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Google Is Rolling Out Android 7.1.1 (engadget.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the come-and-get-it dept.

Google is rolling out Android 7.1.1 for Pixel and Nexus smartphones, including the Nexus 6, Nexus 5X, Nexus 6P, Nexus 9, Pixel, Pixel XL, Nexus Player, Pixel C and General Mobile 4G (Android One). You can download it over-the-air when it becomes available "over the next several weeks" or flash it yourself. Engadget details some of the new features found in Android 7.1.1: As for what you can find from a feature perspective, Google has added support for its "image keyboard" that lets you easily find and send pictures and GIFs without leaving your messaging app of choice. Google says it'll work inside of Hangouts, Allo, and the default Messaging app. Ironically enough, the feature has been available in the Gboard iOS keyboard that Google launched in the spring, but it's good to see it coming to more Android phones now. Android 7.1.1 also includes Google's latest set of more diverse emoji, specifically focused on showing a "wider range of professions" for women. And it also contains the excellent app shortcut feature that originally launched on the Pixel -- if you press and hold on an app's icon, a sub-menu of shortcuts will show up. You'll be able to quickly send a message to a specific contact or navigate to a saved location using these shortcuts, for example. They're very much like the "force touch" shortcuts found on the iPhone, but that doesn't make them any less useful.

6 of 75 comments (clear)

  1. And here I am by ArchieBunker · · Score: 4

    Still running a phone with 4.4.

    --
    Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
  2. And you know what? by p51d007 · · Score: 2

    I don't care. My previous phone, a Huawei Mate2, was "stuck on" jellybean 4.3 for over a year before they pushed out (skipping KK) to 5.1 Oh there were betas, cooked roms and what not, but I stuck with 4.3, because my phone worked perfectly. No problems. In fact, I probably would have left it on 4.3, had Huawei not had an easy way to push it back to 4.3, from 5.1. 5.1 was very stable. My new phone (about 3 months ago) a Huawei Mate8, came with 6.0MM. Huawei says 7.0N will come to it around the 1st Qtr of 2017, but, even if they don't, won't matter. It's very stable, and I never have any issues. I use 1500-2000 minutes on the phone per month, tons of web, mp3's, photos, what not and not one issue. All apps run, no FC's. As long as a device is suppose to run as intended, I don't give a flip about what OS is on it.

  3. Great! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I bet people will enjoy it when it finally makes its way into the hands of the public in several years' time. Right now, only 0.4% of Android users are on Android 7. For comparison, 1.2% of Android users are still on Android 2.3, released exactly 6 years ago today, and 24% of Android users are still on Android 4.4, released over three years ago.

    1. Re: Great! by ChunderDownunder · · Score: 2

      I have a nexus model and it's stuck on 5.x

      Used Nexus 6 phones can be had on ebay for $AU206 but if it costs me two hundred bucks just to get the lastest OS on a soon to be unsupported phone then they really aren't that much better than the competition.

      (Yes, I'm cheap.)

  4. Excellent by Gumbercules!! · · Score: 2

    I look forward to never seeing it released for my phone. AND I HAVE A NEXUS 6P.

    Because despite the misleading article saying Google is releasing it for Nexus phones, the carrier still needs to test and release it (unless you want to download and manually install a ROM and completely wipe your phone) - and my carrier still has not released 7.0 for fucks sake. And for the record, I did manually install 7.1 through the Beta program on it - and promptly lost access to LTE on my carrier.

  5. My next phone by vatin · · Score: 2

    Android fragmentation. I'm thinking my next phone will be an iPhone.