General Why can't we just make iPhones run android and vice-versa?

[cnguyen0320]

I guess its easier to make iphones run android than to make android run iphone because of the closed nature of apple but phones are all chips and wires and a huge honking battery. Its all the same so why cant I boot android on my iphone if i wanted to?

PS sorry, im not that knowledgable about tech

 

[Siggen]

There is nothing restricting you from doing this, if you have great knowledge about making drivers for undocumented hardware and have a lot of time.

Planetbeing (you can find him on twitter), is probably the single most knowledgeable person about this topic in the world. Simply because he might be the one person who has set off most time in the world for this cause. And he is not working on this, and has not been for a long time. This is because he has other things in life to do, like working on the iPhone 5 jailbreak and having fun with other things in life.

 

[Carlanga]

Older iPhones can run dual boot w android. Newer ones has been found to be impossible so far.

 

[Siggen]

Older iPhones can run dual boot w android. Newer ones has been found to be impossible so far.

Not impossible, to much work to make drivers for them...

I think it was about when iPhone 4 came, and planetbeing was not finished with iPhone 3G Android drivers even, he just stopped making them.

 

[takeshi74]

PS sorry, im not that knowledgable about tech

That's precisely the problem with "How hard can it be?" questions. Everything seems simple when you're ignorant regarding the details. The difficulty for any given problem isn't always immediately obvious just by looking at the problem. You don't have to be knowledgeable about tech to understand that. That applies to more than just smartphones or tech.

phones are all chips and wires and a huge honking battery. Its all the same so why cant I boot android on my iphone if i wanted to?

Lots of things are "chips and wires and a battery". That doesn't mean that Android and IOS can be easily put on all of them. It takes time and effort to make these things happen. Android and IOS don't adapt themselves automatically to new platforms. That's the the biggest reason why. There isn't an infinite pool of people with the knowledge and time to do this work for every possible device out there.

 

[Carlanga]

Not impossible, to much work to make drivers for them...
...

That is why I said 'so far'

 

[labman]

lol just buy the android if you want android. A iPhone if you want IOS so much simpler. one of the better hackers @PlanetBeing was doing a duel boot on a 3G project after some success he dropped it.

 

[Siggen]

If the drivers were open source, and the bootrom was open, a power user with little programming experience could make a preliminary port of another OS, just look at the Nokia N900, awesome phone/tablet.