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Android 5.0 'Lollipop' vs. iOS 8: More Similar Than Ever
Nerval's Lobster writes With the debut of Android 5.0 (also known as Lollipop, in keeping with Google's habit of naming each major OS upgrade after a dessert), it's worth taking a moment to break down how the latest version of Google's mobile operating system matches up against Apple's iOS 8. After years of battle, the two are remarkably similar. So while nobody would ever confuse Android and iOS, both Google and Apple seem determined to go "flatter" (and more brightly colored) than ever. Whether or not you agree with their choices, they're the cutting edge of mobile UX design. The perpetual tit-for-tat over features has reached a climax of sorts with Lollipop and iOS 8: both offer their own version of an NFC-powered e-wallet (Apple Pay vs. Google Wallet), a health app (Apple's Health app vs. Google Fit), car-dashboard control (Android Auto vs. CarPlay), and home automation. That's not to say that the operating systems are mirror images of one another, but in terms of aesthetics and functionality, they'll be at near-parity for most users, albeit not for those users who enjoy customizing Android and hate Apple's "walled garden." (Related: Lots of reviews are popping up for Google's new Nexus 6, one of the first phones to come with the newest Android; TechCrunch's is typical, in that reviewer Greg Kumparak has high praise for the Lollipop UI, but found himself nearly dropping the device because of its size and texture.)
The OTA started yesterday. They do a staged roll out for all these updates. So you should get it within a few days.
Unstable Apps: Our Android Apps Don't Suck
Depends on the software. Typically, you have an OS, cache, and data partition. Manual updates of Cyanogenmod through Clockwork have wiped the OS partition, leaving the others in tact. A desktop update using the boot loader shell and instructions might instruct the phone to wipe data and cache, thus performing a factory reset.
It comes down to your phone's boot loader, mostly. The OS image itself is just a file that gets unpacked and dumped onto the OS partition; but if your upgrade software unpacks the OS image, wipes the internal ROM, repartitions, and installs the new OS image, it'll wipe your data. If your upgrade software wipes the OS partition and unpacks, you get an upgrade without a factory reset.
I've had OTA upgrades (Motorola Cliq) wipe the data partition. The only way to know is to find someone else who's done it.
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That's a strange definition of "walled garden" - network crapware? True you can't uninstall some of it, but you're still free to install whatever you want, and from non-Google stores with absolutely no effort what-so-ever... Hell, some of those devices don't even come with Google Play installed by default, so if it is a walled garden, those devices aren't even in it.
And complaining that people have a choice in what level phone they want? Jesus.
Originally tit for tat was a stylised way (ie slang) for saying "this for that". (Interestingly "titfer" became rhyming slang for a hat).
The word 'tat' is also used colloquially in the UK to describe something of poor quality (I believe it came from something falling to tatters). Something described as 'cheap tat' is usually near to wothless / meretricious rubbish.
How well this applies to mobile operating systems is left to the reader to decide :-)
OTA updates for my Archos 43 PDA and Nexus 7 (2012) tablet have always replaced the OS partition, leaving data intact. It's just that the rooting procedure for a Nexus 7 involves performing a factory reset.
Aside from Amazon devices (which use a forked version of Android), pretty much all Android devices are not a walled garden. Yes many are locked to a carrier, or have preinstalled apps you can't delete. But on the vast majority of them you can simply go to the settings, check the option to "allow installation from unknown sources," and you are outside the walls.
Install AppOps on Android and you can refuse any app any permission.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Depends on the tat ... I've got a nude pinup tat ... I'm 100% guaranteed to see tits. ;-)
In general, however, it may not get you any closer to actually touching any real ones.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
This is so stupid. I'm a senior network engineer working in Seattle, and while I can't argue that Android has the low-end phone market pinned, nearly every person up here with money to blow has 1 or more android devices, and in my circles the weight in phone OS is very heavily tilted in favor of Android. I have an android phone and an iphone (work-provided), an ipad, a nexus, a couple nooks.. In fact, the only people-with-money segment I'd say gravitate toward iphones is the soccer mom's and half-functionally-retarded executives who haven't pitched blackberries yet. How insecure are you in your success that you attribute your tastes to a superior income compared to other people? You're a world-class fuckwit, friend.