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A Look at the Amount of Time Smartphone Vendors Have Taken To Roll out Major Android Updates To Their Handsets, and How Things Are Beginning To Improve (androidauthority.com)

Posted by msmash on from the closer-look dept.

Most Android smartphone vendors have been notorious for the time they take to roll out the newest Android OS updates to their respective handsets. To tackle this, Google in 2017 announced Project Treble, which bypasses some middlemen in delivering new updates to consumers. With Project Treble now supported by all Android phone makers, in theory updates should roll out to us faster than before. To test this, news blog AndroidAuthority looked at the data to see where things stand. From the report: On average, Nougat updates took about 192 days to reach key devices, while Oreo was slightly faster at 170. Android Pie updates hit devices much faster, averaging just 118 days from Google's launch to significant OEM rollout. That's a significant improvement, though we're still waiting on updates from LG and HTC, which could drag this average back up. Most manufacturers are faster at providing updates now, but a few are slower. Huawei, Samsung, and Xiaomi were noticeably quicker this time around, bringing updates to key devices before the end of 2018. OnePlus and Sony were especially fast, but they've always been speedier than most. Disappointingly, Motorola has rolled out updates to its flagship Z series slower over the last few years.

73 of 131 comments (clear)

  1. This is about Lock In by Deliveranc3 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I wish Google still "Don't be evil."

    I had a business selling G1 (Still an excellent form factor I hope they bring it back.) and I would Root and Superuser them and install custom Roms.

    They were really amazing, the early Android modding scene had a lot of potential.
    25% better battery life.
    40% better performance.
    More customization options.
    Excellent GUIs.

    But I ramble.

    Anyway nowadays it's hard to Root and get SuperUser and I don't understand why.

    It's actually put a lifespan on Android which is sad.

    Now Android is like Facebook, constantly getting worse and losing sight of what made it better than alternatives.

    I don't want to be one of those old people who think things were better in the past, give me something to work with.

    1. Re: This is about Lock In by Type44Q · · Score: 1

      extreme level of stupid

      Whereas being challenged by four syllable words...

    2. Re:This is about Lock In by Desler · · Score: 1

      I wish Google still "Don't be evil."

      How about you stop being naive instead of falling for an informal motto that was not legally-binding in any way.

    3. Re:This is about Lock In by hawguy · · Score: 2

      Anyway nowadays it's hard to Root and get SuperUser and I don't understand why.

      Seems pretty straightforward:

      https://www.xda-developers.com...

      It's not trivial and should not be since only those that know what they are doing should root their phone.

    4. Re:This is about Lock In by hawguy · · Score: 1

      I wish Google still "Don't be evil."

      How about you stop being naive instead of falling for an informal motto that was not legally-binding in any way.

      There's nothing wrong with expecting companies to abide by their publicly stated position, if a company is going to publicly say they are going to do something, they should follow through. Though they've already removed "Don't be evil" from their code of conduct, so it's moot anyway.

    5. Re:This is about Lock In by Desler · · Score: 1

      But it wasn't a public position. It was an informal motto that they used to trick gullible people into thinking they were something they weren't. Google has always put money ahead of ethics. That anyone believed otherwise is silly.

    6. Re:This is about Lock In by Desler · · Score: 1

      Except one was an official policy statement and the other a throwaway motto.

    7. Re:This is about Lock In by Urinal+Pube · · Score: 1

      I still won't buy a phone until a legitimate root method exists for that model.

    8. Re:This is about Lock In by swillden · · Score: 5, Informative

      Anyway nowadays it's hard to Root and get SuperUser and I don't understand why.

      This is my fault. Not only mine, not even mostly mine, but definitely my team's fault -- and I, personally, have a little of the blame. So that makes me a good person to explain.

      First, let me point out that my teammates and I have no interest in preventing you from rooting your device. None whatsoever. We are skeptical that you can make good use of root without compromising your own security, but we also believe that if you want to compromise your security, you should be free to do so!

      So, if we don't hate rooting, why have we made it hard?

      We haven't, exactly. Let me explain.

      Let's start with the bootloader. If your device has a locked bootloader (note that this is completely different from carrier locking, AKA SIM locking, which is what people usually mean when they talk about an Android device that is locked or unlocked), then you may not install your own software on it. All of the devices from Google ship with bootloaders that can be unlocked, because we think people should be able to do what they want with their devices. Most other Android device makers feel differently about this and ship bootloaders that cannot be unlocked. Some of them will sell you a "developer edition" that is unlockable.

      It's always been this way. Nexus/Pixel devices have always been unlockable, most others have not. Those G1s you were rooting almost certainly did not have unlockable bootloaders. So... how did you root them?

      You exploited vulnerabilities. There were lots of them. There was no software integrity checking, so once you exploited a vulnerability you were able to modify the system and keep it in the exploited state.

      These vulnerabilities were nice for you because they let you root. They were also nice for anyone who wanted to hack into your phone and get your personal data out. Useful to good guys, but also to bad guys. On balance, that's a bad thing.

      What we did was to fix a lot of vulnerabilities. Not all; no software system of substantial size will ever be free of vulnerabilities. Recognizing that, we built defense in depth. SELinux is a big component of this defense in depth. Today in Android it's almost unheard of to find a single vulnerability that allows the attacker to pwn the entire system. Vulnerabilities still exist, but now attackers need long exploit chains. They use one vulnerability to open a chink in a part of the system that then lets them find and exploit another vulnerability, and so on, until they finally get to the data they're trying to get, or -- better yet -- pop the kernel. Root isn't good enough any more; for free reign of the system you need to pop the kernel and disable SELinux. Today's exploit chains often use five to ten separate vulnerabilities, because less than that doesn't do you any good. Working exploit chains for major device models sell for $1M+ on black markets. That's because they're hard to find.

      In addition to that, we also added verified boot, so that every piece of the system software is validated as its loaded. This means that once you find and exploit a long chain of vulnerabilities to get control, you can't just change the system software so that you always have it, because if you modify the system the device won't work any more. You have to re-exploit the vulnerabilities after every boot. (Note that a new class of techniques makes so-called "systemless root" possible; which gives you persistent root without changing the system. We're shutting those down, too.)

      In addition to that, we got much more aggressive about making device makers patch the vulnerabilities. So if you find a sequence of vulns that gets you control, you'd better keep it secret or it'll stop working after the next update. Oh, and we also made it basically impossible to install an older version of the software to get back to a version that had known vulnerabilities you could use.

      That's a small taste; a lot m

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    9. Re:This is about Lock In by hawguy · · Score: 1

      But it wasn't a public position. It was an informal motto that they used to trick gullible people into thinking they were something they weren't. Google has always put money ahead of ethics. That anyone believed otherwise is silly.

      They included it in their S-1 filing prior to their IPO.

    10. Re: This is about Lock In by astrofurter · · Score: 1

      Why the fuck did you decide to _force_ Android Pie users to waste space on their home screen with that garbagey "At A Glance" widget? And you now _force_ users to have the Google search bar on the home screen - and _force_ it to be at the bottom.

      It's bad enough when you futz up my user experience just because you can. But it's inexcusable when you make it impossible to disable your annoying douchebaggery.

      The Android Pie update was a big old middle finger to users. WTF, Google?

    11. Re:This is about Lock In by nightfire-unique · · Score: 1

      It's so bad at this point, I think we need government intervention in the form of right-to-repair legislation that confirms and enforces our right to elevate privileges on any personal electronic devices we own.

      Blocking root or locking bootloaders? Devices shall not legally enter (Canada / US / etc). Would fix the situation quickly.

      --
      A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
    12. Re:This is about Lock In by nightfire-unique · · Score: 1

      No it's not. This is a stupid fucking statement.

      Linux kernel hacker and general Unix admin of 25 years here. I feel I speak with some authority here when I say, yes... yes it is.

      Bootloader locking is a thing these days. Look it up.

      --
      A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
    13. Re:This is about Lock In by nightfire-unique · · Score: 1

      OP may have been referring to the industry in general. Many devices now ship with non-unlockable bootloaders. It's a serious problem.

      --
      A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
    14. Re:This is about Lock In by nightfire-unique · · Score: 1

      See, I'm seeing this from the opposite perspective, and it's terrifying.

      Given your UID, I'm guessing we're probably around the same age, having grown up with early x86 machines, dos, os/2, slackware, etc. Not to go all nostalgic, but "those were the days." We were free to explore, learn, tinker, fix, and break. We could output directly to ioports and trigger interrupts as a matter of course. I learned more about what makes a computer compute as a kid with a beat up old 8086 than I have as an adult (both in University and professionally).

      Over the next 20 years, computers gained protected mode instruction sets, virtual memory and page isolation, and a thousand other features to enhance security for the user. But at no point, until recently, did our devices attempt to protect themselves from us.

      If I could beg Google for one thing, it would be to deny compliance certification (and Play Store access) to any manufacturer that doesn't provide bootloader unlock codes to their users at the point of sale. Android would not even exist were it not for Linux, and Linux would not have existed if computers refused to boot an experimental kernel, as so many devices do these days.

      --
      A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
    15. Re:This is about Lock In by nightfire-unique · · Score: 1

      Bootloader locking is different than SIM locking.

      SIM locking is illegal in Canada*. I will vote for an MP candidate who promises to also make bootloader locking illegal.

      * technically legal, however vendors are required by law to provide SIM unlock codes free of charge.

      --
      A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
    16. Re:This is about Lock In by 0ld_d0g · · Score: 1

      You make some valid points, but..

      because we think people should be able to do what they want with their devices.

      You should add the caveat, - "as long as Google can mine the users data". That is the only thing Google really cares about. In a sense, allowing vulnerabilities means that there's competition to get to the data. It makes sense in other contexts too as to why Google is never going to allow users to encrypt the Inbox.

      We don't mind you guys fixing vulnerabilities, or even employing dark patterns across your products, or even trying to trick people to use your products - Hey, its a tough world out there. Its only when you cloak your actions under altruism that we find it reprehensible.

    17. Re: This is about Lock In by swillden · · Score: 1

      Sorry, I have nothing to do with any of that. But, can you not still install a custom launcher and change it however you want? Your complaints are all about the lack of configurability of the default launcher... but that's hardly your only option.

      --
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    18. Re:This is about Lock In by swillden · · Score: 2

      Given your UID, I'm guessing we're probably around the same age, having grown up with early x86 machines, dos, os/2, slackware, etc.

      I suspect so. I'm 50.

      Not to go all nostalgic, but "those were the days." We were free to explore, learn, tinker, fix, and break. We could output directly to ioports and trigger interrupts as a matter of course. I learned more about what makes a computer compute as a kid with a beat up old 8086 than I have as an adult (both in University and professionally).

      Yep, but the openness of the systems isn't the only thing that has changed in the last 30-40 years. When we were tinkering, computers were rare, little-used and isolated. Now they're ubiquitous, so heavily-used they're almost a brain expansion pack and they're networked all of the time. The fact is that the vast, vast majority of computer users -- especially of mobile devices -- know absolutely nothing about how they work, and have no interest at all in learning, exploring, tinkering. They just want to read Facebook, surf porn, make phone calls, etc. They would look at the computers that you and I started on as completely and utterly useless because it took a tremendous amount of work to make them do anything.

      Another thing that has changed is the nature of the threats. 35 years ago I wrote a little terminate-stay-resident DOS program that made the characters on the screen fall into piles on the bottom. I gleefully installed this on lots of friends' and family members' computers (well, "lots" was like four; machines were rare). Later I modified it to spread itself virally, by writing itself into the boot sector of any floppy it could. I never installed that one anywhere, though. But we're long, long past the days of the casual, for-fun hacker. Today security is a serious problem. The attackers are often organized criminals, of varying but often significant sophistication. Sometimes the attackers are nation states. Military cyberwarfare groups, intelligence agencies, etc. (Aside: We'll never keep the really serious attackers out of consumer devices, but we maybe can make it hard enough that they can't scale their attacks.)

      The reason that the attackers have changed is because the way we use computers has changed. Absolutely everything is on a machine somewhere. Our mobile phones contain pretty much our whole lives: personal, financial, photographic, you name it. This puts even the average person at significant risk, mostly financial. We've seen hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of people scammed out of significant amounts of money by people who explolited vulnerabilities in their devices. And that's nothing compared to the risks to high-profile people, who have much more to steal.

      The total number of Android users has passed three billion, and it won't be long before it hits four. Shipping vulnerable software to damned near 50% of humanity would be unthinkable, especially in the high-threat world we live in.

      So... we do everything we can to make it secure. We fail, of course. We always will. But we fail less every year.

      (Aside: Working on Android security is particularly challenging, because we write our specs and our code, and then throw it all over the wall to the device makers, who are free to change almost anything. So we have to come up with ways to make stuff secure, and then we have to further find ways to design/build it so that it's hard for the device makers to screw up.)

      If I could beg Google for one thing, it would be to deny compliance certification (and Play Store access) to any manufacturer that doesn't provide bootloader unlock codes to their users at the point of sale.

      Now you're talking about something well above my pay grade. But I'll take a stab at it anyway. I think the reason Google doesn't do this is because carriers and device makers would Just Say No. It wouldn't take much for them to organize and set up an alternative app

      --
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    19. Re: This is about Lock In by swillden · · Score: 2

      Why can't I get root on any android phone just by connecting it to a pc, enabling developer mode, letting the pc with adb set or deny root, or special commands like let apps of my choosing enable or disable wifi, data, gps, etc.?

      Let me tell you a story. A true one. It's not actually an answer to your question, but it points the way.

      Last year, a major Android device maker came to me and asked how I planned to fix the developer mode vulnerability. "What developer mode vulneability?" I asked, reaching for my laptop to look up the CVE.

      They explained that in various parts of the world, especially Asia, but not only Asia, there are lots of free charging stations at bus stations, airports, coffee shops, Internet cafes, restaurants... and just about everywhere else you can think of, including public restrooms. These charging stations have a sign hanging over them with a list of instructions that people have to follow to get free charging:

      1. Go into the settings app (actual signs explain in detail how to do this on many common devices).
      2. Go into "About phone"
      3. Tap the "build number" seven times.
      4. Go into "System", tap "Developer options"
      5. Turn on "USB Debugging"
      6. Plug your phone in. When the dialog pops up asking to "Allow USB debugging", tap "OK".

      According to the device maker asking the question, If you go watch one of these locations you'll see that 95+% of people dutifully carry out all of the steps so they can charge their phone. They often don't notice the flood of malware the charging station sideloads onto their phone. This is because it doesn't do anything right away, usually not until after the next reboot plus a random delay.

      I put my laptop away and explained that we had no plans to fix the developer mode vulnerability.

      --
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    20. Re:This is about Lock In by swillden · · Score: 1

      You make some valid points, but..

      because we think people should be able to do what they want with their devices.

      You should add the caveat, - "as long as Google can mine the users data". That is the only thing Google really cares about.

      It's really not.

      First, let me make clear that I work on Android. This is completely separate from the Google Apps. From my team's perspective, Google is just another app developer (though obviously a very influential one).

      The Android system provldes no special access to Google. None whatsoever. If you want to scoff, please point me to the Google-data-mining hooks in AOSP.

      Further, Google's apps are not special to Android. They cannot get any data from any other apps that don't choose to share it with them. That said, the Google suite of apps is very comprehensive, and users do tend to use a lot of them, and nearly all of their personal data does flow through them. Mail, contacts, location services, browsing, etc.

      OTOH, it's also a very broad, deep and high-quality set of services, for which users pay nothing, in dollars. The deal is you trade the ability for Google to target ads to your eyeballs in exchange for all of that. If you think that's a bad deal, you're completely free to opt out. Buy an unlockable device, unlock it, remove all the Google apps, use a different search engine, don't use gmail, etc.

      (Yes, I recognize I'm being a little disingenuous here. Most people couldn't actually do what I describe. But it is possible, and many Google engineers put in a lot of extra work to make sure that it continues being possible.)

      In a sense, allowing vulnerabilities means that there's competition to get to the data.

      No... we do not consider attackers who exploit vulnerabilities to be in any way "competition". Facebook is competition, as are other app developers who build tools that attract a lot of user data and then advertise to users.

      It makes sense in other contexts too as to why Google is never going to allow users to encrypt the Inbox.

      You certainly can do it if you want. GMail has full IMAP4 and POP3 interfaces, and you can use them with mail clients that support S/MIME or OpenPGP. Yes, I'm also disapointed that the Google end-to-end encryption project has died. I don't know why that happened, but I suspect that it was lack of executive support, probably for exactly the reasons you postulate: it undermines the business model that pays the bills -- including for the operational costs of GMail.

      Anyway, my point is that your claim is wrong. Google does allow you to encrypt the inbox... Google just doesn't encourage it. A different sort of company would ban it.

      We don't mind you guys fixing vulnerabilities, or even employing dark patterns across your products, or even trying to trick people to use your products - Hey, its a tough world out there. Its only when you cloak your actions under altruism that we find it reprehensible.

      There actually is a huge amount of altruism at Google. it's not a cloak, it's reality. Of course, it's sometimes in tension with the need to generate profits, but less often than you might think. Generally, if you build something that hundreds of millions or billions of people want to use, there's some way to make it generate revenue -- which is good because running such massive services is expensive.

      For me, personally, making Android secure is as much about improving the world as it is about getting a paycheck. I could get paid to do a lot of things. Few of them would be as rewarding as what I do.

      --
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    21. Re: This is about Lock In by astrofurter · · Score: 1

      "Your complaints are all about the lack of configurability of the default launcher"

      No, no, no, _NO_. My complaints are all about Big Brother Google forcing users to have an experience they don't want. And the Googly "fuck you, pleb, that's why" attitude underlying that coercion.

      It's really obvious that Google holds us users/"products" in abject contempt. Once upon a time I was a big fan and advocate of Google's software, including Android. No more.

      It's time for Uncle Sam to break up Alphabet.

    22. Re:This is about Lock In by acrimonious+howard · · Score: 1

      I can't believe you haven't received 20 responses saying thank you for eloquently sharing your knowledge, experiences, and well-informed opinions. And thank you for making Android more secure, and thank you for entertaining some of these imo misguided responses.

    23. Re:This is about Lock In by 0ld_d0g · · Score: 1

      OTOH, it's also a very broad, deep and high-quality set of services, for which users pay nothing, in dollars. The deal is you trade the ability for Google to target ads to your eyeballs in exchange for all of that. If you think that's a bad deal, you're completely free to opt out. Buy an unlockable device, unlock it, remove all the Google apps, use a different search engine, don't use gmail, etc.

      Well sure. I do my best. I try to avoid Google products as much as possible. I've switched to FF. Tried switching to bing, buts its terrible for technical searches. I don't use ad blockers because I'd rather just not visit a website than block ads.

      Anyway, my point is that your claim is wrong. Google does allow you to encrypt the inbox... Google just doesn't encourage it. A different sort of company would ban it.

      Okay but then at that point "Gmail" is just a folder to store mbox data. You cannot decrypt messages using the web client AFAIK.

      (Yes, I recognize I'm being a little disingenuous here. Most people couldn't actually do what I describe. But it is possible, and many Google engineers put in a lot of extra work to make sure that it continues being possible.)

      At the same time, many other Google engineers put in a lot of extra work to make AOSP useless without Google's closed-source play services. Which is fair, in a business context. But then don't pretend "Google loves open source". Google tends to commoditize the thing that lets them collect data. Anyway, there is no point in rehashing old criticisms. Again, to re-iterate, there is no problem with closed source products or with selling a product for profit. People get turned off when a company pretends to be something its not.

      No... we do not consider attackers who exploit vulnerabilities to be in any way "competition". Facebook is competition, as are other app developers who build tools that attract a lot of user data and then advertise to users.

      They're don't pose a real threat. But by definition they are competition. Google does not want anyone else snooping except themselves. They don't want ISPs snooping on user data, they don't want routers doing deep packet inspection, etc. HTTPS everywhere == nobody except Google can mine user data. Chrome one one endpoint, google ad scripts on the other endpoint. In cases where Google's interests align with the users interest, obviously everyone supports it.

      There actually is a huge amount of altruism at Google. it's not a cloak, it's reality. Of course, it's sometimes in tension with the need to generate profits, but less often than you might think. Generally, if you build something that hundreds of millions or billions of people want to use, there's some way to make it generate revenue -- which is good because running such massive services is expensive.

      Yes, that is the business model that Google has chosen. I would have preferred it if people just paid Google a fee for all of their services.

      For me, personally, making Android secure is as much about improving the world as it is about getting a paycheck. I could get paid to do a lot of things. Few of them would be as rewarding as what I do.

      I don't want to make you feel bad about working for Google. But please understand that people don't like google for legitimate and perfectly rational reasons.

  2. Uh huh... by Desler · · Score: 4, Interesting

    With Project Treble now supported by all Android phone makers, in theory updates should roll out to us faster than before.

    This is a rather interesting edit of a sentence from the actual linked article which says:

    With Project Treble now supported by key Android flagships, in theory updates should roll out to us faster than ever before.

    msmash, you do realize that the two versions do mot mean the same thing, right?

    1. Re:Uh huh... by swillden · · Score: 1

      With Project Treble now supported by all Android phone makers, in theory updates should roll out to us faster than before.

      This is a rather interesting edit of a sentence from the actual linked article which says:

      With Project Treble now supported by key Android flagships, in theory updates should roll out to us faster than ever before.

      msmash, you do realize that the two versions do mot mean the same thing, right?

      Whatever msmash did or didn't mean, here's the reality of the situation: Treble was mandated by Google for all devices that initially launched with Oreo (8.0) or later. If you buy a device that once ran Nougat or below, it probably doesn't support Treble. If you buy a newer device model that never ran anything pre-Oreo, it does.

      --
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  3. Google updates are like ads by WCMI92 · · Score: 1

    You don't want them. Yet they still come.

    --
    Corporatism != Free Market
  4. Planned Obsolescence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Planned Obsolescence isn't going anywhere. Its what keeps device makers in business.

  5. Meanwhile... by Anubis+IV · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Look, it’s great that updates are available sooner on “key devices”, but the fact that this is being cited as something praiseworthy is rather indicative of how broken the situation remains. It took 192 days on average for Nougat to even become available on a subset of devices. 170 for Oreo. 118 for Pie. Meanwhile, iOS has always taken 0 days: it was available to all compatible devices immediately upon its release.

    And availability is just half the problem. If availability is staggered, you have a harder time encouraging people to update (or even making them aware of the update), which hampers the deployment rate. Improving the speed of deployment needs to be the end goal. Improving availability is just a necessary step towards clearing hurdles that are in the way.

    1. Re:Meanwhile... by alvinrod · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I think that you're leaving out something even more important which is that for a lot of devices, the update will never be made available nor are there even any plans to make it available that only end up getting canceled. At some point all hardware hits end of life, but for a lot of Android phones that's artificially lower than it should be.

      But on the flip side, I don't think you get to 0 without having the same kind of control that Apple exhibits, and I'm not sure that's something that would be good for Android. If you're careful with your own personal choice of which device to buy, you can get that immediately availability for yourself. It may require extra effort on your part, but that's the cost of the greater freedom that Android affords.

    2. Re: Meanwhile... by cyber-vandal · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The price you pay for "freedom" is being constantly vulnerable unless you buy a new flagship phone every year plus having Google spying on you constantly. Both options in the smartphone market are shit but I'll go with the one that's still getting updates after 5 years. There are no Android phones that have that option.

    3. Re:Meanwhile... by Anubis+IV · · Score: 1

      Yeah, because iOS is only available on apple phones.

      The fact that someone else found a solution that doesn’t work for you doesn’t make your problem go away.

      To typical end users, iOS is only available on Apple phones and Android is only available on Android phones. We know that to be an oversimplification, but the typical end user doesn’t care (or sometimes even know) about the difference between HTC, LG, or Samsung. All they know is that new features aren’t available on their Android phone, and they don’t know why. That’s the broken situation I was talking about.

      You don’t need to make your own phones to fix that problem, but that is the tack that Apple took. It’s an approach that works. Google is going a different route, and I hope they succeed, since it’s in their customer’s best interests to have updates rapidly available.

    4. Re: Meanwhile... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      My galaxy s5 is still getting updates and in two months that'll be the 5 year mark.

    5. Re: Meanwhile... by cyber-vandal · · Score: 1

      What OS is it running?

    6. Re:Meanwhile... by Solandri · · Score: 2, Interesting

      But on the flip side, I don't think you get to 0 without having the same kind of control that Apple exhibits,

      Technically, Apple's iOS release are not available on their phones in 0 days.

      • Apple's software guys are happy with all the feature changes they want to make to iOS. This is analogous to Google making a new version of Android available.
      • Apple then tests it internally on their current, upcoming, and older phones to make sure everything still works. If something doesn't work, the software guys have to tweak it further, test it on all models again, repeat. Until it's finally ready to be released to to all users. This is analogous to the Android version being rolled out to the different phones.

      So the difference is that in Apple's case, the lag between software feature freeze and end of hardware testing is internal and hidden from the public. In Android's case, the lag is public, making people antsy about a "delay" which really is nonexistent. Android rollouts are "slower than iOS" only if you use different ways of measuring how long a rollout takes for the two OSes.

      In other words, if Google did it Apple's way, they would not release the new version of Android on their AOSP servers the moment their software guys were finished with it. They would send it in secret to all their OEM vendors, then OEM vendors would work to modify it to make it compatible with all their devices. All OEMs would be embargoed from releasing the new version of Android until the last OEM finished their testing and had it ready for their phones. Then there would be a simultaneous rollout of The New Version of Android across all devices and on the AOSP servers on "day 0".

      So really, those graphs in TFA should be inverted, with the last OEM to release each Android version set at zero. And the bars for the other OEMs indicating how many days before day 0 you got the new Android version on your device, because your vendor managed to finish modifying and testing that Android version before what would've been day 0 in Apple's case.

    7. Re: Meanwhile... by Desler · · Score: 3, Informative

      BS. The last major OS version for the S5 that was officially released by Samsung was Android 6.0.1 which was released by Google 3.5 years ago. So you're either falsely conflating security updates with OS upgrades (you know, the topic of the submission) or you're using a third-party ROM when this whole topic is about first-party support.

    8. Re:Meanwhile... by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      What you said rings true of the early smartphone era where updates actually mattered. These days frankly, who gives a damn. In the past OS updates were critical. Killer features were added. Security updates came through the OS updates. It was all quite important. But these days ...

      Security updates are now decoupled from the OS updates. I've not seen a monthly security patch come through more than 2 weeks after they were released.

      I'm on Oreo. I don't know if there's plans to bring Pie to my device. I also don't care anymore. What do I miss? Timers to limit the use of my phone? Suggestions in search of how to call an Uber? Slightly different text selection? Changed screenshot tools? These are the "most interesting" of the article in the "cool new features" articles floating around the internet. And they are well and truly a big fat *yawn*.

      Now developers may be more interested. But what do they get? Notch support, WiFi RTT, Multi-camera support, a few new native codecs, and new notification system. Out of all of those most of them require hardware support, and the remainder aren't killer features that replace something archaic allowing developers to benefit by dumping obsolete code. So developers don't even get a big benefit by having users upgrade.

      So yes, the situation remains broken, but it's broken in a way that no one really cares about. I understand your idea that improving the speed should be the end goal to fix this problem, but I fundamentally don't see a driver to do so.

    9. Re:Meanwhile... by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      At some point all hardware hits end of life, but for a lot of Android phones that's artificially lower than it should be.

      What makes you link lack of OS update together with end of life? There are as far as I know no plans for my device to get Android Pie. That doesn't mean it's end of life. Only last week I got the January 2019 security patch so clearly my device is still very much in service despite not getting OS upgrade.

    10. Re:Meanwhile... by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 1

      I that’s a bit of an oversimplification. Android offers a public beta program (much like Apple) which does test pre-releases against a set of eligible Android devices with the stated purpose of identifying both software and hardware incompatibilities.

      However for those Android devices which are not beta-eligible, your statement is true.

      --
      #DeleteChrome
    11. Re:Meanwhile... by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 1

      For Android Pie, the beta-eligible list appeared to be

      Essential Phone
      Google Pixel Xl / 2XL
      Nokia 7 plus
      Oppo R15 Pro
      Sony Xperia XZ2
      Vivo X21UD
      Vivo X21
      Xiaomi Mi Mix 2S

      (From https://www.wikigain.com/insta... )

      --
      #DeleteChrome
    12. Re: Meanwhile... by cyber-vandal · · Score: 1

      You could do that if your device is supported or you have the ability and knowledge to customise a very complex piece of software. If it's not supported and you don't have the skills then you can always pay someone a lot of money to keep it up to date. Yay freedom. Alternatively the ecosystem could be designed to allow updating in spite of manufacturer / carrier incompetence / greed. Imagine having to be, or have access to, a kernel dev if you wanted the latest version of Debian on your PC.

    13. Re:Meanwhile... by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      This is a very common misunderstanding about Android versions.

      The major named versions are feature updates. Just because you don't get them, doesn't mean you are not getting security updates, or app updates including the core Android stuff like the browser and Play Store.

      Feature updates are a mixed blessing. One the one hand, you might get new features... On the other hand, you phone works differently to the way it was when you bought it, and a lot of people hate that. it might also get slower or have less free space available for your use.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    14. Re:Meanwhile... by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      The issue with the way Apple does it is that you are forced to stay on the latest version if you want all the security updates. On Android they have separated out most of the core OS services and they get patched separately for security issues.

      If you don't want the latest version of iOS, perhaps because it makes your device very slow, you have to accept no security patches too.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  6. Samsung is bad... by Ecuador · · Score: 2

    The Galaxy S3 was my last Samsung "flagship". Not only was it stupidly expensive for what it was, but the updates were slow to come and they seemed to leave the phone worse-off. I'm now settled with the Xiaomi Mi Mix line (switched from the cheaper but almost as good Mi line partly because of supporting T-Mobile LTE when I travel to the US), cheaper, better in most respects and updates don't leave the phone worse off. And according to TFA the updates come quicker too, although if that was my main concern I'd probably be looking at Android One phones or something like that...

    --
    Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. Polar Scope Align for iOS
    1. Re:Samsung is bad... by fbobraga · · Score: 1

      My only (and unique) "flagship" was (and still is) a S5, buyed refurbished after 2 years of the launch, mainly by the removable battery and http://lineageos.org/ :P

    2. Re:Samsung is bad... by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      The Galaxy S3 was my last Samsung "flagship". Not only was it stupidly expensive for what it was, but the updates were slow to come and they seemed to leave the phone worse-off.

      A LOT has changed across all vendors in the Android landscape. Judging any by their past (including both good and bad points) really doesn't help you make the right choice. Vendors have very much met each other with mediocrity. Samsung appear to be rolling out security updates as fast as Google, and Google appear to ever more be obsoleting their hardware (reads: not releasing OS upgrades) as much as other OEMs.

      And updates really haven't left phones worse off since around Lollipop/Marshmallow when Google actually started caring.

  7. Tablets? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Does this cover Android-based tablets?

    Even if it does...what I'm getting from this is that even my most recent Android device--running 6.0 (Marshmallow) is eventually going to go to its grave with the exact same OS it was born with. The apps get updated all the time (to the point of being more annoying than Windows is with its updates), but the OS is the same one it was shipped with, still susceptible to countless vulnerabilities that have been discovered and long fixed elsewhere.

    I guess I should forget about my older 4.x devices also.

    In hindsight - I have 5 Android-based tablets I can't trust to do any serious transaction on, because they're all running different versions of an OS that are all known to have huge security holes.

    How fucking dumb should I have to be to believe any newer device I spend even more money on is going to come with an OS that *will* get patched, "for real this time"?

    1. Re:Tablets? by reboot246 · · Score: 1

      My Lenovo tablet will be three years old in March. It still has the same version of Android that it came with. I've never done any serious transactions on it because I use it simply for media consumption.

      I wonder if Amazon updates their version of Android on their tablets.

  8. Treble is great for the bottom line by PhrostyMcByte · · Score: 1

    What users see: "Treble lets them get me updates 2x faster" What LG's management sees: "Treble lets me fire half my update staff and still meet existing goals"

    1. Re:Treble is great for the bottom line by hirschma · · Score: 1

      Most bizarre about LG is that they update their hardware faster than their software. The V series has had three releases in 18 months. OS upgrades? None for at least the last two.

  9. Where is My Update?? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Where is my update for my Samsung Galaxy Player?
    It's still using Gingerbread.

  10. Re:Android Sucks by Stormwatch · · Score: 1

    To hell with Windows Phone, it is the reason why we lost MeeGo.

    --
    Circumcision is child abuse.
  11. Re:Um... by LynnwoodRooster · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Two billion Android devices and 3.5 billion searches a day. You're right - no one uses Google services. No one. Sad.

    --
    Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
  12. Samsung WTF! by denisbergeron · · Score: 1

    I have a Samsung Note 8, the security patch is from October 1, 2018 and I got an old 8.0.0 Android... I just check and Samsung said that my phone is up to date with the last software! Yeah! Right !

    --
    Ceci n'est pas une Signature !
  13. Re:Android update? by hawguy · · Score: 1

    I've never seen this offered on any phone I've ever owned, ever.

    First, look at the back of your phone, if there's a half-eaten apple logo on it, this article doesn't apply to you.

    Second, if you do have an android phone and if updates are important to you (and they should be), look for a phone that's part of the Android One program:

    https://www.android.com/one/

    "Android One phones will receive at least two years of OS upgrades. With the latest version of Android, you'll get software that auto-adjusts to your needs, and helps you get things done more easily throughout the day. "

    Or, if you can afford it, just buy a Google made phone then you'll be sure to get updates quickly, my Pixel gets an update every month.

  14. Cherry picked results? More like a year for me by nerdonamotorcycle · · Score: 1

    Interesting how the Moto Z got Oreo after 129 days. I have a Moto G5 Plus and Motorola was vapor-waring Oreo for over a year. Oreo was released August 2017 and my phone didn't get Oreo until November 2018, after at least a year of "It's coming in two months, we promise!"

  15. Project Treble by coldmist · · Score: 1
    Read this article on Project Treble: ArsTechnica

    A quote:

    Iliyan Malchev: With Treble, the operating system has separated to the adaptation layers that tailor down to the hardware. And that's still the case, but the devil is in the details. There's a ton of nuance that we still need to get right, and this is what we've focused on with this [Android P] release. What is the case today—and I think that gets overlooked by a lot of the press on Treble—is that any device that is preloaded with Google's apps, any device that launches with Oreo or subsequent releases, must work smoothly with a binary image of Android that we built for certification purposes.

    This image isn't a product. The intent is not to launch this, but the idea is, by requiring that this "golden image" run on everything out there, we create a centripetal force that pushes our partners ever so gently toward not changing Android in ways that aren't really meaningful to their bottom lines. We finished that technical work with Android P this year, and we started working with silicon manufacturers.

    Hopefully this will help reduce the re-done overhead across the phone manufacturers, hopefully reducing updates down the road. By 50%? I hope.

    --
    Don't steal. The government hates competition.
  16. Re: Um... by nazsco · · Score: 1

    if all the air around you reeked of feces, you would still have to breath.

    monopolies make a ton of money for a reason.

  17. Re: Um... by LynnwoodRooster · · Score: 2

    Are there alternatives to Android and Google tools? Yes? Then perhaps billions of people use them because they generally work well.

    --
    Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
  18. Re:Android update? by arglebargle_xiv · · Score: 2

    Same here. Android phones get updates? The only way I've seen to update an Android phone is to throw it away and buy a new one.

    There's also a marked difference between "is an update available" and "is it possible to update it". Some phones, and I'm thinking specifically of Samsung's J series, are so desperately crippled that if you install anything more than a weather app on them there's no room to perform updates. So even if you could, in theory, update them, you can't actually do so in practice.

  19. Re: Um... by astrofurter · · Score: 1

    Two smartphone OSes, Android and iOS, account for 99.999% of the smartphone market. Both OSes are the product of Surveillance Valley, thus both of them snoop you 50 different ways. Android may perhaps be a little more hostile to privacy, but it's a close call. I suspect most of the 'superior privacy' Apple sells is just empty marketing and lies.

    Otoh, in the past I found Android to have a superior UI and therefore to win on usefulness. However over the past couple years the quality of Google's consumer baitware has nosedived, Android included.

    My phone was recently updated to Android Pie. What a steaming bucket of shit! That version of Android is like a big ol' "fuck you" from Google to its users. As much as I dislike Apple's software and loathe Apple's marketing image - my next phone might be an iPhone. Ugh, gross, the thought is revolting.

    How long can Google remain a major player if their baitware gets noticeably worse with every release? At this point they are already dependent on their monopoly power to stay relevant. Soon they may be forced to fall back on their horde of intellectual pooperty to sue competitors out of business.

  20. There are choices by p51d007 · · Score: 1

    If you want super duper fast updates, you go with the pixel phones, or iPhones. A few Android vendors are "fast" with getting the updates out, but, you have to look at it from the sales & marketing side. It's not in the "best interest" of the manufacturers or carriers to spend the time to test, fix & send out updates, when people "generally" don't keep their phones for more than 2 years. With the prices of phones being in the stratosphere, maybe people will start keeping them longer. Just look after the latest iPhone announcement this past fall, how the number of people that took advantage of the cheap battery replacement went up.

  21. Re: Um... by LynnwoodRooster · · Score: 1

    The nice thing about Android is you can download and try lots of different launchers to make the UI as you want it. Google offers their own take on a UI, but they also enable it so you can make the UI as YOU want it.

    --
    Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
  22. Re: Android Sucks by astrofurter · · Score: 1

    Yay monopoly power!

  23. Nokia by blackpig · · Score: 1

    My Nokia 8 gets updates at about the same time as Pixels do (Within a week)

    1. Re:Nokia by Stephen+Chadfield · · Score: 1

      It took Nokia a long time to release Pie for the Nokia 8 Sirroco. Even when it was released nothing appeared OTA in my region and I had to download the update from a third party site.

      And this is an Android One branded device.

  24. Android names by Superdarion · · Score: 1

    Wouldn't it be much more intuitive to name the different versions of Android by number instead of sweet-du-jour in the summary? How many people not in the business know by heart the order in which these randomly-assigned names came out?

    I understand that the writing makes it obvious in which order they were rolled out, but were they all major versions? Subversions? Are subversions even named?

    (Mind you, the full article does have version numbers next to the names)

    1. Re:Android names by Superdarion · · Score: 1

      And just as I clicked on submit and went back to the full article, it dawned on me that the names are in alphabetical order, so ignore me; I'm just a bit more ignorant than I thought.

  25. It removes the focus from Google by sad_ · · Score: 1

    What all these efforts in making it easier to upgrade phones to the latest version are about it shifting the focus from Google to the manufactures.
    Google has it made so easy to upgrade your phone to the latest version that it now is absolutely clear for consumers to find out who the good players are and which the bad ones are. There are no excuses anymore.

    --
    On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
  26. People Don't Want Customisaztions - Just Updates by BrendaEM · · Score: 1

    I am not a big Android fan or even a fan of the cell-phone market, but I am a Android phone owner. As an owner of a phone, I hate when the company that is supposed to stand behind it--doesn't. We don't need to have so many stupid me-too modifications that they can't be updated. Having only one world, we can't afford to think of cellphones as being disposable.

    --
    https://www.youtube.com/c/BrendaEM
  27. Leading a horse to water by ilsaloving · · Score: 1

    This perfectly fits the saying, "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink."

    Project Treble was a long time coming, and could be argued that Google should have baked this into Android since v1.

    That being said, it's here now and one would think that it should make a huge difference, but all this is really doing is putting a spotlight onto how little manufacturers care about support after their product has been purchased.

    What frustrates me the most is that Google has so much sway over the ecosystem via their certification processes, etc. Why has Google not put a stipulation in their certification process that says, "To be able to access Google services, you commit to updating your devices for x time."

    Why do they not do this?

  28. Re: Android Sucks by astrofurter · · Score: 1

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wik...

  29. Re:Android Sucks by Stormwatch · · Score: 1

    The market was not so solidified back then. MeeGo had a shot at taking a nice chunk of the market. But WP did not, for a number of reasons:

    > Carriers who wasted time and money preparing for MeeGo were pissed.
    > There was no upgrade path for app developers from anything to WP.
    > Microsoft's acquisition of Skype made carriers see them as a major enemy.
    > Even before the first Lumias came out, it was known they would not be upgradable.
    > Early versions of WP were very buggy and lacking in features.
    > Nokia's crap management ruined their once-great relationship with retailers.

    --
    Circumcision is child abuse.