Typing this on a Moto G6 (2018). I also have a fully patched Nexus 7 tablet (2013).
Technically, there's nothing wrong with them. It's just that the vendors can't bring themselves to do the work.
Hopefully some legislation will come into place at some point to enforce this.
In the same way, mods for games aren't an alternative to the developer just fixing issues.
But I have to say, Apple's OS version updates are not always quite what they seem. My 2 year old iPad gets OS updates in name only. None of the major new iPad OS features are supported.
That's fine if the hardware just isn't capable of supporting those features. But it sort of muddies the water compared to an Android device that doesn't get a nominal OS bump but still gets security updates and all the new features distributed through Google's Play services.
GrapheneOS on Pixel is probably the best bet right now.
Yes, absolutely. I didn't mean to imply anything else.
Google says Pixel 6 will get "at least 5 years" of security updates. We're going to have to wait and see if that's better or worse than what Apple does.
Compare that to Android where the best case is invisible security updates and guess which causes upgrade anxiety?
I'm an Android developer for a living but I use iPhones because the Android ecosystem is currently optimized for generating e-waste.
SoC manufacturers generally don't make enough money to want to do more than the bare minimum, so unless you're Google making billions off a hundred other angles you don't do OS updates for more than a few years and maybe pay lip service with security upgrades.
As you know, Google updates apps and cloud features on a continuous basis while Apple holds back most new features until they release a new OS version. If you look through the list of iPad OS 16 features for instance, you'll see that almost all of them are in fact new apps, app features and sharing/cloud features that Android users would be getting anyway [1].
Of the very few actual OS features, the most substantial one by far is Stage Manager, which is only supported on M1 iPads as esteth has said. This isn't just "a few flashy features".
I'm a bit unlucky with my iPad purchases because this is the second time I'm missing out on the most important new OS features on a new-ish iPad. Granted, nothing of the sort ever happened to me on iPhone. I'm rather happy with Apple's iOS update policy.
You cannot keep 4 major apps in memory without seeing an eviction.
Also your comparison doesn't make sense, you're comparing iOS built-in apps to Android 3rd party apps by Google... AOSP's built-in photos and emails apps have barely been updated in the last decade.
All in all if you think iPadOS is letting you down, Android upgrades are a circus that Google refuses to rein in.
I'm not comparing them, I'm putting them aside for this comparison, because Apple links a lot of regular apps to the release cycle of the OS while Google doesn't do that. That's a separate issue that isn't relevant for the point I was making.
I'm only talking about features that would have to be part of the OS on iOS as well as on Android. There are very few new features of that sort in iPad OS 16. I'm not getting most of them.
I understand that this may be down to hardware capabilities. But Apple does have some wiggle room when it comes to deciding how to implement any new features and how much work to put into making them less resource intensive.
You realize the Gmail app is not the equivalent of the iOS Mail app right? That would be the AOSP email app which only gets updates when Android OS gets updates...
My point is that I didn't get the most important new iPad OS features on my new-ish iPad. Apple simply didn't implement those features in a way that makes them work on relatively recent devices.
>You realize the Gmail app is not the equivalent of the iOS Mail app right?
Yes, but the differences are not relevant to the debate. I'm talking about OS features only, and I'm disregarding regular apps that just happen to get distributed along with the OS for business reasons.
Like I said already:
- there was no magical way to make this feature work on your "newish iPad".
- You can even test it yourself: open Safari, open a few productivity apps, and watch the cold starts come flying.
- Stage Manager is not the most important feature, being on the newest development target is since if you're not most updated apps will not support your device in 12 months
> I'm talking about OS features only, and I'm disregarding regular apps that just happen to get distributed along with the OS for business reasons.
So you're arbitrarily deciding which OS features count, cool... you're free to do that... but that's the definition of a strawman.
Apple's approach to an OS places more value on built in apps, so you see a ton of app based features, that use OS level APIs that don't exist until a new OS upgrade.
You're trying to say Apple could just ship them as app updates, but no, they can't. The APIs they're built on don't exist until a new OS version comes out.
I don't know how difficult it would have been to support a broader range of devices. There are always trade-offs involved, engineering trade-offs as well as economic ones. Neither of us is familiar with the technical details or with the options they discussed.
Fact is, this major new feature (and others) is not supported on very recent hardware they sold to me. That's disappointing irrespective of the reasons. And it raises the question how meaningful those X years of OS updates really are.
>So you're arbitrarily deciding which OS features count
I'm counting all OS features but not apps that are only linked to OS releases as a sales strategy. Of course they want to show off new OS APIs in their apps when the OS gets an update. That doesn't require syncronising release cycles the way they do. Many if not most new app features do not depend on new OS APIs at all.
That's a truly terrible example...
First off it's not "the major feature of iPadOS 16, it's one call out of many _many_ features: https://www.apple.com/ipados/ipados-16-preview/
Second, _massively increasing multitasking capabilities_ is being given to the models that have _a massively upgraded SoC_ there's nothing artificial about that limitation.
Older iPads cannot not hold 4 arbitrary apps in memory, try it yourself if you want. For anything but the most basic set of apps you'll find something evicted by the time you loop back...
Third, "the" major point of an OS upgrade if any is being on the latest development target. Ask Android devs still targeting versions of Android from 2015 about that...
I'm sure some will appreciate the (security) updates, because the year or so of OS updates I've experienced have been a constant trend towards the worse.
Usually you lose access to things like GPay or certain NFC functionalities, and end up with a not-entirely stable experience anyway. I'd rather a phone that just worked. The half a dozen I had previously at least didn't struggle with the basics!
Every app I've tried to use on it has worked.
I recommend you give it a go.
If you don't like it, you can always reinstall the stock OS at https://pixelrepair.withgoogle.com/
> it is more secure than the stock OS
Maybe, but I don't trust community maintainers (nor auditing) enough. At least Google has a business entity that backs their services, community ROMs have nothing of the sort.
I dabbled in ROMs and the likes previously, but I just want a phone that works like a phone should right now. I've got too many other things to tinker with already.
However, re community maintainers, clearly you have read nothing about GrapheneOS, as security is by far their top priority, at the expense of nearly everything else.
I just want a relible, usable phone, and do not experience safety concerns that would warrant preferring a less convenient experience. I don't think most people do, for that matter.
Mine just gives up on connecting to things, WebView is absolutely broken, and the daily UX is just me rebooting it 5-10 times a day. Stupid.
On chinese marketplaces there are batteries for almost any phone, might be in your local marketplaces as well, depending on location.
The core problem is security updates.
I've been running a Galaxy S7 since 2016 like that and only now do the first battery issues slowly start to appear.
I has received frequently updates until now, including the change of the major version of Android, from the one with which the phone had been initially delivered.
https://www.reddit.com/r/zenfone/comments/ollaq6/i_will_neve...
https://www.androidauthority.com/phone-update-policies-16586...