Canonical to expand Ubuntu for smartphones, tablets

IDG News Service - Canonical plans to expand its Ubuntu Linux distribution so it could be used on smartphones, tablets and other touch interface consumer electronics, said Canonical founder Mark Shuttleworth.

"Everyday computer users are starting to do their computing across a broader array of devices and form factors," Shuttleworth said. Canonical wants to "bring Ubuntu to all the personal computing form factors, on phones, tablets, and smart-screens."

Shuttleworth will introduce his plans Monday at the Ubuntu Developer Summit, being held this week in Orlando. At the conference, he is hoping to raise enthusiasm on the part of volunteer developers, whom Canonical will need to help develop the platform and provide applications for the expanded OS.

"An application for Ubuntu in the future will have multiple personalities. When it is running on a desktop computer, it will have a different personality from when it is running on a tablet," Shuttleworth said. "From a developer point of view, there will be a phenomenal amount of coherency and reuse of the core capabilities on the application."

Canonical faces some stiff competition in tablet and smartphone markets, even beyond Apple's current dominance in these arenas. Google's Android smartphone OS, also based on Linux, runs almost 40% of the smartphones in the U.S., according to the latest ComScore survey. For tablets, Android hasn't been widely adopted yet, though Microsoft could very well make major inroads with its upcoming release of the tablet-friendly Windows 8 OS.

For developers and users, Ubuntu can provide a number of advantages over more established choices, Shuttleworth argued. Unlike Google, which is acquiring handset manufacturer Motorola, Canonical has no plans to offer its own smartphones, so presumably would be a more neutral party to hardware manufacturers. Shuttleworth also promises a more uniform update process through its Ubuntu One service, thereby potentially reducing the fragmentation and uneven update process that has bedeviled Android to date.

Ubuntu could also provide a unified code base, Shuttleworth argued. A developer can write an application for Ubuntu and have it run, with only minimal modification, on smartphones, tablets and desktop computers.

Canonical has been making moves in preparing Ubuntu for this move for some time, Shuttleworth said. The company's controversial move to the Unity interface was done, in part, because Unity would be better suited to work across different platforms.

"The basic design of Unity puts us in a good position to build a coherent family of interfaces. The basic structure of Unity will be able to reach all of those form factors, retaining some coherence for users, and respecting the unique characteristics of these form factors," Shuttleworth said.