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Ten Features To Love About Android 1.5
An anonymous reader writes "Last month, Google officially announced the Android 1.5 update, dubbed 'cupcake.' The new software is apparently ready to roll out to Android-powered devices beginning tomorrow. Make no mistake, Android 1.5 is a major upgrade — they could have called it 2.0. The software brings a host of new capabilities, some of which can't be found on rival mobile platforms, including video recording and sharing."
I installed Ubuntu 9.04, whats Jaunty Jackalope?
I've tried numerous times to program for this platform but I hate it so much.
The IPhone has a lot of limitations, but the amount of apps for it makes it the killer device. The iphone has more quality apps than all other platforms have total apps combined. and the new hardware/software combo coming out in the next 2 months will make it even better.
until Android, winmo and BB get more and better apps and the ability to install over 10-20 apps on the device i'll probably buy a new iphone come july to complement my wife's iphone. even with all it's limitations.
this is almost exactly like the story with Windows in the 1990's. it was far from the best OS, but the amount of apps for it clinched it's success.
I really like Android as concept. Unfortunately, in the USA the number of devices are not very appealing (the ones that are available). My carrier doesn't even have android phones. Strange, because the whole point of Android I figured was to allow manufacturers to focus on innovative cell phone designs. Maybe manufacturers will eventually make more phones with Android, but right now they are kinda lousy IMHO.
Until better hardware, the future is Palm Pre or iPhone
Actually, you have the issue backwards. Your selection of MS-Exchange as a messaging platform has limited the financially viable choices available to your firm to basically, Windows Mobile. Don't blame your vendor lock in on anyone other than your messaging vendor and the person who decided to buy MS-Exchange. You didn't HAVE TO do it.
-- $G
It's not about the name, it's about the content.
Think of it like the Princess Bride.
> Google has already demonstrated that it is willing to pull certain apps that T-mobile doesn't like.
Except it doesn't matter, because on an Android phone you can install an apk package from anywhere on the web without rooting your phone. (There is a single checkbox in the settings you need to check first.) The Market actually has a strong incentive to be less fascist than the app store, because if it is perceived as hampering developers, developers will simply go elsewhere. I have no doubt that Google knew this when they designed the OS, and that they intend to be more egalitarian in the future. They're also still getting used to this thing, so I'm cutting a little slack. Have no doubt that if, in the future, Google decides to be dicks about the Market, I will put the apps I develop for Android online somewhere else.
It's rare that you're presented with a knob whose only two positions are Make History and Flee Your Glorious Destiny.
Just because something has a feature the Jesusphone doesn't, doesn't mean it is mindblowing and revolutionary...
There's a difference between "having a feature" and "having a feature that's actually usable".
My Nokia E71 has loads of features. And most of them are so crummy and hard to use, that they might as well not exist. It has GPS. Which is so cumbersome to use that I never use it. It has web-browser. But browsing with it is so frustrating and clumsy that I only use it when I desperately need to check something online.
The thing is that when the iPhone was released, people compared it to other phones (like Nokias) and said "my phone has had those features for a long time already, how exactly is the iPhone "revolutioary?". But they fail to understand that it's not about list of checkboxes called "features", it's about features that people can actually use.
Like I said, my E71 has a web-browser. It also has WiFI. But for some reason I never use it for web-browsing at home through my Wifi, I use my iPod touch for that.
You can't compare phones (or any other devices for that matter) by staring at a piece of paper that lists their specs. You need to actually USE the devices to make that judgement. And the thing is that iPhone might not have every single bell and whistle some other phone has, but the bells and whistles it has. are so usable that people actually use them. Nokia has been piling features to their phones for years, but since they are implemented in such a crappy way, they go mostly unused.
If your phone has a feature that no-one uses, is it really a feature?
Lesbian Nazi Hookers Abducted by UFOs and Forced Into Weight Loss Programs - -all next week on Town Talk.
I own neither of those phones, but could someone explain to me why 35.000 is much more important than 20.000? With that many apps chances are you will have a harder time finding quality in the heap of binary junk.
If your phone has a feature that no-one uses, is it really a feature?
Eh yes. Because sometimes, the use of a feature is also a function of the user's intelligence, training, awareness or needs. My mother might use my PC, but I'm pretty sure /she/ wouldn't touch the gcc installed on it. Yet my PC continues to 'feature' gcc.
Religion is what happens when nature strikes and groupthink goes wrong.
Agreed. This is usually the way to spot the Apple fanboi.
When they bring up how Apple's App Store has 35,000 applications and Windows Mobile (or some other phone) has only however many thousand, point out that Windows has far more applications available than Mac OS X, so it is obviously superior.
I did this once. It was great fun to watch him stammer. "But, but, but...it's completely different! How many word processors to do you need?" "Oh, I don't know, probably about as many tip calculators, fart noise generators, and flashlights."
How did they miss the ability to read .pdf and MS Office documents?? They're pretty basic to anyone using the phone for business of any size. Sigh...
r
Your concept of a smartphone is that of companies like Blackberry and Palm's 24 months ago.
Apple saw a market for a consumer smartphone and exploited the fuck out of it. Now all the traditional business smartphone companies are trying to catch up.
Its a show stopper for me? I was looking into mobile phone development a few months ago, no native C = no open source C libraries i can use (glib/gobject/gtk/clutter etc...)
I don't want to have to reinvent the wheel over and over again in java when my C stack does it fine just now.
Mostly I just don't want my freedom of choice removed, this is supposed to be the worlds open source mobile OS, but in reality it feels just as closed off as anything else, Its their way or the highway.
I'm convinced that the programming model of Android is what will make it a winner. Programming for Android is very easy if you're a java programmer, and there's millions of java programmers out there.
You can't even compare it to developing for WinMo or Symbian phones, which is a very hard task.
The ease of development, and support for a market with tons of free (and paid for) apps simply blows WinMo and Symbian out of the water.
Once you get a phone with the app support of Android (or iPhone) there is no turning back.
Symbian will die soon for sure, except perhaps for low cost, low function mobiles. WinMo will survive just because it has MS to hold it up with their desktop marketshare.
don't forget there are millions of desktop/enterprise java developers. People who think 2Gb RAM and dual core is a minimum spec :)
Java on embedded devices is relatively small, certainly not as widespread as you'd think. I'd go out on a limb and guess that there are more Symbian developers (who use C++) as there are simply far more Nokia phones in circulation than any java-based phones.
I would think Google should release a C/C++ application environment for Android, lots of people want it, lots of code already exists to make use of it (or the underlying Linux platform), I can't really think there's a good reason to restrict use to java only.
In fact, the java-only model is a poor one, you're locked in to java, get what the environment gives you. Having Android linux based makes such good sense you're likely to get as wide a range of software running on it as you have with Linux. Making it Java only stops that, you only get Android programmers coding for it.
Beats me why they bothered - its not even real Java, considering they reimplemented their JVM to get round the licencing issues.
Ah yes, it's the grumpy featurism claim.
Well my Motorola V980 phone is better than the Iphone. No, it doesn't do touchscreen or wifi, but that's just a "list of checkboxes", right? (It also does video recording simply by pointing and clicking - it Just Works.)
but since they are implemented in such a crappy way
* Installing an application from any site on my phone Just Works, it doesn't need the phone to be hacked.
* Tethering on my phone Just Works, it doesn't need the phone to be hacked.
* Copy and paste on my phone Just Works, I don't have to retype the material.
I've given you three objective examples of implementation. So let's hear your examples - I want evidence, not "crappy way". What sort of debate is that? I might as well say "My Amiga 500 is also better than any PC out there - who cares about feature lists, it's just better, it just is, honest, because I say so, anything else is just crappy." I like to think I can come to Slashdot for some intelligent debate, not "Who cares about features, it's just crappy".
If your using a mac for more than a few hours and havnt got sufficently used to the right click you clearly shouldnt be trying to share you wisdom with the world