Google IO : Android Announcements | Hacker News Reader

Google IO : Android Announcements

googleblog.blogspot.com

52 pointsamnigos15 comments

"To start, we're jointly announcing that new devices from participating partners..." (Verizon, HTC, Samsung, Sprint, Sony Ericsson, LG, T-Mobile, Vodafone, Motorola and AT&T) "...will receive the latest Android platform upgrades for 18 months after the device is first released, as long as the hardware allows."

That to me is the most significant of all the announcements listed.

Sadly, it doesn't say they'll receive timely releases.

At least Google is listening and doing something about it, though.

They need to do more. Not having to think about updates at all on iOS devices is absolutely huge for adoption. My mom doesn't care about "Gingerbread" or "Honeycomb." She just wants something that she understands and won't confuse her later. Right now, the only mobile platform that will handle that elegantly is iOS.

Google still has a long way to go if this is all they've got to announce.

The general population doesn't care about updates. XP is the world's most popular desktop OS and it was released the same week as the original iPod.

Google does need to work on updating, but I find it very hard to believe it slows down Android adoption at all.

They did not now about Apps either until Apple popularized the term. Now my parents ask me about iPhones and iPads and what they can do. If apple believes updates are an important differentiator I bet they will start advertising it.

That's absurd. The general public doesn't know or care about the difference between Android versions any more than they know about the difference between iOS versions.

It's true that more timely updates would be good.

BUT many people ignore the fact that the lifespan of a phone is two years. For those of us used to rapid iteration that seems an eternity, but in reality it isn't a bad situation. Compare it - for example - to the time IE6 (and now IE7) needs to be supported for.

It is still a tad vague to me. "As long as the hardware allows" seems like it provides some wiggle room for carriers to squirm out of any responsibilities to honor this.

Additionally, it only says that the devices will receive the latest upgrades for 18 months after the device is first released, which is problematic in many regards. If you get a phone the day it releases and are forced into a two year contract (which you almost certainly will be if you are going with a carrier), then for the final six months, or 25%, of that contract period, the carrier is not required to allow for you to receive Android upgrades. That instantly devalues your device. And what if you get a new device, but not until six months after its release? Well, then your carrier is only required to permit the upgrades for the first year; the last year is back to same old, same old.

And it says nothing about how timely the upgrades are. As it currently reads, all it guarantees is that for a year and a half after the device is released, carriers must eventually allow your device to upgrade to the latest version of Android. It is not a long enough time to cover an entire contract period and it has a little clause that is open to interpretation by all parties involved.

Edit: I'm writing this from the perspective of an American consumer. I do not know anything about the way that carriers and their mobile contracts work elsewhere.

Phone makers are slow to release upgrades because it takes resources to test and modify new Android releases (many of them are modifying the UI for a differentiated experience).

I don't see any reason why the likes of Samsung, Motorola, HTC would go through the trouble of releasing an update just for a couple of customers, ignoring the rest.

Its simple when the OEM gets approved by a Mobile Operator at least for the USA ones the MOs are negotiating an update fee that they pay OEMs for that very purpose..

So its probably set up as 3 Major version updates as Google/OHA members want that kept at every 6 months..hence the 18 month time limit..

So what all is Ice Cream Sandwich about? It's simply bringing Honeycomb to the phone? It seems like a long time to move working code to a smaller form factor (and with QHD, similar resolutions).

All indications are that Honeycomb was a rush job in an ill-advised attempt to beat the iPad 2 to market. There's probably a large amount of refactoring needed to support phones, and of course there will be new functionality as well.

I wonder how it'll work with regard to the "phones have the four hardware buttons, tablets don't" thing.

Also: in the Apple world, many apps look/work very differently between their iPhone and iPad versions. Can anybody say anything about what guidance is given as far as when an Android app should "switch"? In other words: suppose I make an app that runs great on my 3.5" phone, then I make a more tablety version of the app that runs great on my 10" tablet... which version should run on a 5" or 7" screen?

Ideally, you should be using the various SDK options for handling various screen sizes and densities so that you don't have to care about what the actual size is. The SDK can handle a lot of the ambiguity for you.

http://developer.android.com/guide/practices/screens_support...

http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/fundamentals/fragm...

http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/resources/providin...

New UI, new app framework, all those Android at home API's (I think, if they're not in Honeycomb 3.1 already).

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