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Who's Afraid of Android Fragmentation?
Nerval's Lobster writes: The dreaded term "fragmentation" has been applied to Android more times than anyone can count over the past half-decade. That's part of the reason why game developers often build for iOS before Android, even though Android offers a bigger potential customer base worldwide, and more types of gaming experiences. Fortunately, new sets of tools allow game developers to build for one platform and port their work (fairly) easily to another. "We've done simultaneously because it is such a simple case of swapping out the textures and also hooking up different APIs for scores and achievements," London-based indie developer Tom Vian told Dice. "I've heard that iOS is a better platform to launch on first, but there's no sense for us in waiting when we can spend half a day and get it up and running." So is fragmentation an overhyped roadblock, or is it a genuine problem for developers who work in mobile?
I buy Android apps. Although, I admit I usually download the free version first. If I like it I usually buy it. Otherwise I just uninstall it. I rarely buy anything that I don't get to try this way first. I do have apps that have no free versions. Most of them I would buy just to get rid of the ads if I had a choice!
But... I wouldn't necessarily buy them at iOS prices. I do have an iPad too, on which I rarely install anything. My most used app on either platform is Anki, a flashcard program. It's free on Android, not even any ads. On iOS the same app is $50! iOS is such a ripoff!
...Variety of devices, Running different versions of the OS.
The first one IMHO is a strong point for Android since there's so many different devices you're likely to find what you want (cheap, expensive, large, small, metal build, removable battery...). In this respect Windows Phone also has an interesting number of devices (although infenitely less than Android) and iOS is horrible in this respect: You basically have this year's or last year's model, neither of which is exactly cheap.
The second one is definitely bad: Several versions of the OS having significant marketshare means extra work for developers, and fewer apps for users (since some require a version newer than you have). Windows Phone and iOS are much better than Android in this.
As an iOS developer, I have to agree with your comment. It used to be a standard resolution up until the iPhone 4, at which point it was just double the resolution. Easy right? A simple check to see if you need to double the resolution or not, same aspect ratio, no problem. Then the 5 screwed up the aspect ratio entirely. Then the 6 and 6+ new resolution and aspect ratio. At this point you might as well have a dynamic UI for any ratio/resolution which does blur the line when it comes to the simplicity of iOS vs Android. Android will still be working with different inputs, different processing capabilities, and different hardware which may respond differently which still makes it a lot more problematic to develop for. But yes, the margin is slowly shrinking.
Actually Apple just pushed way harder on carriers making them approve their phone updates. Google's bargining power is weaker, along with Microsofts. Apple played it right when Steve Jobs made the deals.
Who's Afraid of Android Fragmentation?
I'm afraid of the ***lack*** of fragmentation in Android.
I believe that Linux's success is directly tied to it's fragmentation.
When a early Linux distro is hard to use (mailing lists), a much easer one comes out (Slackware). When a different Linux vendor goes insane (SCO Linux), other vendors can remane sane. When a different linux goes expensive (RHEL), affordable forks spring up (CentOS).
Fragmentation is what keeps Linux safe both-from-and-for things like systemd. If systemd turns out great - fragmentation is what allowed early adopters to use it so it gained traction. If systemd turns out to be horrible, fragmentation is why other linux distros will survive that experiment.
TL/DR: We need more fragmentation. The mobile world would better if I could choose to run Ubuntu-Android, Fedora-Android, Samsung-Android or Google-Android on my phone.