Ubuntu - enterprise mobility champ?

[TomVanDoo]

This may sound like a very weird title, because: "Wasn't Ubuntu a desktop Linux distribution?"

-Yeah, it is, but now it's also a mobile phone operating system, and a tablet operating system.

New Mobile Os contender

A while back, Ubuntu had already announced the mobile Phone OS. It looks great, it packs a lot of new ideas and I can't wait to get my hands on it.

The thing that got me going though, was the idea that you could have your mobile phone, with a nice Phone-optimized UI, but in the background, it's actually a full-blown desktop Linux.

Once you dock the phone with a screen, keyboard and mouse, you get to see the full blown desktop mode. How cool is that?

You don't even need a laptop any more, you just carry your entire PC in your pocket.

That's the post-PC era right there!

Yesterday, Canonical announced their tablet OS.

The same principle applies here as well. It's actually a full blown Ubuntu installation, but with a different Layer on top, to make it optimal for tablet devices.

Again, you can dock it and turn it into a desktop.

What interests me most about this tablet version, is the fact that you can have multiple user accounts on it.

That means you can separate your personal data and your professional data in a very easy way. You even have a guest account for the rest of the family.

Multiple accounts on the device will make it much easier to partially manage the device, only for the professional part. That is the one thing that is missing from Android, iOS and WinPhone. There's no separation of corporate data and personal data. There's no different identities or roles on those devices. And that is the reason why BYOD remains so hard.

Integration

All of these different Ubuntu versions (Phone, Tablet, PC, Television) are all actually one and the same Operating System, but with different layers on top. That means that your phone, tablet, pc and even television are 100% compatible and mutually interchangeable.

I always hoped that Android would evolve to such a model, but Google opted for Chrome OS for the notebooks. But here is Ubuntu rising to the challenge.

I think that this sort of model may very well be the future for enterprise mobility.

Opportunity

From February 25 to 28, there is the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. Canonical will be there, announcing their first phones and flashing your Galaxy Nexus if you want. SAP will be there as well.

I hope the opportunity rises for the folks of SAP to sit together with Canonical and integrate support for this new challenger in their device management and development platform.