Frustration with development pace

[Subsentient]

I agree that the basic hardware support needs urgent work. I have absolutely no experience doing kernel development. Is it realistic that I could dive into it knowing nothing at all and produce useful code in a useful amount of time?

I bought my PinePhone with the intention of doing front-end development and now I'm paralyzed by indecision. I want Plasma-Mobile to succeed because I really like Plasma Desktop, so I'm currently leaning towards Kirigami app development.

I actually don't think the PinePhone will ever be my daily driver. I'm simply much too used to the high performance of flagship Samsung phones. I kinda see the PinePhone as a platform to stabilize and provide useful software for in a lead up to much better hardware down the line. I would happily pay $1000 or more for much better hardware.

If you know C fairly well, then kernel development shouldn't be that difficult. It takes learning the codebase, which I haven't had time to do. There's not really a need for assembly language in the drivers that need work, there's really not much of it in the kernel to begin with, so that shouldn't be a concern. I definitely think you could be useful if you know C.

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After reading again all the posts, I would like to comment 3 points:
-  people using PP as a daily driver are very brave, but not realistic If you are missing phone calls, missing messages, etc. You are going to be missing meetings, calls from the doctor, from the kids' school, etc You can put a brick in your pocket and say is your daily driver, but is not. The phone has to be able to get phone calls and txt and being able to call and text without major issues.

- From some posts, I understand that hardware/firmware should go first, then OS would go faster. Is that true? Because if this is true, donations from PP and people should go to the priority. Let's get the firmware working then let's worry about the OS.

-I have the impression that if important issues as point 2 are ignored, the PP project will die as a realistic project. It might survive as a toy for tinkers, developers, etc but will never become a real phone. May be is what is it. An exploratory platform to prove a linux phone is possible (but not PP).  Is PP about this?

- I have indeed suffered a bit from the intermittance of my BraveHeart, but overall I think I've gained more than I lost. For me, the objective of the PinePhone is so critically important, I'm willing to sacrifice a bit to see it come to pass.

- Kernel development and phone-related subsystems are the biggest problems. The modem firmware *is* undoubtably buggy and partially broken, but it definitely can be worked around. The USB disconnects, for example, can be worked around if software is smart enough to wait for the connection to resume. I think our first priority is the kernel, which is common to all operating systems that currently boot on the PinePhone.

- I do think that's a serious concern, but I don't think we've reached that point yet, and I don't think we should give up yet. I do think with enough work the PinePhone could be stable, but we need to pick up the pace and direct effort where it's really needed, rather than fluffy GUI stuff that ironically relies on the broken pieces.