For quite some time, I’ve been trying to answer the question What is the best smartphone for Linux users? I’ve suggested that – ironically – Windows Mobile is a solid solution and looked forward to the release of the Nokia N900 (forever delayed it currently seems).
My use case was of using Evolution for calendaring and addressbook and one of my requirements was direct sync – that is to say, you plug your phone into your computer or pair via bluetooth and off you go rather than relaying through a third-party service. By deciding to be a bit flexible on that requirement, I’ve come up with an answer.
Yes, direct sync is the ideal situation but frankly, it currently leaves you in the horrible situation of using Windows Mobile. My hopes for Maemo5/Conduit remain to an extent but as yet, there isn’t a Maemo5 build of Conduit (or – of course – a released N900 in case I hadn’t mentioned that).
The winner is: Symbian.
I currently own a Nokia N95 which runs Symbian S60v3. Symbian is now an open source platform as of Symbian^1 which means that I’m comfortable recommending it and when I’m next able to upgrade (late next month), I’ll likely opt for the N97 or N97 mini both of which run ^1 (essentially S60v5) given that the N900 almost certainly either won’t have been released or won’t be available with a buy-with-contract discount on Orange.
So, how to go about it? Well, the solution is in the form of SyncEvolution. At the moment (0.9.x), this utilises relaying through a service like myFunambol, which I use. However, version 1.0 is slated to support direct sync making it only necessary to be slightly flexible on my requirement of direct sync. SyncEvolution works a dream and the Funambol plugin to Symbian sync also works just how one would want.
So, just to tweak the winner slightly, it’s Symbian with SyncEvolution.
SyncEvolution is the sync solution in the Moblin netbook user interface so if you’re running Moblin (eg by using Goblin on openSUSE), you’re good to go. I’m not using Moblin but thankfully, SyncEvolution has a straight GTK+ interface available so if you’re using openSUSE, you can install the syncevolution-gtk package from my GNOME repository (1-click install for openSUSE 11.2, if you’re using 11.1, search for a 1-click depending on your version of GNOME).
Of course, using SyncEvolution does mean that you can use any phone supported by whichever service you choose to for synchronising (Funambol support tons) but there are reasons to prefer Symbian:
- It’s Open Source.
- It provides SyncML over HTTP natively which means that once direct sync is supported in SyncEvolution, you’re ready to go
- Thanks to ModemManager, you can tether your phone to your laptop for mobile broadband (and this actually works far more easily in Linux than Windows).
- It’s Open Source (bears mentioning twice).
The N900 has promise, there is the prospect of SyncEvolution being built for Maemo5 allowing for relay-based sync but Maemo doesn’t provide SyncML over HTTP so direct sync won’t happen so to reiterate:
The best smartphone platform for Linux users is Symbian.
