open source efforts that are backed by major vendors, 'openness' only goes so far. By defining what goes into the heart of the stack - and limiting the technologies that can be layered on top of it - hardware suppliers are able to put their own designs in control. According to Marcel Holtmann of the Intel Open Source Technology Center, oFono is licensed under the GPLv2 process, and it includes a high level D-Bus API for use by telephony applications licensed under any other open source system. It also includes a low level plug-in API for integrating with third party telephony stacks, cellular modems and back ends.
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