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My G1 (bought as a Android developer https://market.android.com/details?id=com.evojazz ) died after about six or seven months (would no longer charge or turn on), but I did not get it replaced under the warranty in time (too busy with other stuff). I also figured I'd probably be replacing it with something better eventually, anyway.

The built-in keyboard on the G1 had had problems with not recognizing some keys even before it died totally.

One problem with cell phones and warranties is that you don't know what happens to personal data on it in internal flash memory when you send it into be replaced.

The same thing is true for hard drives, of course.

So warranties on products you store information on can be problematical.

The main reason I thought about going to the trouble to replace it would have been to be able to give it away or repurpose it in the future.
http://p2pfoundation.net/backups/p2p_research-archives/2009-November/006250.html

They call it the Android Compatibility program [link], I have read they require prototype devices and have flexed this muscle in the past to prevent things they dont like from going into phones despite them causing no compatibility issues [link]

You can build a device without their blessing, but you are forbidden from using the Android name or adding any Google service like Maps or the Marketplace (and no American carrier will sell a phone without those.)

Not exactly.
Google provides an open-source compatibility toolkit. Device manufacturers or anyone can use it to ensure their device is compatible and submit test results to Google. If a device manufacturer wants to use the Android name, which is optional, their device must pass the compatibility test. If a device manufacturer wants to license the Google Marketplace app, which is optional, they must pass the compatibility test. There is no requirement to install any google tracking service.

http://source.android.com/faqs.html#is-compatibility-mandatory

you misunderstand 'certification'. The certification is more about whether the OS will work, not at all about the hardware and how often if fails. You don't even have to get your device certified - you only do so if you want to use the 'android' brand name. otherwise just take the source code and go for it. http://source.android.com/faqs.html#is-compatibility-mandatory

cisco vpn is coming to android with the enhanced vpn apis available in ice cream sandwich. http://phandroid.com/2011/10/25/ice-cream-sandwich-will-have-cisco-anyconnect-vpn-support/

most samsung touchwiz enabled products already support it, too.
https://market.android.com/search?q=anyconnect&so=1&c=apps

Yeah, the iris app is making good progress. See also the Jeannie app (which identifies itself as "Voice Actions" once installed). The feature set of Jeannie is better (e.g. "enable bluetooth"), but it doesn't have the iris/siri-like display of the chat dialog. Maybe these 2 apps should get together and combine forces.

Siri is slick, but it's not like similar things haven't been developed on other platforms. Here are a few competitors on Android (definitely less slick, but not far from the mark):
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.google.android.voicesearch (Google standard issue)
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.pannous.voice.actions.free
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.vlingo.client
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.dexetra.iris

Two years behind? More like two months. With megapixels, speed, and bandwidth running out of room for improvement, the intelligent assistant may be the next mobile arms race.

Siri is slick, but it's not like similar things haven't been developed on other platforms. Here are a few competitors on Android (definitely less slick, but not far from the mark):
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.google.android.voicesearch (Google standard issue)
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.pannous.voice.actions.free
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.vlingo.client
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.dexetra.iris

Two years behind? More like two months. With megapixels, speed, and bandwidth running out of room for improvement, the intelligent assistant may be the next mobile arms race.

Siri is slick, but it's not like similar things haven't been developed on other platforms. Here are a few competitors on Android (definitely less slick, but not far from the mark):
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.google.android.voicesearch (Google standard issue)
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.pannous.voice.actions.free
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.vlingo.client
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.dexetra.iris

Two years behind? More like two months. With megapixels, speed, and bandwidth running out of room for improvement, the intelligent assistant may be the next mobile arms race.

Siri is slick, but it's not like similar things haven't been developed on other platforms. Here are a few competitors on Android (definitely less slick, but not far from the mark):
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.google.android.voicesearch (Google standard issue)
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.pannous.voice.actions.free
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.vlingo.client
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.dexetra.iris

Two years behind? More like two months. With megapixels, speed, and bandwidth running out of room for improvement, the intelligent assistant may be the next mobile arms race.

"Iris, does this article look like a steaming pile of turd to you too?"

Yes Dave, it does look like a poorly researched paid product placement.

If Google has been collecting such data about the most common english transliteration for the most common words in other languages, it has a treasure trove of stuff. If that probability engine could be adapted to voice, it would have a global reach. If Siri has an American English focus, its lead is definitely not two years. Do not count the non-native English speakers out.

Have you checked out Google translator? https://market.android.com/details?id=com.google.android.apps.translate&feature=search_result

It has great potential to be a actually universal translator among normal users. But how many will know about that app again versus siri?

Don't worry about it. Happens to me all the time. I'm told it is due to me deadpan delivery. Perhaps I should carry around a rimshot noise so every time I make a joke I can append a Ba - Dum - Da.

A lot of the phones listed as abandoned now comprise an ever-shrinking part of the Android market. Many of them are first-gen devices on-par with the G1, the first Android phone. Most 2nd and 3rd gen Android phones have been getting updates to FroYo and Gingerbread from the manufacturers because they learned a lot from those 1st gen devices. For reference, consider Google's numbers on which OS each active phone is running: http://developer.android.com/resources/dashboard/platform-versions.html

The reality is that a developer can likely create an app for FroYo and up that will still be mass market. People running Eclair, Donut, or Cupcake are in an every-shrinking segment of the Android ecosystem. And honestly? Those of us who bought those 1st gen devices kind of knew what we were getting into or probably should have known better. I have a Moment and recognize that I'm bleeding a bit for being an early adopter. (That said, the updates from SDX for FroYo have been awesome. They're also working on Gingerbread.)

Current Android phones are better able to handle updates than their predecessors, so they get better updates. This article is kind of a non-news item.

There's an app for that - https://market.android.com/details?id=com.pottymouth

Er, on Android...

At best, it can register a "charm" (basically an action for the app-wide context menu) for a certain protocol, and another app can register itself as handling that protocol - then, whenever user activates that charm in app #1, app #2 is activated and parameters are passed to it.

This sounds awfully familiar... Anyway, thanks a lot for taking the time to explain win8/Metro. There's a lot of interesting stuff to learn about!
A terrific day to you and whoever's with you.

I have been using an app called voice actions on my Android phone for several months. It does text messaging and email quite well. It seems they recently renamed it to Jeannie. Check it out instead of this useless app. Market link

Indeed voice commands have been in many phones for a while,

Including older iPhones - but here's the problem: They barely work. I use it very occasionally for simple things, like getting the time in winter when the phone is somewhere in an inside pocket.

From all I've seen, Siri works. That right there is the entire secret. It doesn't have 25613 features, but it works.

What's worse is Apple probably managed to get a patent or two on Siri.

They bought it. If there were any patents, they certainly now own them, but it's not Apple's fault or decision. Siri was almost complete when it got bought up.

It is so obvious that a bunch of coders at a hackathon could put something similar together in a few hours and have a demo of the same thing. Oh... wait... they've done exactly that, it's called Iris Alpha from a firm called, and it took eight hours.

Allegedly. Plust quite frankly, this nice video here:
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.dexetra.iris
has me minus-convinced. Funny how there is always a cut between the question and the answer...

Point is, while Apple's idea is clever, the polish and packaging good and the marketing cleverest, but it is absolutely not start of the art artificial intelligence,

Agreed. It is, however, the state of the art of the personal assistant. It is precisely the polish, integration and Steve's obsession with perfection that makes it a success. I'm sure there's at least a hundred prototype projects around that can do more, have more advanced AI, etc. etc. etc. - but none of them are in a state where you could put them out into a mass market.

And that's why Apple is making more money than they know what to do with, and the Iris Alpha coders are playing "look ma" in the Android market place.

Personal disclaimer: Don't get this wrong as a lack of respect. The same reason is why a friend of mine makes a living with computer games, while I have the better game ideas but barely make what I spend on engine licenses, etc. and consider it a hobby - when I think a game is done, he starts the polishing process, the other 50% of development.

And Apple is a master of that part.

Android has had GPS proximity alerts in LocationManager since API 1.0 http://developer.android.com/reference/android/location/LocationManager.html But I bet it was Steve Job's idea.. That way it could be magical when they release it 4 years later.

Assuming it's like Gingerbread, then yes and yes. Depending on your phone, you will probably need hardware drivers for some things, though (for which, just as with any linux distribution, you'll have to speak to the hardware manufacturers or wait until a compatible ROM is released by the phone manufacturer).

for e.g., Linux kernel is open source .i can always over write my kernel from the distro by downloading the source from kernel.org. can i do the same with android?

That's possibly not the best example for you to pick -- are you aware that Android runs on top of the linux kernel, and that you can build and install your own custom kernel on your Android system if you want?? But yes, you can download the full android source from here and build your own AOSP ROM should you so wish.

Of course, you could have found this out by using the search engine of your choice rather than trolling /. -- googling for "android source" brings up the relevant link on the first hit.

Yes, the ICS tree that will be released to AOSP is the same code used to do the build for Galaxy Nexus (among other products).

Instructions on building for Galaxy Nexus will likely end up here (alongside Nexus S):
http://source.android.com/source/building-devices.html

The handful of closed source userspace pieces necessary (some firmware, the hardware opengl libraries, samsung radio library, etc) will end up here:
http://code.google.com/android/nexus/drivers.html
(please disregard the unfortunate use of "drivers" here -- all the kernel drivers are GPLv2, none are closed source)

What's not included is the Google Mobile Apps (gmail, gcalendar, gtalk, maps, etc). These are proprietary Google applications, not part of the core Android platform (which consists of the lower level libraries, dalvik vm, framework libraries, services, core apps like phone, contacts, launcher, settings, etc, etc).

There are remarkably few binary blobs in Android lead devices (some OEMs add more proprietary goop to their own phones though).

http://source.android.com/source/building-devices.html

Nexus S, for example, requires these pieces above and beyond the available open source userspace and kernel code:
- opengl userspace libraries (ImaginationTech)
- radio interface library (Samsung) -- glue between the Android Telephony stack and the Radio
- firmware for bt/wifi chip (Broadcom)
- GPS userspace library (Broadcom)
- NFC firmware / loader library (NXP)
- auto-calibration library for orientation sensor (AKM)

The closed pieces are available here, under a license that allows you to use them in your own builds, and even to redistribute (non-commercially) entire flashable OS images including them.

We continue to work to reduce the number of closed binaries needed on the lead Android devices. We have *never* shipped a lead device that includes any non-gpl/bsd kernel code.

Dan Morrill
  Oct 20, 4:29 am
Hi!
As you know, like many other projects the Android Open-Source Project was
affected by the recent kernel.org downtime. So, we’re pleased to let you
know that the Gingerbread source code is now available again, and AOSP git
servers are back online.
Even before the kernel.org downtime, it was clear that AOSP was sometimes
taxing kernel.org’s git infrastructure. When we did the Gingerbread source
release, for example, load due to AOSP made part of kernel.org unusable for
several days. This isn’t fair to kernel.org’s staff or the community, so for
some time we’ve been preparing our own git hosting on Google servers.
We were finishing up just as kernel.org experienced their downtime, so the
Gingerbread source is now available on Google’s servers. Accordingly, the
git URLs have changed.
Here are the instructions to access the new git servers:
      - You need to get the latest version of the repo tool:
      curl https://dl-ssl.google.com/dl/googlesource/git-repo/repo > ~/bin/repo
      - You need to initialize a new repository:
      repo init -u https://android.googlesource.com/platform/manifest -b
      android-2.3.7_r1
      - The full instructions are at
      http://source.android.com/source/downloading.html
There are a few limitations to be aware of:
      - Our priority has been getting the main source code mirrors back online,
      so for the moment gitweb source browsing and Gerrit Code Review are still
      unavailable.
      - We are now working on bringing AOSP’s Gerrit Code Review site back up,
      and hope to be able to say something here soon.
      - It might be a little while longer before gitweb comes back,
      unfortunately, since Gerrit Code Review is the next priority.
      - To reiterate, these servers contain only the ‘gingerbread’ and ‘master’
      branches from the old AOSP servers. We plan to release the source for the
      recently-announced Ice Cream Sandwich soon, once it’s available on devices.
      - As these new servers are, well, new, there may be hiccups if we
      encounter unexpected issues. However we’re keeping a close eye on them and
      will respond to any issues as quickly as possible.
Finally, we’d like to send a huge “thank-you” to the kernel.org community
and Oregon State University Open-Source Lab staff. They’ve done an
incredible job hosting the AOSP source code mirror and Gerrit Code Review
for nearly 3 years. Without them, it’s safe to say that AOSP would not be
where we are today.
Thanks, and happy coding!
- Dan

The proof is in the pudding. Android itself and Android apps cosistently don't hold a candle to iOS apps in their functionality, usability and general quality. The obvious culprit is the underlying over engineered misarchitecture and the resulting horrific APIs.

Silly me. Here I was thinking it had to do with the fact that there is much more money to be made developing for iOS so developers are going to target it first and hardest.

Case in point. For the very obvious and what should be mundane and simple task of communicating between activities you get this, http://developer.android.com/resources/faq/framework.html#3, various different ways of saying "use globals".

Assuming you understand how intents work, how is

Intent.putExtras()

a global in any conceivable way?

I looked at the implementations of the alternative to many of the Collections classes in particular, and they had nothing in them that suggested they were "better suited to mobile devices". And I'm not going to dig through the API docs, but they were certainly no improvement on the equivalent Java classes, and I recall them often being less intuitive.

The use the Java classes. Why complain about choice?

I know you can construct your UI directly in code, but virtually all the documentation I have seen assumes you'd never want to do that and omits coverage of it. Hence why I said the XML format was presented as "the preferred way".

Yes, because the XML way is going to be easier and more intuitive for many people. For the hardcore olde thymers such as yourself, you can use Java. Again, the choice is yours.

The process is exactly the same as when the app is explicitly shutdown by the user or the app developers code, so it is true. That's why you have to store the current state of the application, as you allude to in your comment.

No, it most assuredly is not. Android apps are not like desktop apps. The lifecycle is totally different and more suited to an "on-the-go"/everything runs fullscreen device. onCreate initializes the logic of your activity and it is called once when that activity is first run. When you shut down an app explicitely, it calls onCreate when you go back to it. When you rotate the screen, it calls onPause and onResume so that your portrait layout (for example) isn't just jumbled together and resized for landscape. You can have a completely different layout for the two modes. Or you can just use onPause and onResume to fill form data back in and to hell with having multiple layouts. When the screen is rotated, everything done in onCreate is maintained that includes all variables, etc. You save form data with onPause and refill it with onResume. It's trivially easy and in the context of the system makes sense. I'm not a teacher, I'm a programmer so my explanation likely sucks. My suggestion is you read this.

Well, if you feel it's more than just adequate then I dread to think what your own code looks like.

Because I disagree with you and think Android is an elegant system to develop for, that means my code sucks? I'm sorry, who are you and what are your credentials again that I should just slavishly follow what you say? When you can give me compelling reasons for why Android supposedly sucks (and you haven't), I'll believe it. So far, you've just given biased opinions based on your impressions of a platform that you don't code for and obviously don't have any real intentions of even giving a fair chance. With that attitude of inflexibility, I'd really hate to see your code.

Even with the Honeycomb support for WiFi Proxy, apps or may not be able to take advantage of the new proxy support, and might have to be updated (at least at that time, that was case). Common example: set a proxy on your XOOM and your could browse the internet, but the mail app, and other apps that relied on http connectivity, would not necessarily work without modification by the developer).

Motorola (and perhaps other manufacturers) have included proxy support in their phones. My Bionic has it, but I no longer need it, and haven't tested it. I'm not sure who else provides it. I think some of the other tablets, may be the Galaxy Tab include a way to set the proxy, but again, if the app doesn't know how to take advantage of it, it's gains you nothing, beyond web browsing.

Even the oldest of Blackberries I used supported proxy settings on WiFi. It boggles my mind that Google would allow such a glaring omission to last for such a long time, especially when it has a huge effect on Android's adoption in the enterprise.

There's another free voice app that does much more Siri-esque magic than Google's default. It's a lot of fun to play with and I can't wait to see how much better these voice command apps get in the next decade. Seems like the most difficult challenge ahead is filtering out the aggravating background noises and conversations in most environments.

The app itself is free to download from the android market and will run on any Android device running Andorid 1.5+. That's pretty much everything.

Conversation mode does appear to require Android 2.2 though, which means it should work on fine on ~85% of Android devices out in the wild.

But, without integration into the OS, isn't this just a standalone app with limited usefulness? I'm not trolling, I'm genuinely curious. How does something like this enhance the ability to schedule an event, play a song, ask for directions, etc. (all which require interacting with another app)?

Google Translate is as much a competitor with Siri as MS Word is a competitor with AutoDesk Inventor. They have nothing to do with each other, other than they are both "software".

You are correct. I'm sure Siri will gain more functionality in the future but as it stands now, Siri should be compared to Voice Search and other third party voice command apps.

Google Translate does translate.

Siri (on iPhone) and Voice Search (on Android) handle voice commands and interaction.

The app itself is free to download from the android market and will run on any Android device running Andorid 1.5+. That's pretty much everything.

Conversation mode does appear to require Android 2.2 though, which means it should work on fine on ~85% of Android devices out in the wild.

See they have this thing called a marketplace, and well I'll let you click and learn

https://market.android.com/details?id=com.google.android.apps.translate&feature=search_result

I'm kind of annoyed that the Galaxy S doesn't come with a firewall built in.

It looks like I'll have to root my phone, and risk bricking it, just to use the iptables functionality via Droidwall or similar. I still don't understand why these key Linux functions are not readily available.

Speaking of rooting, why doesn't the Android OS give the user the option to gain root access? sudo even?

Meanwhile, I look forward to the day when your droid can be configured to use VPN / TOR / HTTPS / local DNS / etc that we have come to know, love and expect from Linux.

I know, it's early days yet. I know, this functionality can cost CPU cycles and can drain the battery... and these new phones are quite power hungry.

What I'd really like is to be able to install a mobile proxy service on my home server, and have my phone always get pages via my home server. Same service that the current range of browsers provide, but secured by my own machine. This way the only information that my ISP can see is requests to and from my home machine.

Sorry, forgot this one too. It's made to record inside automobile footage but there's no reason you can't use it for anything else.

Like this one? or this one or even this one if you set it up to auto-upload.

Like this one? or this one or even this one if you set it up to auto-upload.

Like this one? or this one or even this one if you set it up to auto-upload.

I asked Voice Actions, "Who would win - Superman or Batman?". It answered (out loud), "Superman, because he has super strength, and Batman only has fancy gadgets and hand-to-hand combat."

Its thoughts on pirates vs ninjas were also enlightening and extensive. And it'll even read you a poem, if you ask for one.

"Official Android player for Music Beta by Google."
"Available in the U.S. by invitation only and free for a limited time.
Request an invitation at music.google.com."

So it's out there but that doesn't seem like a "full" release to me.

You mean like Vadim Lopatin's GPL Cool Reader does for RTF files on Android? Extremely useful app. Market link. It even keeps track of what page you were on last time you read the file. By the way I downloaded Opera for Android but Android's built in browser also adjusts the divs to make one column. Reflowing layout is what HTML is supposed to be about. I don't get where there is a need to patent this at all. Obvious software is obvious.

That's nice, because the vast majority of android users are on old operating systems.

Just my 2c... My 2 yo HTC Desire with launcherpro and cyanogenmod will outsmooth an iPhone 4 every day of the week. Apart from that, I could swear that since 2.3 the GPU could be used to render the UI, if available, but that's beside the point. ( And that's from a phone that when launched you could get for 200$ less than an iPhone and that now costs less than half the price an iPhone 4 does (unlocked). )

Also, Android will try, when resources are free, to pre-load the applications you use the most, so that when you click them, they're just there. Most android phones run at 55% of full capacity all the time because of this, and you need almost no user interaction with the tasks (if you really want to it's there, but there is no need to do anything).

Also, citing objective-C as a reason for better and faster apps also shows ignorance. Ignoring the fact the Objective-C is a nightmare to program to (and that it has a stupidly steep learning curve), you can write c/c++ for android ( http://developer.android.com/sdk/ndk/index.html ). That means that you can have the performance of C for what needs performance and still have the user-friendliness of java for the rest. When someone trying to explain to me iOS programming starts by saying "first, you try to get to a webview as fast as possible!" (true story), it must mean something.

Is iOS bad? Not by a longshot. But trying to justify your point of view with "facts" that haven't been true for years now makes you look bad. Really really bad.

I think you just took someone to school. +1

http://developer.android.com/sdk/ndk/index.html

Also, davilk is not Java. You might write things in java, but it's interpreted in a much faster and more efficient way.

Just my 2c... My 2 yo HTC Desire with launcherpro and cyanogenmod will outsmooth an iPhone 4 every day of the week. Apart from that, I could swear that since 2.3 the GPU could be used to render the UI, if available, but that's beside the point. ( And that's from a phone that when launched you could get for 200$ less than an iPhone and that now costs less than half the price an iPhone 4 does (unlocked). )

Also, Android will try, when resources are free, to pre-load the applications you use the most, so that when you click them, they're just there. Most android phones run at 55% of full capacity all the time because of this, and you need almost no user interaction with the tasks (if you really want to it's there, but there is no need to do anything).

Also, citing objective-C as a reason for better and faster apps also shows ignorance. Ignoring the fact the Objective-C is a nightmare to program to (and that it has a stupidly steep learning curve), you can write c/c++ for android ( http://developer.android.com/sdk/ndk/index.html ). That means that you can have the performance of C for what needs performance and still have the user-friendliness of java for the rest. When someone trying to explain to me iOS programming starts by saying "first, you try to get to a webview as fast as possible!" (true story), it must mean something.

Is iOS bad? Not by a longshot. But trying to justify your point of view with "facts" that haven't been true for years now makes you look bad. Really really bad.

What is Android?

Android is a software stack for mobile devices that includes an operating system, middleware and key applications. The Android SDK provides the tools and APIs necessary to begin developing applications on the Android platform using the Java programming language.

The point would be to read it with your own language and with better content. Neither of those are true.
So only thing to read about that, is not about reading about it but reading about the comments about it.

I love one Android (and available for iOS as I would think) application what is for tablets and smartphones and it is a News360.
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.news360.news360app
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.news360.news360tablet

It is awesome on tablet, great on phone. As it allows you to find out other articles from same news but from different providers. You can have quick way to see what others are writing about and leave all those RSS and Bookmarks. Just pick topic and then you can scroll trough the list and quickly you find out how the opinions are different and who is more or less just copy-cat.

Too bad thing is that News360 does not query all news from local. It really would be awesome function to get every small released news from it. As it build great mashup for those who just want quick glance of the happening.

Oh, and did I forget to mention that it is little bit like wikipedia, where you can easily click keywords in articles to query them from all other news? Locations, people, happenings etc.

The point would be to read it with your own language and with better content. Neither of those are true.
So only thing to read about that, is not about reading about it but reading about the comments about it.

I love one Android (and available for iOS as I would think) application what is for tablets and smartphones and it is a News360.
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.news360.news360app
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.news360.news360tablet

It is awesome on tablet, great on phone. As it allows you to find out other articles from same news but from different providers. You can have quick way to see what others are writing about and leave all those RSS and Bookmarks. Just pick topic and then you can scroll trough the list and quickly you find out how the opinions are different and who is more or less just copy-cat.

Too bad thing is that News360 does not query all news from local. It really would be awesome function to get every small released news from it. As it build great mashup for those who just want quick glance of the happening.

Oh, and did I forget to mention that it is little bit like wikipedia, where you can easily click keywords in articles to query them from all other news? Locations, people, happenings etc.

I scanned down the list of things in TelephonyManager that require READ_PHONE_STATE.

Say a program needs to stop playing music if the phone starts ringing. In Android, background processes such as Internet radio applications run as services. So how is a service created by a program without READ_PHONE_STATE notified that the phone is ringing so that the service can stop playing the stream? Or does Android automatically stop all other audio sources once the phone starts ringing?

Say a program needs to make a unique user ID. The program could require the user to enter an e-mail address and password, but that has three drawbacks:

• Users under 13 couldn't use it due to the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act and foreign counterparts. This makes it not viable for games that would be rated E or E10+.
• Having to key in a name and password on a touch screen every time creates a poor user experience.
• Resetting forgotten passwords would cost the developer's customer support department money.

So applications tend to generate a user ID based on the IMEI or the IMSI, which requires READ_PHONE_STATE.

https://market.android.com/details?id=mobi.mgeek.TunnyBrowser&hl=en

This is true, and it's because these devices cannot pass (or do not attempt) Google's Compatibility Test Suite. Proving compatibility via a crapload of tests is a requirement for Google services.

The post also fails to mention a rather large category of apps that are also excluded from the Playbook: apps based on the NDK, which is to say apps that have components written in C++. That includes pretty much all modern games, as well as other CPU-intensive operations.

From http://developer.android.com/reference/android/app/Activity.html, "An activity is a single, focused thing that the user can do."

So it sounds like only apps that have 1 window/ui screen.