Pinephone Keyboard Update

https://forum.pine64.org/showthread.php?tid=13684

by TheUnelisted • 5 years ago

55 20 5 years ago

forum.pine64.org

xbar• 5 years ago

Very promising. Psion-killer?

I sure think so. Less a killer though and more of a real continuation of it. Not to say the Gemini, Astro Slide, etc isn't continuing it, but Planet Computer's devices run Android and not mainline Linux like the PinePhone does (sure you can run Linux, but only with an android kernel).

easton• 5 years ago

Also this won't cost $300-500 like all of those others do, which of course means you get a slower phone but since this is probably more of a Linux tinker toy so far, not too bad.

lukevp• 5 years ago

That keyboard seems incredibly thick. Does it have an extra battery or something? Or is that just for key travel?

jraph3• 5 years ago

Yes, it has a big battery.

TheUnelisted4• 5 years ago

6,000 MaH

megous3• 5 years ago

It has battery with twice the capacity of the one that's in the phone itself. That's a bit crazy :) In total this combo will have ~33Wh.

jraph3• 5 years ago

I was considering getting one of these keyboards when they are available. I was actually looking forward to it. It would make typing texts way easier and the big battery compensating the weak one in the Pinephone would be great. It would probably be the main selling point for me. It would also make a nice protection for the phone.

However, I read someone today rightly pointing out that:

- the screen (and the notification led) would be hidden when the keyboard is closed, which won't help noticing new notifications.

- it might not be always convenient to use the phone on the go, holding the phone with one hand

- it would render making calls quite awkward

So now, I'm not sure anymore. It's probably fine to use as a PDA, not quite as a phone, and that's what I use the Pinephone for.

I think what I really need is a better battery and a case. A physical keyboard would be really good too, but not if it makes using the Pinephone as a phone harder than it is already. I gess I should buy a spare battery (since the Pinephone has a removable battery!) or a power tank, and a case.

Do you know if phones in general, and the Pinephone in particular, recognize that they are on battery and enable their energy-saving features while connected to a power tank? I would not expect them too, and this is a main reason I avoid them. That, and the fact that it seems incredibly inefficient that they charge their own batteries from the power tank, when we know that a battery gives back at best 50% of the power used to charge them.

At least I guess I could ask the Pinephone not to charge itself and to enable its power saving features by running a script, which would probably be good enough. I'd expect that to be hard to do on Android by the way.

TheUnelisted4• 5 years ago

With a Bluetooth headset i think it would be okay for calls, and infact the keyboard might make it much nicer for texting.

As for notifications: You can't see notifications from apps on the PinePhone anyways unless you disable suspend, as the crust suspend firmware only detects wakeup events from signals sent by the hardware. So while the modem can send a signal to wakeup the device when there's a call or text, and the RTC (Real Time Clock) can wakeup the Phone when there's a alarm going off, there's currently no solution for waking it up when say you have a new Telegram or Matrix message while in sleep. More than likely people will figure out a way to solve that in the future with custom wifi chip and modem firmware that can handle push server wakeup events.

With that said though, the 6,000 MaH battery this keyboard addon will have should make up for that. You could disable suspend and have all the apps constantly watching for new messages and sending notifications, and probably wont have to worry about battery life even still. This is exactly what i will be doing personally.

The only problem i forsee is how big and bulky this is, meaning it will probably not be feasible to use one handed, and it also will be heavy in a pocket.

jraph3• 5 years ago

With a Bluetooth headset i think it would be okay for calls

I don't think so, for the reason that I won't necessarily have the time to pull the headset from the bag and pair it to the phone when receiving a call. Assuming I even have a bag on my back… with my headset in it. A headset or earpieces with a jack cable would probably be slightly better but that still makes me rely on such a thing, and on being able to quickly pull it from the bag and connect it. That adds to time of one ring the Pinephone already takes to wake up before actually ringing.

I guess it is feasible to answer a quick call by just opening the keyboard, but it still seems a lot of trouble and not very convenient.

You can't see notifications from apps on the PinePhone anyways unless you disable suspend

Indeed, but I happen to only use texts and calls so it is okay for me.

More than likely people will figure out a way to solve that in the future with custom wifi chip and modem firmware that can handle push server wakeup events.

I hope so! :-) It seems quite feasible at least on mobile data since one can run arbitrary programs on the modem.

mewse-hn• 5 years ago

Working from home as an IT guy I've been spending my whole day using ear buds and an iphone screen for texting. I've been considering grabbing a bluetooth keyboard to make life easier but this form factor would be nice as sort of a mini terminal to respond to texts and take calls on earbuds. It definitely would be awkward putting the phone against your noggin with the keyboard attached.

saagarjha• 5 years ago

As I understand it, the keyboard is a bottom half and a top case, which means that the seam (https://i.imgur.com/3uedtMo.jpg) is entirely in the control of the keyboard. If that is the case, why the the corner radii differ? It seems somewhat sloppy to have the edges meet at different places like that.

megous3• 5 years ago

It will be easier to open, perhaps?

megous3• 5 years ago

Someone needs to optimize the kernel console rotation on arm64 with some neon. :)

s3r3nity• 5 years ago

Nice to see we've come full circle back to Blackberries =)

Black101• 5 years ago

And Blackberry is pretty much out of the phone business as far as I know.

heavyset_go• 5 years ago

Cool. I'd kill for a Pinephone with a Fxtec[1] form factor, though.

[1] https://www.fxtec.com/pro1x

mastrsushi• 5 years ago

Why aren't people making touch interfaces for dragging together shell scripts? Mobile Linux should make use of the modularity of the Unix Environment, along with today's smartphone technology.

A big part of NextStep's design was an OO environment in a Unix OS. Those ideas later helped create the most successful Unix consumer operating system, macOS.

Command line on a smartphone is uninspiring. There needs to be something that reflects on today's technology. Like how NextStep reflected on GUI and OOP.

linmob• 5 years ago

You could start it, and I would be happy to tell people about it :-)

Pinephone Keyboard Update

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