[Nexus 5 Android Development] mudnightoil:
Received my Nexus 5. Rooted, installed MultiROM, flashed CM12.1, then added Sailfish Alpha 9 for N5 on top of CM11 M9. Installation went smoothly. I'll try and test it with a SIM over the weekend, but here are my initial thoughts and feedback:

Display:

*Sailfish is much less eye-bleeding than on the Jolla. Even though the Nexus 5 is old and predates the Jolla even, contrast, vividity of colours, and colour accuracy are a big upgrade, and make Sailfish look immensely better. The ghastly colour casts are gone and pixel density is much higher. The larger screen and MUCH smaller bezels also draw the eyes directly to the screen, rather than distracting you from it, resulting in a more immersive experience.

*However, there are a couple of minor issues currently. It appears that the maximum brightness setting for the Nexus 5 is lower under Sailfish than in Android. I can't confirm without a second phone or a calibration tool, but it looks this way. Also, scaling and icon grids still aren't really working properly, but presumably will be fixed in the next couple of updates.

Bugs:

* "Files" does not work. It opens (but never full screens) and just chews, with a second blank application cover also opening. You have to force quit it. It appears that the application hangs when it tries to browse files. Warehouse does exactly the same when you go to "My Profile", then "View full list". It hangs when it tries to read the file system and doesn't recover. Seems to be some kind of file browsing issue. Gallery works on the other hand.

*Can't browse Jolla Store (known bug I think).

Performance:

*No OOM RAM issues, unlike the Jolla. Woohoo!

*Battery life is quite a bit better on wifi only (no sim) than the Jolla.

*But, and it's a very big but:

Given the much greater IPC, clock speed and more cores of the Snapdragon 800 quad core than the Snapdragon 400 dual core in the Jolla, and better GPU, it is reasonable to expect that there should be a significant increase in performance. However, there isn't at all. A few applications open marginally faster (I would guess due to slightly faster solid state memory), but that's it. At first I didn't think this significant, as the device hasn't been optimised fully. However, it became disquieting when I realised that NOTHING was faster. Indeed, more or less everything had what seemed to be identical (or very close to) performance. Whether it was basic apps, or the Browser or Gallery. The SD800 ought to offer a huge increase in browsing performance and load / render speeds, even in an unoptimised state. But page load times are IDENTICAL, as is scroll speed / judder and general slowdown on media rich sites (excepting the more serious RAM issues). This strikes me as both bizarre and extremely disconcerting. I can only imagine that Jolla have done some very strange device 'optimisation' for the Jolla Phone, by instituting some kind of resource cap, which affects Sailfish or native apps generally. It appears to only be using what resources it would on the much slower JP. I assume 1 core (2 max) are being used, and either directly performance gated or apps have a utilisation cap. Even 1x Krait 400 core operating at max (2.3Ghz) frequency should still be much faster than 1x (possibly 2x) 1.4Ghz Krait 300 core, even if the other 2-3 cores are unutilised. The Adreno 330 GPU is again much faster than the 305 in the Jolla, but GPU optimisation isn't so expected, I suppose.

General Suggestions / Feedback:

*We need some degree of user-modifiable gesture configuration in Sailfish. Particularly with different devices with different screen sizes or aspect ratios. I have (very) large hands, but the swipe to close gesture isn't terribly reliable on the N5 when using one-handed, without stretching one's thumb upwards uncomfortably. On this screen size and larger it would make far more sense to be able to swipe up to close apps, and flick down to access status - less accuracy is needed for the status panel gesture, so no need to stretch, it's used less often and it would tally with coming soon status bar.

* We desperately need Jolla Store transactions (app payments and developer tipping). Userbase is miniscule, community and app catalogue even smaller and there's literally zero incentive for any non hobby-devs to get involved. Furthermore Jolla stand to gain nothing (directly) from any Android phone owners who do convert until there is one.

* Due to the above, we desperately also need Alien Dalvik to drive any adoption of Sailfish on Android phones. Though a Jolla employee did say that it would be ported eventually, in the 1+1 forums, recently.

Overall Impression:

At first, great, due to the superior screen and ergonomics on the Nexus 5. Then rather worrying, given the performance. I've always been deeply sceptical of how much work Jolla have actually accomplished on Sailfish, and what ramifications any half-arsed performance 'optimisations' might have on devices other than the relatively weak JPhone. Constant delays, failure to deliver features and bug-fixes, getting Push IMAP 17 months after release, connectivity (or conman) still being a total joke, DAV still not being properly functional, basic apps not being worked on at all since pre-release, Enhanced Voicemail Notifications being ignored and then Zeta (community guy who made the patch fix) being completely ignored by Jolla ... this does not breed confidence. The situation described above diminishes it further. There could be a perfectly reasonable explanation in this instance, but even if there is, it probably means Jolla are even further behind than we hoped, in terms of Sailfish being a device agnostic OS.

As for my likely usage, it becomes another toy for now. Hopefully further updates and Mitakuuluu's successor (native WhatsApp) will very soon allow me to use it in place of the Jolla when I'm at home. When away from home I'll need some Android apps and Sailfish probably won't be in a state where I can completely rely on or trust it for a long time, so I'll likely use the N5 with Paranoid Android. At least that'll allow me to make do with 1 phone when traveling, rather than 2 as of now (Jolla and Sony Z3 Compact). But if things remain bad/chaotic with Sailfish/Jolla, I'll finally push myself to abandon it. CM/PA/UP would be my choices. CM just works. PA has a great UI and of course the usual Android apps. Whilst Ubuntu Phone lacks plenty of features still, the UI concepts are a mixed bag and multi-tasking sucks, its basic functionality as a phone & browsing tool is already way more reliable than Sailfish, it's developing much more quickly, and its lack of apps isn't likely to remain the case forever unlike SF.

Thanks to the porters for all their hard work.