Posts Tagged ‘Android Market’
5 Issues Google Nonetheless Must Repair In Android
Any day now, the Evo 4G is going to get an over-the-air update to Android 2.2 (aka Froyo), complete with marquee features such as the ability to play Flash video and share contact details over Bluetooth. But after spending every day with a Motorola Droid, now running Android 2.1, we can think of plenty of smaller things we wish Google would work on instead.
High on our list, for instance: Make spellcheck work consistently across the platform and sync with business-grade Google Apps calendars. If Flash support wont even allow you to watch Hulu videos on your phone (Hulu cruelly blocks mobile access), what else can Google do to make Android a more polished, user-friendly platform?
Push for More Consistency
Its the small things that add up. For us, one of the most annoying things is the fact that if you make a spelling mistake while searching for an app in Android Market, Android doesnt correct you.
For Andy Castonguay, Director of Mobile Device Research for the Yankee Group, its the fact that on certain devices, the accelerometer only works if you tilt the phone to the left. What makes it worse, he says, is that the Android experience is even inconsistent across manufacturers, as each phone maker layers their own interface on top (think HTC Sense and Motorolas Motoblur) as a way of making their Android phones stand out. And these extra layers, of course, make it especially hard to update a phone to the latest version of Android, creating an even larger disparity between what Android phones can and cant do.
The great thing for the manufacturers is they can create that brand affinity with the consumer on the back of Android, instead of having Android be front and center, Castonguay said. That results in idiosyncracies and discrepancies.
Google cant wean itself off these skins entirely, lest it alienate the very OEMs that have made Android so ubiquitous. But Google can, and will have to, work harder to develop more and better widgets, so that its not up to the likes of HTC and Motorola to decide what information you can see at glance, and what you cant.
HTC and Motorola have adapted to reflect consumer needs in a very positive way. Android as a platform will need to adopt some of those characteristics, said Castonguay.
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How To Be An Android Power Consumer!
Everything you need to know to master Google’s smartphone OS
From its auspicious start as the brainchild of Internet giant Google, Android has matured into a well-rounded, extremely capable smartphone operating system. Advocating open source, Google released Android to the masses, opening the doors to application developers. There were a few growing pains, of course, such as weak Bluetooth support and a lack of multitouch support, but today Android is knocking on the door of the iPhone mansion, and it’s knocking hard.
Android hardware offers some of the most powerful smartphones we’ve ever seen. The Android Market app store is growing strong, and the Android user base is growing just as fast. Android phones are flying off the shelves faster than they can be created, so we think it’s about time we put together a guide for the Android power user. On the following pages, well walk you through what you need to know about Googles mobile OS and how to make the most out of it.
General Usage Guide
Using Androids basic touch-screen interface is relatively straightforward. You’ll find that many applications and functions utilize the “long press,” where you hold your finger to the screen rather than just tap it. Think of a long press as a right-click on a mouse; it will bring up additional functionality for the object you press. All of this will be familiar to anyone coming from any other touch-enabled smartphone.
When coming from an iPhone, though, the transition can be somewhat awkward because the Android platform brings several additional buttons over the iPhone’s single button interface. Get comfortable with Androids Menu button, as its essential. You’ll find that many settings, functions, and options can only be accessed via the Menu button. Holding the various hard keys can also bring up additional functions; for instance, holding the Home button will open a list of recently used apps.
For the Android devices with a hardware keyboard, you also have the option of using keyboard shortcuts, which are done through combinations of keys. You can also create custom shortcuts under the Quick Launch option in the Applications section of your phone’s settings.
Default Keyboard Shortcuts
Quick Launch
Search + B = Browser
Search + C = Contacts
Serach + E (or) G = Email (or) Gmail
Search + M = Maps
Search + S = Messaging
Inside the Browser
Menu + B = Bookmarks
Menu + W = New Window
Menu + R = Refresh or Stop page load
Menu + F = Find on Page
Menu + J (or) K = Navigate Backword (or) Forward
Inside Maps
Menu + D = Directions
Menu + M + Change Map Mode
Menu + O = My Location
Optimize Your Android Experience
One of the key features Android offers is the ability to customize nearly every aspect of your device. You can download widgets to keep information available right on your home screen, install custom skins and keyboards, and create notifications and ringtones.
Stay Up to Date Using Widgets
Widgets are like small applications that run on your home screen and keep information right at your fingertips. A simple long press on an empty space on your home screen will bring up the option to add widgets. Because many apps in the Android Market have widgets, there are widgets for just about everything including texting, Twitter, and email; weather, stocks, and news information; and music controls. Because Android lets you configure several home screens, you can group messaging widgets on one screen, news and weather on another, your music library and Pandora on the next, and so on, keeping all of your important information just a finger swipe away. Widgets on your home screen are kept active and update regularly, so you have to be careful not to add too many, especially on older and lower-end devices. If swiping between home screens begins to appear sluggish, you may want to consider removing a few widgets.
Stay Organized with Shortcuts
Just as with widgets, Android lets you add shortcuts directly to your home screen. Adding a shortcut is done the exact same way as adding a widget; just long press on an empty space and you’ll see the option to create a shortcut. If there’s anything you find yourself doing often with your phone, creating a shortcut can make it even easier. Shortcuts can be created for launching a bookmarked website, calling a specific contact, accessing settings, playing a music playlist, opening a specific inbox, and, of course, applications. If you find your home screen becoming cluttered with shortcuts, you can create home screen folders that let you group similar shortcuts together. For instance, you can put all of your email inboxes into one folder, your work contacts into another, and your personal contacts into yet another. One common practice is to create application shortcuts on your main home screen for your top four to eight apps, generally messaging, email, browser, and maps. Then, one screen over, put the runners up, like the Market, contacts, calculator, etc. It doesn’t particularly matter where you put your shortcuts or how you group them as long as it’s intuitive to you, and you can find them quickly.
Find Your Perfect Software Keyboard
One of Android’s most criticized features is its default software keyboard, but thanks to Android’s unrestrictive nature, there are several great alternatives available both on and off the Android Market. We recommend Better Keyboard (available on the Android Market for $2.99), the HTC IME modified keyboard, and Swype.
All of these keyboards offer significant improvements over the stock Android keyboard. Better Keyboard has a multitude of skins as well as many customizable settings. HTC IME modified keyboard is a well-made imitation of the keyboard found in HTCs popular SenseUI custom Android skin. Swype offers a unique and original text input interface that greatly improves texting speed. Installing a custom keyboard is not entirely straightforward, though. You will need to both enable the keyboard in the Keyboard and Language section of your phone’s settings, as well as long press on a text box and select the new input method.
Use Identifiable Ringtones and Notifications
Like all modern mobile phones, the Android platform lets you select and create your own ringtones. Creating ringtones and notifications can be done manually or with the help of an app from the Android Market. Manually adding a ringtone to your phone involves creating several specific directories on your SD card, based on the type of ringtone you’d like to add. The other method is far easier. Simply download the Ringdroid app free from the Android Market and use it to edit and trim your audio files before saving them as a ringtone, notification, or alarm. You can customize notifications and ringtones on a per contact basis by opening the desired contact’s information and selecting Set Ringtone. You can change email notifications within the Gmail app (though you might want to select Silent if you receive a lot of emails).You can also set a different song to wake you for each day of the week by creating an alarm ringtone of your favorite songs, and creating an alarm for each day of the week, then selecting the desired song.
Create a Unique Look
The keyboard and ringtones aren’t the only things Android lets you customize. You can also select your own background wallpaper, which for many Android 2.1 devices, includes Live Wallpapers that actually move and react to your interactions. Wallpapers are just the tip of the iceberg, though. Apps like aHome, found on the Android Market for $4.99, let you apply skins to just about every aspect of your interface. With aHome, you can download skins, themes, fonts, and widgets to make your Android phone look as unique as possible. Some themes not only change colors and add flare, but also make significant changes to the interface itself, allowing you to customize the way you interact with your phone to exactly how you want it.
Android’S Ascent In China Won’T Elevate Google
Google’s Linux-based Android mobile platform is rapidly gaining traction around the world. Recent reports suggest that it is on a trajectory to become the dominant mobile operating system in China, a region with a large population of mobile Internet users and enormous growth potential.
Although this may seem like an unambiguous victory for Google on the surface, the implications are actually not that clear. It’s important to understand that the Chinese mobile ecosystem is producing its own variant of Android, called OPhone. It’s a fork of the platform that largely cuts out Google as the middleman. The fork offers Chinese handset makers and mobile carriers considerable autonomy, because it allows them to circumvent the licensing policies and technical mechanisms that Google has traditionally used to exercise control over the platform.
Like most Linux-based mobile platforms, Android is not entirely open source. The core operating system consists of the GPL-licensed Linux kernel and an Apache-licensed middleware and userspace stack. Several key components at the higher levels of the platformparticularly the Android market and several other pieces of Google-branded softwareare proprietary. Device makers that want to use include those components on their products have to commercially license the software from Google.
In our recent in-depth coverage of the Android fragmentation issue, we explained that Google uses its ownership of the Android Market as leverage to ensure interoperability between Android devices and to encourage a certain degree of consistency. In addition to paying licensing fees, Android Market licensees must also demonstrate that their products meet the strict requirements of Google’s compatibility specification.
As the sole arbiter of Android’s dominant application delivery channel, Google has enormous control over the platform and how it is used. This is an extremely effective tool for preventing platform-level fragmentation and discouraging vendors from building forks that deviate from upstream Android in ways that might diminish application compatibility across devices.
From the perspective of some carriers and handset makers, the downside is that it precludes certain kinds of deep customization and makes them beholden to Google and Google’s stewardship of the third-party application ecosystem. It’s possible, however, for handset makers and mobile carriers to replace the parts that are controlled exclusively by Google and integrate their own alternativesthus allowing them to adopt Android without having to make any concessions to the American search giant.
That is exactly what the Chinese mobile industry is doing with OPhone. They are creating a completely distinct third-party Android software ecosystem that is independent from Google and they are building a heavily-customized userspace stack that integrates with completely different Web services and allows them to deliver the kind of user experience that they want.
In effect, they are using Androidbut not Google’s Android. They don’t need Google’s Android Market and they aren’t necessarily integrating with Google’s search or other services. When you think about it in those terms, it makes Android’s ascent towards dominance in Asia seem like a hollow victory for Google.
The success of OPhone and the potential opportunity to compete head on with Google in the mobile space by building an Android fork is starting to gain the attention of some of Google’s rivals in the region. Recent reports suggest that Chinese search giant Baidu and its software partners Tencent and TekMobile are planning to build their own Android-like operating system. It’s unclear if they will use Android as a base, but it seems likely.
Although the growing dominance of Android forks in China isn’t inherently beneficial to Google, there is a silver lining for the company. It validates Google’s message that Android is an open platform and it could encourage broader participation around Google’s code base. Maintaining a fork of a large code base is an enormous pain because it becomes difficult to incorporate upstream improvements as the fork diverges.
It’s possible that the companies behind OPhone and other forks will actually contribute some of their improvements to Google’s own code base (and the upstream Linux kernel itself) as a result of their efforts to augment the platform. Google’s decision to use the permissive Apache license means that it’s not mandatory for OPhone’s developers to disclose their userspace improvements, but they have an incentive to get code upstream so that they will have a smaller delta to worry about maintaining.
As China’s population of mobile Internet users grows, we could see Android take center stage and play a prominent role in shaping the country’s mobile technology landscape. Although Android may be destined for ubiquity in China, it’s clear that it won’t be Google calling the shots.