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Amazon Fire Tablets and Other Gear Will Reportedly Switch Away From Android

posted by hubie on Wednesday November 15 2023, @04:58AM   Printer-friendly
from the year-of-the-Linux-*insert-shiny-thing* dept.

Freeman writes:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/11/amazon-fire-tablets-and-other-gear-will-reportedly-switch-away-from-android/

Amazon has been working on an in-house replacement for its Android-based Fire OS, codenamed "Vega" and built for easier app development, according to reporting from Janko Roettgers at Lowpass.

Based on job listings, multiple sources, forum posts, and unguarded LinkedIn boasts, Roettgers writes that Amazon has been working on Vega since at least 2019, is mostly done with the core development, and is now focused on an SDK and developer outreach. Vega would replace the Fire OS that is installed on Fire TV sticks and televisions, Kindle Fire tablets, and other Amazon devices. Vega, based on "a flavor of Linux," uses the popular JavaScript-based React Native as an application framework. This could simplify development for Fire devices alongside other React-ready platforms, including smartphones, desktops, and other smart TVs.
[...]
While an Android base provides a relatively familiar entry for developers that already have Android apps, rebuilding the AOSP project—meant to support a wealth of different devices and carrying years of technical debt—seemingly became frustrating enough for Amazon to push toward an in-house solution.

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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by VLM on Wednesday November 15 2023, @01:19PM (1 child)

    by VLM (445) on Wednesday November 15 2023, @01:19PM (#1333036)

    Kindle Fire tablets

    Everyone I know who has one, has "that one app" they can't do without, so this will torpedo sales.

    Why buy a kindle that won't run your one app, if you can buy any other tablet on the market that runs kindle?

    My guess is, since they don't want to torpedo sales, this means they're silently planning on discontinuing the kindle app on android, iOS, etc. Otherwise nobody would buy a Fire tablet, if literally every other tablet on the market is superior.

    Of course this is almost the textbook definition of monopolistic product-tying, but Amazon seems immune to prosecution, so maybe they'll do it anyway.

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  • (Score: 2) by Reziac on Thursday November 16 2023, @07:28AM

    by Reziac (2489) on Thursday November 16 2023, @07:28AM (#1333127) Homepage

    Well, if it's linux, and lets you do normal linux things, there's a workaround...

    https://www.howtogeek.com/760044/how-to-run-android-apps-on-linux/ [howtogeek.com]

    [I have no idea how well this works.]

    --
    And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.