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Android fragmentation is apparently the bane of Google-sided developers everywhere. So many devices, so many OS variants, and nothing seems to run smoothly on everything. Google agrees, but it blames developers just as much as manufacturers.
It’s made causing the act of fragmentation illegal, by adding a new fragmentation clause to its terms and conditions. As The Register points out, it’s not really aimed at your Gamelofts or Facebooks, but at developers who take Android and spin it into something else — here’s looking at you, China.
Will this help prevent fragmentation of Android? Probably not. But it’ll stop companies taking the core of Android and spinning it into something entirely, fragmentarily different. Now, if we could just get every Android device updated to 4.2, that’d solve the whole problem. Simples, right? [Google via The Register]
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Google should had taken this step way before. Hopefully with Nexus 4 everything will change, forever!
I think it’s quite simple. If you take the core of Android from AOSP and modify it so that either Android apps cant run on it or Apps on it cant run on android, then you shouldn’t be able to call it Android. Samsung/HTC/LG stay within the limits as does Amazon, I suspect this is mostly as a result of that dodgy “android compatible” OS Dell were partnering with (or not) a while back.
There are far too many “Android” devices that doesn’t have access to Google’s Play store. Google software update depending on handset and network is another royal pain. I really think that Google can make things much better and I hope it does.
I agree there needs to be a better definition of “Google Android” – Android that contains the Google Apps and App Store, “Android” – anything built off of AOSP source and “Android Compatable” for anything that can run Android apps but is forked. A simple labelling system would use the Green Bugdroid for the first and Amber and Red for the others.
To build an Android device, you have to run it through a series of tests that ensure it’s compatible with the Android API’s. If you fail any of these tests, you cannot be certified by Google (that is, no Google apps including the Play Store).
Now, all major Android manufacturers are part of what’s called the “Open handset Alliance” and when part of this, you get some say in the direction of Android. However, to stay part of this you’re not allowed to release devices that aren’t Android compatible – this is what nearly happened with Acer a few months ago. It wasn’t Google stifling competition, but enforcing the OHA doctrine.
Now it gets a bit more confusing with someone like Amazon, who are NOT part of the OHA and can fork Android in whatever way they like. This move, it seems, was designed to stop those developers using the Android SDK for non Android compatible devices. I think (could be wrong), this would mean that if Amazon diverges too far from Android, they’ll have to build their own SDK and not be able to use Google’s.
I hope you copied and pasted that or it was for someone else’s benefit. I am fully aware of the OHA, the rules and how acer fell foul of them (I admit I put dell, slight confusion on my part). I doubt Amazon will stray too far from AOSP Android, since they would lose a lot of apps if they were no longer compatible.
It wasn’t directed towards anyone in particular, just this “thread” of discussion. I think my point about who this SDK change is aimed towards is valid, though.
Slightly unrelated, but any advice for someone who’s just upgraded to ICS but is finding their phone is lagging a bit? (Xperia U and it’s Sony’s official release).
Since it’s an official release I’ll assume your phone isn’t rooted. That’s going to make the next bit painful. The only way I can think of is to do a factory reset. This means you are going to have to reload all your apps and you will lose any data that isn’t on a removable sd card (remove this during the reset just to be on the safe side. Even then I cannot guarantee this will work, your best bet is to look in a forum over at XDA or Android central that is specific to your device as the people there will know the foibles of your phone, may have had the problem and may have a thread posted with a solution.
Yeah I tried a factory reset but that didn’t help :/ Cheers I’ll check those forums out then
Unrelated, but any advice for someone who just upgraded their Xperia U to ICS (finally…) but is finding their phone is being quite slow?
Ooops…
Outside Android fragmentation (i.e. taking a copy of Android OS and calling it something else while making breaking compatibility with existing Android Apps) doesn’t feel like it’s an issue. Android has so much momentum that any company would be crazy to throw away all those apps already available.
Inner Android fragmentation (i.e. percentage split of users on different Android OS version) is just crazy. It’s my biggest issue with Android. Phone manufacturers and carriers are mainly to blame as they are the ones who decide what phones will be updated and which ones will be stuck on aging OS versions. I think Google is partly responsible because it has allowed this to happen. I’m not sure how they could stop it from happening without locking down Android which goes against their whole “open” mantra.
I think the Nexus 4 is a great step forward. It’s a great phone with a great price so market penetration should be high. The more people that have Nexus devices, the more people who will be updating to the latest OS as and when it is available. As manufacturers start to realise that handset support is important, it’ll encourage them also to stop messaging about with the UI and release updates for their phones in a more timely manner. If they don’t then people will jump ship to the Nexus devices where it will be timely.
All of this will help improve the fragmentation issue in the long run. However, I can’t see any quick wins on this front. The fact that over 50% of users are on Gingerbread which is a 2 year old version is simply disgraceful.
Nexus 4 will be a step to right direction on a big margin and with the affordable pricetag I could see those 50% Gingers moving on to ICS finally, hell of a migration right? lol
What does it matter that so many people are still on Gingerbread? Seriously, the “fragmentation” issue regarding Android OS’s is a non-issue at best. Apps written for Gingerbread will work just fine on Honeycomb, ICS and JB – so where’s the problem?
Because it’s outdated? I would prefer Windows 7 to Windows 98 surely?
Ok, it’s outdated – but so is the device that’s running it. If you’re on a gingerbread device, that device must also be a year or so old, possibly even 2 years (or more). And once again, why does it matter if your apps still work just fine?
Software makes all the difference, Jellybeans have tons of features that you can’t do with Gingerbread. That’s why people put custom roms on like cyanogenmod etc. I agree that many people will only happy with the apps from play store but it’s the latest features and polished (eye candy of ICS) that becomes a bit of disappointment.
Remember that not everyone cares about having the latest version. At the bottom end android is replacing feature phones for non technical people. So long as they are can get email, Facebook and Twitter and play Angry Birds, such people are happy.
Glad to know Google is finally taking steps in the right direction when it comes to fragmentation of it’s platform
Stopping chinese companies from makinf “Android Spinoffs” doesn’t tackle the core of the problem in my humble opinion. The real problem is with the big players like Samsung, for example.
They take the beautiful android 4.0 and make it look just like their previous skin of Android 2.3. All the beautiful black backgrounds and blue lines go away and we end up with some crappy half backed skin…
I don’t think Chinese spinoffs or Samsung is the target of this change, it is Amazon as it states:
“You agree that you will not take any actions that may cause or result in the fragmentation of Android, including but not limited to distributing, participating in the creation of, or promoting in any way a software development kit derived from the SDK.”
In terms of fragmentation we often think about screen size and other hardware – but Google is addressing real fragmentation of taking Android away from the core and splitting it at a base service level – Amazon is the only big company I know of that has their own SDK called ‘Amazon Mobile App SDK’. So they are saying to Amazon that they can make Android tablets in future, and they can still add Amazon services to that but can’t negate Google services in the process of that, which I think is fair enough.
Very true. Consistency would help Android, but I guess the reason most manufacturers actually signed up for Android is the App offering as this attracts users.
Surely Android can’t be Fragmented…. REALLY!