Peter Gamma (Physiologist & Director) Meditation Research Institute Switzerland (MRIS)

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Save the Pinephone – it is worth it!

Posted bypg@petergamma.org 2 Comments on Save the Pinephone – it is worth it!

Last Updated on June 17, 2024 by pg@petergamma.org

Peter Gamma from www.petergamma.org:

001. Director Peter Gamma
  • has invested a lot of time in finding out about the Pinephone, but he did not use it a single day up to the present day.
  • Peter bought a Pinephone.
  • Sold it to Italy.
  • Bought another Pinephone from Ricardo Switzerland.
  • Has put it onto the screed.
  • Took it down.
  • Has put it onto the screed again.
  • Took it down.
  • Now it is somewhere in Zurich where Peter stores things where they are safe from thieves.
  • Peter has invested much time in finding out about the Pinephone but was not able to use it for the purpose he bought it up to now.
  • Peter Gamma joined on the 06-08-2020 the Pine64 forum.
  • He has written 378 posts there about the Pinephone and asked many questions about the Pinephone.
  • He invested almost a month in installing LibreOffice on it working every day a little bit on it:

https://forum.pine64.org/showthread.php?tid=16614

  • Read what Peter Gamma from www.petergamma.org has written about the Pinephone to avoid to have the same fate as he had which was investing a lot of time in finding out about it and not making very much progress:

https://petergamma.org/category/pinephone

  • Peter thought LibreOffice would be his primary application for the Pinephone.
  • but has anyone exept from him reported to use LibreOffice on the Pinephone?
  • Sooner or later someone will use it with LibreOffice, I suppose
  • if no further issues occur which cannot be resolved.
  • Peter Gamma has posted on his blog what could be done with the Pinephone to make it a bit better for people like Peter Gamma:

https://petergamma.org/category/pinephone

  • Peter has furthermore shared what he learned about the Pinephone on about 100 posts on www.petergamma.org
  • But he did not use it for a single day.
  • The tags for the Pinephone on www.petergamma are currently broken
  • most of the tags about the PInephone are gone:

https://petergamma.org/category/pinephone

  • I most probably will update this sooner or later.
  • There where about 100 tags.
  • You can find the posts about the Pinephone on www.petergamma.org also with the search box and typing “Pinephone”.
  • Most of those are negative
  • only about the 10 latest are positive
  • And this was regarding a possible future development of the Pinephone.
  • In the last view days I invested even more time to report about all the issues I still have with the Pinephone.
  • But I will keep my Pinepone as my 3th phone, next to an Android phone, and a Ubuntu Touch privacy phone.
  • The Pinephone offers features Android phones don t have
  • For instance installing Linux apps, such as Abiword, Gnumeric and LibreOffice.
  • These applications have desktop counterparts
  • These can process the files further we have written on the phone without conversion.
  • The Pinephone offers features most of the phones of the Ubports foundation do not offer
  • For instance writing to the external SD card.
  • I am a Linux beginner but it should be possible also for me personally to use the external SD card for data exchange from a Pinephone with postmarketOS to a Ubuntu PC and back.
  • But I failed to this date.
  • There where users, as for instance Walter 1950 who manged this with Abiword and LibreOffice for conversion.
  • I suppose the problem is with Linux permission and me as a Linux beginner.
  • Writing to the external SD card is something Android phones can’t do anymore after Android 4.4.
  • With the Pinephone keyboard the Pinephone reminds of the QTEK 9000 which was my all day companion for many years.
  • But for instance postmarketOS offers only English and Czech.
  • This is an issue for Swiss who speak and write German.
  • In fact a reason to look for another device.
  • I still miss a contemporary and affordable QTEK 9000 in the year 2024.
  • Is it better to build one from a Raspberry Pi?
  • I will try to find out what I can do when I use the Pinephone with a Ubuntu PC.
  • The answers of supporters in the Pine64 forum are often from coders targeted at other coders.
  • And they are sometimes not easy to digest for people who usually don’t code.
  • I invite everybody to participate in the further development of the Pinephone to make out of:

a piece of pine wood

  • what the Pinephone currently is for me personally

a 18-carat gold nugget

  • currently the Pinephone is a Linux phone with a hard wired keyboard for around 400 USD
  • This is shipping & import taxes to Switzerland included.
  • There are many alternatives which are eventually better but cost more, or are little developed.
  • The Pinephone was developed by Martijn Braam who does computer stuff:
  • But Martijn left Pine64 which is a pity:

https://blog.brixit.nl/why-i-left-pine64

  • Martijn Braam, thank you for the Pinephone, which is a great piece of pine wood.
  • But does this peace of wood not need a bit of further development?
  • The Pinephone cannot compete with the Raspberry Pi which is 10 years of development ahead
  • The Pi’s where developed by developers at the university level as far as hardware and software is concerned for instance by computer scientist and Raspberry Pi CEO Eben Upton.
  • But which Raspberry Pi product fit’s in your pocket and is satisfyingly developed?
  • If the issues of the Pinephone are too big and cannot be resolved, a solution based on the Raspberry Pi and Raspberry Pi OS would be an alternative for me personally.
  • But this again take time to evaluate.
  • And the question arises if sooner or later a better device than the Pinephone which is based on a Raspberry Pi will come onto the market.
  • Currently the Raspberry Pi 4 is my preferred Raspberry Pi.
  • But the zero 2 w is also a great product, and eventually suitable for mobile applications.
  • The Pi 4 requires a large battery for mobile use which does not fit easily into your pocket.
  • The Pi zero 2 w draws much less battery.
  • I bought also a Raspberry Pad 5 which is based on a CM4.
  • The form factor is similar to the Pinephone.
  • But software installation is tricky.
  • I did not get to work the Raspberry Pad 5 up to the present day.
  • The device seems to be used for instance with OctoPrint as a printer screen.
  • An alternative would be a CM4 with a carrier board.
  • Jeff Geerling has reviewed some of those but I did not find one which would fit for my needs at first sight.
  • But if I can find a community of users for a Rasperry PiCM4 carrier board which can convince me this would be an alternative for me personally.
  • But the CM4 draws also a lot of battery power and is not optimized for mobile use.
  • Raspberry PI OS is a well developed OS which works great.
  • Peter Gamma from www.petergamma.org went to Zurich today.
  • He was a litte bit worried about his Pinephone.
  • It is there somewhere in a box.
  • Can he still find it?
  • He found it.
  • Does it still work?
  • It still starts up.
  • He charged it.
  • But then he wanted to log into postmarktedOS.
  • But unfortunately he forgot the password and failed.
  • Eventually it has still the default password he does not remember.

Information for product sellers who do stock market speculation and scalping with products mentioned by Peter Gamma on www.petergamma.org

According to the little experience of Peter Gamma from www.petergamma.org, many of the products listed here are still full of issues which need to be resolved. If you do stock market speculation and scalping with those, you will loose Peter Gamma from www.petergamma.org as a buyer of these products and as a reviewer. Is this not risky? Will you not loose a majority of your costumers as well?

And is it not so, that society in general does not accept stock market speculation and scalping with products as those which are listed here? And will you not be politically incapable of finding a majority of the voters if you do stock market speculation and scalping with these products?

And as a consequence will you not be condemned and punished by a political referendum soon? Especially if you do this to a Swiss, since are not majority of Swiss against stock market speculations and scalping with people on a budget? And people in Switzerland are known for a lot of political referendums, since we have direct democracy in this country.

And Peter Gamma from www.petergamma.org will fight up to the European Court of Human Rights against people who do stock market speculation and scalping with the products which are mentioned on www.petergamma.org. And if they do not have yet the legal basis there to do so, he will fight for it.

What is a scalper?

A scalper is someone who buys something and resells it at a price far above the initial cost. For instance some says: “He got theater tickets through a scalper”: Someone who buys tickets to an event in order to resell them at a profit. And is it not also scalping if you take reviews from this site to make out of it a new product offer, and sell it for a higher price? We doubt that you will be successful with it. Since Peter Gamma will review your product and will user not come back to www.petergamma.org after that?Edit