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A widget is always there displaying your information or waiting for your interaction, while an app must be located, opened, and navigated through. Opening an app can take anywhere from almost no time, up to several seconds, depending on the app, and navigation can also be nontrivial.

I guess we really operate differently. I unlock, look at mail, done. My home screen is organized to have the apps I'm interested in 1 tap away, so generally, unlock, tap, look, done. Home, tap, look for another app. As the phone is more than capable of appearing to be running all my apps all the time, it's not an issue. Oh, and background processing is turned off pretty much across the board.

Google basically did a "how fast can we rip off and write a clone of iOS with what we have" rush job, and they've been bandaiding it ever since.

Do you honestly believe that? Like, really? You think they put together a full operating system and hardware to run it on, build a handful of test units, got FCC approval, got it into manufacturing, and moved it onto store shelves in a matter of weeks? If they did, they should sell logistics as a service; just getting FCC approval for a device takes longer than people making that claim seem to think the entire R&D, testing, approval, manufacture, and shipping process took Google.

Actually, they did. They had a phone in development for a couple of years, and when they discovered what the iPhone really was, they scrapped their design and whipped up a clone as fast as they could.

What's the average, though, and did you have to buy them all at once? That was my point. With the exception of the $600 iPad Pro, the remaining $3900 outlay in Apple gear, just for web browsers, was all bought at once. You don't know pain, as it relates to testing gear, until you spend $2300 for a copy of Safari.

I guess a $400 mini wouldn't satisfy your Safari needs?

I never argued otherwise; but if you're buying a device for testing, you're going to buy the one that will be supported for the longest period of time, which means you're buying the newest device in most cases, so the $129 SE isn't really relevant here.

Actually, I had to buy an SE, and some lower level Android devices, specifically to ensure that our apps worked properly on them. It wasn't at all about whether the phones would be supported, but that our user base was supported.

Except that Android looked very different until the iOS came out. Google bought it and took it in a new 'iOS' direction. Claiming it isn't so doesn't change the before and after.

http://random.andrewwarner.com/what-googles-android-looked-like-before-and-after-the-launch-of-iphone/

Claiming Google didn't borrow liberally from the GUI elements of iOS is stretching it a bit.

Hm. I gather you did virtually no research before you wrote that. Unfortunate: revisionism makes you look very bad when you get caught at it. It's very apparent that you were comparing the iPhone to HTC's Sense custom user interface, which has about as much to do with the stock Android experience as apples do to oranges: other than the fact that they're fruit, and they're round, the resemblance ends. Presumably HTC was attempting to appeal to the well-known iPhone users addiction to gratuitous graphics. In any event, they replaced the entire so-called "home application" (the code the generates the GUI on Android) and the stock widgets with their own. You'd have discovered that in about about three seconds of Google time, but I guess it was more important to demonstrate (however inadequately) that Android is a rip-off of the iPhone. Like the GNU/Linux operating system that it is derived from, multiple user interfaces are readily available from different development teams. So, if you're gong to compare the iPhone to what Google offers, you really have to use the off-the-shelf Android interface or you're just blowing hot air.

In actual fact, Google was involved with Android well before the release of iOS. Maybe you've heard of a guy named Andy Rubin. Well, if you're an Apple fan you probably haven't, but in any event here's something you might want to take a gander at. This will also be enlightening from the Apple side of things. Note that Google acquired Android from Rubin in 2005 (they also acquired Rubin.) Apple released the first iPhone in January of 2007, and while the first Android version come out in November of that year, we're talking two entirely separate development projects. Nobody (and I mean nobody, except maybe an Apple patent lawyer) would have been confused as to which was which. That's still true today.

If you'd actually used Android and iOS in any significant way (not using some third-party Android GUI) you really wouldn't see any unusual similarities, other than, "yeah, they have icons, and the screen, like, scrolls and all." Heck, the first versions of Android didn't even have multitouch, although they did have widgets. They also multitasked, something else that the iPhone couldn't do at the time. I know, I owned one of the first T-Mobile G1s, the very first Google Phone. It had some very nice under-the-hood capabilities, but GUI-wise it was actually pretty lame compared to the iPhone.

I might add that Apple has been liberally borrowing from Android in recent iOS versions (nothing the least bit wrong with that, cross-fertilization benefits everyone.)

Now you can go revise your blog.

Don't forget what Android looked like pre-iPhone

If Android had launched like that, the iPhone would've destroyed it. Yes, phones before the iPhone had capacitive touch, but no one was doing multitouch. Or at least, not on a wide scale like Apple did.

Good comparison, except those are completely different phones, you idiot. Hint: Android still looks like that on some really crappy HTC models. Even more odd is that the UI on my Motorolla DROID looks nothing like either of those two! You might almost say that the UI is ... CUSTOMIZABLE.

Of course they're different phones, dumbass! Just like the OS looked different before it had iOS to copy off of, the phones looked different before they had the iPhone to copy off of!

Don't forget what Android looked like pre-iPhone

So they went from copying Blackberry to copying Apple?

Don't forget what Android looked like pre-iPhone

If Android had launched like that, the iPhone would've destroyed it. Yes, phones before the iPhone had capacitive touch, but no one was doing multitouch. Or at least, not on a wide scale like Apple did.

Good comparison, except those are completely different phones, you idiot. Hint: Android still looks like that on some really crappy HTC models. Even more odd is that the UI on my Motorolla DROID looks nothing like either of those two! You might almost say that the UI is ... CUSTOMIZABLE.

Don't forget what Android looked like pre-iPhone

If Android had launched like that, the iPhone would've destroyed it. Yes, phones before the iPhone had capacitive touch, but no one was doing multitouch. Or at least, not on a wide scale like Apple did.

Except that Android looked very different until the iOS came out. Google bought it and took it in a new 'iOS' direction. Claiming it isn't so doesn't change the before and after.

http://random.andrewwarner.com/what-googles-android-looked-like-before-and-after-the-launch-of-iphone/

Claiming Google didn't borrow liberally from the GUI elements of iOS is stretching it a bit.

What Smartphones Looked Like Before and After the Launch of iPhone

“It’s no coincidence that Samsung’s latest products look a lot like the iPhone and iPad, from the shape of the hardware to the user interface and even the packaging. This kind of blatant copying is wrong, and we need to protect Apple’s intellectual property when companies steal our ideas.”

Apple is in the right here. Certain companies just want to copy Apple's designs, slap Linux on them, and make money, and the only reason geek communities like Slashdot support it is because they run Linux, even though Slashdot has previously trashed other companies like Microsoft for ripping off people's ideas.

Just look at what Android phones looked like before and after the iPhone was released in 2007. At first, they looked like Blackberries, and then all the sudden, they all looked like iPhones.

You're a stupid fuck, aren't you?

“It’s no coincidence that Samsung’s latest products look a lot like the iPhone and iPad, from the shape of the hardware to the user interface and even the packaging. This kind of blatant copying is wrong, and we need to protect Apple’s intellectual property when companies steal our ideas.”

Apple is in the right here. Certain companies just want to copy Apple's designs, slap Linux on them, and make money, and the only reason geek communities like Slashdot support it is because they run Linux, even though Slashdot has previously trashed other companies like Microsoft for ripping off people's ideas.

Just look at what Android phones looked like before and after the iPhone was released in 2007. At first, they looked like Blackberries, and then all the sudden, they all looked like iPhones.

No Apple is playing within the law, unlike Google. You see Apple actually owns the patents in question, where Google just borrows them, slaps them on a 'free' product, and then open sources them before the shit hits the fan.

http://random.andrewwarner.com/what-googles-android-looked-like-before-and-after-the-launch-of-iphone/

...as we've had wireless sync-ing and notification icons for, oh, at least 2 years now.

I really don't think Android fanbois want to get into a discussion about who stole what from who...

Now, STFU, troll.

Mango delivers last years Android features 6 months from now. I guess it's interesting for nostalgic value. Of course, by that time, Android and iOS will have lept past them yet again. It's a losing battle for MS. They're just too late. Better luck next round.

Yes, yes. We all know just HOW innovative Android is...

[Rollseyes]

You know there were smart phones before the iphone. Sure apple made the UI simpler and had it flow nicely but they certainly didn't invent it. Its just windows mobile 2003 with application shortcuts on the front page (instead of pressing start all programs). I don't know why I'm even bothering with you its like trying to convince a religious fanatic the earth isn't 4000 years old.

Really now? Apple didn't just make the UI simpler, they completely changed it.

Name one phone before the iPhone that had a browser that people actually wanted to use?

Name one phone before the iPhone that had a useable, non-stylus-oriented touchscreen interface?

Name one phone before the iPhone that had a useable, non-stylus-oriented touchscreen keyboard? Whether you personally like it is immaterial. Name one. This and this is what a "touchscreen" phone looked like before the iPhone. BTW, I have one of those Treos. It is the biggest POS on the planet. The UI freezes up constantly for seconds at a time, for no reason, even when just using the hardware "joystick", and while you can sort of use the touchscreen with your finger, with the exception of the dialpad, the UI features are definitely designed for a stylus. And if you touch the "end" button for more than a fraction of a second, it disables the phone (takes it off line) completely, and with no confimation dialog. You usually only find out when you haven't received calls for a few hours, and people bitch you out about "never answering your phone".

Name one phone before the iPhone that had random-access voicemail?

Name one phone before the iPhone where the phone manufacturer defined the feature set, not the Carrier?

If the iPhone wasn't a game-changer, then why have so many other phones since the iPhone desperately tried to copy it?

If the iPhone wasn't a game-changer, then why did Google's Android immediately abandon its shameless clone of the Blackberry interface and form-factor in favor of a shameless clone of the iPhone's "Springboard" and the iPhone form-factor? Same thing goes for most Windows Phones, which HTC has even become desperate enough to sell for a PENNY, LOL!!!

Sorry. It is the Windows Phone and Android fanbois that are in serious, almost delusional, denial; not the Apple fans.

Copied what exactly? Tiled icons? The shape of the phone speaker hole? Colors? Or just the general shape of the phone?

Yes, all those things and more. The point is made perfectly well by viewing pictures of Android phones before and after the launch of the iPhone.

http://random.andrewwarner.com/what-googles-android-looked-like-before-and-after-the-launch-of-iphone/