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Conflicts of interest with Android supporters helped kill Google's Nexus One project, but that is not stopping the search giant embarking on another bid to keep Apple-style control of the Android platform. Google is reported to be planning a unified user interface that will be imposed across Android products, ending the fragmentation that dogs the system, but also restricting partners' development of their own user experiences.
Full story HERE
if the UI makeover is any good then I wont mind but I do hope they dont make it harder on HTC to make sense for gingerbread as I quite like Sense UI.
I'm not that fussed on sense to be honest. I could take it or leave it.
I just hope that Google don't start to push people away by trying to monopolise everything. I can't imagine that HTC would be happy if they were having their lives made difficult by Google.
HTC have made an excellent phone in the desire, and if things like this make them think again about a new release using Android then it can only be bad for all of us.
True.
Android is open source so Google cant ban anyone from making thier own UIs so in that sense should be fine. if they do start to monopolise then yeah I will get worried as thats going the apple way.
This depends on the implementation if we (at least I) should take it as good or bad.
Good: google unifies the UI but also allows others (developers) to make their own UI and doesn't make hard the implementation of personal UI. In the end, after Froyo, google needs a nice and unified UI. Froyo brings many things which are needed, now the only thing lacking is nice and unified UI.
Bad: google unifies the UI and doesn't allow nobody to make their own UI. Then they will become like apple and I will personally refuse to purchase anything that has to do with them. To speak the truth, I chose the Android (Desire) device only because of Android openness. If someone takes that away from me, I will take my 500 euro from them. Simple as that. That is the least I can do.
I know this sounds terrible but to be honest I have no problems with Google semi 'monopolising' Android. Unity is so important for a mobile OS IMO. Look how far Apple has got with theirs.
Unlike Apple however, I trust Google not to go too far with it all...
If the UI is good, I dont mind.
I hate everytime Google released a new version of Android and I have to WAIT to get it.
Kill that fragmentation ... please ... please Google?
Whether we like it or not, it seems this is the direction that all OS's (i.e. Microsoft WP7) seem to be going in although Google has under gone more radical changes with it's new versions due to being so new and having developed so fast. Despite what that article above said Microsoft with WP7 are stopping (having stopped development of WM 6.5) OEM's from adding custom UI's so that they can roll out OS updates without OEM's getting in the way or delaying them. This means they can have uniformed releases of OS updates across the whole platform and them not be device dependant.
It's not a bad idea as long as they do not completely lock it down and still allow 3rd party enhancements to be added to the core OS with custom launchers and widgets IMO, as we don't all want or need to have our devices all looking exactly the same. But if it means new OS updates reach users faster as long as the hardware is capable that has to be good for both us the users and Android or any of these OS's.
Also remember Google has said after Gingerbread their will be a slow down of core changes to the OS as it just won't be so necessary as it starts to mature and should only require minor tweaks or fixes from then on. That's not saying development will cease just that it won't need to be so rapid and if by then there are a minimum spec being used with less custom UI's any new features should be easier and faster to apply to all the devices.
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Sent via the XDA Tapatalk App
i think that what should be done is a unified UI by google which many users like but it will be awsome if their way of customizing is on top of the main core files and can be customized bu 3rd parties too. so there will be faster updates and the possibility of customizing it. something like a folder with the customizations that will be used instead of the system defaults......
Yes....What should I say????......
If(google==apple)
cout<<"**** THEM BOTH";
else
cout<<"Long live google!!";
That has to do it!(c++ style comment)
FroydVillain 1.3/2.x roadmap
EDIT: Due to unforeseen issues rapidly accelerating the release of 1.3 (more framework changes), I'll edit this roadmap to reflect 1.4 as well as what we hope to accomplish depending on how many of the 1.3 promised features make it into the accelerated release. Thanks for your patience.
Now that FroydVillain 1.2.x is somewhat stable we can concentrate on the next releases.
First, any and all "WHENNNNNNNNNNN???????!!!!!111oneeleven" posts will be ignored. As usual, "when" = "when it's done".
Features/items in this roadmap are things you can definitely look forward to unless otherwise stated, ie, something happens that renders that feature impossible. Like an asteroid hitting my house, for example.
First, the preliminary work.
I promised the guys over at Cyanogenmod that my new build profile for the Hero (and other MSM7xxA based phones, so the Dream, Slide, G1, etc etc) will be tidied up and offered up in a pull request. I will be cleaning up my tree and submitting my changes before I begin work on the next release of FroydVillain. The main reason for this being, the closer the CM tree is to my tree, the less work involved in keeping the FroydVillain tree up to date with upstream fixes.
Right, so the changes.
Version 1.3.x:
Obviously it is customary to break some **** with each major revision just to give me an excuse to release another release after that broken release.
So for 1.3.0 I nominate, umm...nah I'll let you find out. A release post isn't complete without at least 20 posts asking if anyone is having xxxxx problem and a further 20 posts complaining about the said problem after I post that we're aware and we're very sorry and those responsible shall be flogged.
FroydVillain 1.3.x:
Further changes to the build base and source code to move Froyo-on-Hero further away from reliance upon Eclair libraries. We aim to be building a native libcamera.so in the same vein as the D/S guys are. This combined with already eliminating proprietary liblights makes it easier to...
Switch over to the Froyo prelink map. If you don't know what prelinking is, don't ask. Either don't worry about it or do some Googling. The upshot for you the end user should be better stability and maybe even some added performance improvements.
Along with the addition of the CPU profile to the CM base I'm hoping to get VFP support fixed in the kernel and in the dalvik source. VFP is your phone's ability to offload number crunching to a dedicated number crunch piece of hardware. The cpu the Hero has supports it, however support for VFP on ArmV6 architecture is a bit...well, pants. Accomplishing this should also give another measurable boost in dalvik performance since currently the only enhancement to dalvik, is the optimised binary, the source itself still trudges along with only armv5te support which again rather pants.
Giant /data partition. Thanks Maxisma and co. I'm not going to bring this in until we next need to do a wipe, ie, 1.3 since it resizes the mtd partitions. Coupled with old school apps2sd there should never be a single whine about space on /data ever again. Even dkelley could fit all of his dalvik cache data on it with his encyclopaedic collection of apps. Be aware this will be accompanied by an updated recovery.img so the different layout is supported. You have been warned.
Debugged Exchange support. I can't promise that this will appear in a 1.2.x update but I will get it in for 1.3. I don't use Exchange and so have to rely on others to help find the cause of the issue, debug it and test it. I can't believe after nearly 10 years dodging it, I'm back troubleshooting Exchange bollocks again.
Theme revival. Because Google were kind enough to provide no theming engine what so f**king ever (cheers lads) theming is a pain in the behind that involves hacking the framework. However because we now build from source rather than trying to crowbar bits in and out of a prebuilt HTC tree, it's significantly easier to produce themes from the newly built source tree. I'm working with Alex24 on a project to go with 1.3.x which will put Themes back into the OTA app and they'll be available at the same time as the new releases are. This also allows us to easily add more themes over time.
CMSettings/CMParts. After having a chat with the folks at Cyanogenmod they're more than happy for me to make the menu entry in settings feel more at home within FroydVillain instead of looking like a kicking and screaming rip off from the Cyanogenmod ROM itself. So those of you that have been hopping up and down for CMSettings functionality, it's coming.
Better GPS functionality/better radio functionality overall. For various reasons, changes made by Google, the fact we'll never have official "Froyo supporting" radios, bugs creep into the OS when it comes to using newer Google based apps that make use of the radio. We'll have some fixes for the slow GPS locking and the random reboot/crash when looking for a GPS signal. We're hoping we have mobile data+gps properly nailed down as well.
We're also going to look into different Gallery implementations. Gallery 3D is annoying as hell and the bugs with it are likely due to us relying on the Eclair GL libs. So no further ground is likely to be made until/if/when another MSM7xxA class phone gets Froyo which if any will likely be the Legend. That's a big if though. Imagine if you will, 50 metre tall letters I and F, draped in neon coating with a flashing, strobing sign above them announcing "THIS IS A BIG IF." But no whining if the best you get is the old 2D Gallery as I'm really struggling to find any decent Gallery implementation. Which is somewhat surprising. Perhaps we should offer a bounty for a new decent one.
Add further language support
That's all for 1.3.x for now I think. I'll update this as new things occur or as things appear to be impossible.
FroydVillain 2.x:
Kernel 2.6.34.
What? That's not enough? Wtf is wrong with you? Ok fine.
2.6.34 will provide official support for the newer Froyd features such as in built Tethering and no more annoying bull**** surrounding connecting a simple USB phone to a simple USB port on a simple Windows system. Apparently the Windows driver stack is easier to confuse than a 90 year old Alzheimers suffering dementia patient.
We'll also be looking to bring the Hero Froyo platform closer in line to the more complete Cyanogenmod D/S platform. There's really no reason why we shouldn't be able to especially once 2.6.34 is available since as far as the hardware is concerned the phones are practically identical.
More will be added to the 2.x branch as we discover it. Don't be surprised if in the course of working on 1.3.x some features get pushed back to the 2.x release due to practical limitations or it just making more sense.
Now is the time for feature requests from you the user. 1.2.x is now critical bugs only, I do not want to have to make you wipe/flash 1.2.x now until 1.3 hits so any fixes involving a framework rebuild won't appear until 2.x. 1.2.x is now considered feature complete in the scope of features we want to have supported. New features will appear in 1.3.x or 2.x depending on the work required to make them appear.
So the forum is now yours, dear users, to get those feature requests in. We'll endeavour to get as many implemented as we can. Any ridiculous or unobtainable goals will be identified as such as quickly as possible so people don't get their hopes up only for me to dash them like an abusive husband.
Thanks for all of the Froyo deliciousness you've provided us with! I myself will be waiting with baited breath for the next installments of Froyd.
p.s.
If you need more people with access to Exchange, or if you'd like an Exchange environment to play around with, let me know. I've got an Exchange 2010 machine sitting next to me.
Looking great! Hope you'll get that all working!
acolwill said:
Thanks for all of the Froyo deliciousness you've provided us with! I myself will be waiting with baited breath for the next installments of Froyd.
p.s.
If you need more people with access to Exchange, or if you'd like an Exchange environment to play around with, let me know. I've got an Exchange 2010 machine sitting next to me.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ah, now that -would- be useful. [email protected] if you want to hit me up on GTalk.
maxisma said:
Looking great! Hope you'll get that all working!
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Click to collapse
Cheers bud! Check your PMs.
wow keep on the great work...
Flash? 10char
dpi295 said:
Flash? 10char
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Click to collapse
Impossible, it doesn't work on ARMv6 CPUs.
Ah, now that -would- be useful. [email protected] if you want to hit me up on GTalk.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Req sent. Gimme a nudge
dpi295 said:
Flash? 10char
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Best we can do is see if we can hack over the Flash Lite stuff from Sense, but don't hold your breath.
In fact, you all should start a campaign and hammer the **** out of Adobe to provide an armv5te or armv6j version of the flash library. It's their fault, make them fix it.
Hacre said:
Best we can do is see if we can hack over the Flash Lite stuff from Sense, but don't hold your breath.
In fact, you all should start a campaign and hammer the **** out of Adobe to provide an armv5te or armv6j version of the flash library. It's their fault, make them fix it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
They won't do that, they aren't powerful enough..
I'd appreciate it if you would make an optional patch for people who want their phone unlocked by double clicking menu button.
Amazing work! Data Partition, Themes, VillainSettings... cant wait!
As for Feature Requests, +1 for a quick 2D Gallery
Nice post ninpo.
Thanks for your great ROM. I'd love to see better rtl language support in your ROM.
Really lame request, and probably easily fixed just by finding the pictures myself, but could you put all the nice wallpapers you had back into the releases?
It's obviously a very trivial request, but the wallpapers were always exceptional compared to my attempts of being sophisticated. I always ended up with either breasts or something Xbox related...
mobydeek said:
As for Feature Requests, +1 for a quick 2D Gallery
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
+1 for the standard 2D Gallery.
Tanks guys for your hard work.
Sent from my HTC Hero using Tapatalk
Woah, that's a lot of things to do, and some big ones too. Good luck on that, would be awesome to see these things done in the next months, though, take your time, no rush .
As for Feature-Requests: I only have one, and I don't have any idea if it's already done (I don't test many ROMs that often, I'll prefer to stay on my 2.1 Vanilla ROM ) or if it's even possible, so sorry for my Noobishness in advance. Now, I would love to be able to control the Music Player with the volume keys. Short presses change the volume, like before, and long presses skip the songs.
Screatch said:
I'd appreciate it if you would make an optional patch for people who want their phone unlocked by double clicking menu button.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Blue-K said:
Woah, that's a lot of things to do, and some big ones too. Good luck on that, would be awesome to see these things done in the next months, though, take your time, no rush .
As for Feature-Requests: I only have one, and I don't have any idea if it's already done (I don't test many ROMs that often, I'll prefer to stay on my 2.1 Vanilla ROM ) or if it's even possible, so sorry for my Noobishness in advance. Now, I would love to be able to control the Music Player with the volume keys. Short presses change the volume, like before, and long presses skip the songs.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
We'll be putting a modified CMSettings back into FroydVillain in 1.3, so these features will be there automaticallymagically.
Yeah, it's a fair bit of work, but with HTC pretty much ditching the Hero we can take the project and make sure it's all done and done right.
There's collaboration with other developers on other projects for a lot of this, it's not just me or Team Villain making it all happen. I'll be pushing the fixed cpuprofile up to cyanogenmod and they can then work on it too, I'm working with Elemag on the 2.6.34 port, Maxisma brought the repartitioning stuff to everyone's attention for the Hero, etc. Proper open source development at its best.
It's well worth it too. Look how different the Hero runs with FroydVillain 1.2.1, I'm quite frankly disgusted that HTC never, ever, tapped all that potential.
I can't believe it, my hero will never die!
This is indeed great news and I can't wait!
I just wanna thank everyone involved, all the developers are doing a fantastic job bringing us things i never thought was possible on the hero, and I totally agree Hacre, it's a real shame that HTC ditched ther hero when there's still juice left in it!
Cheers!
e2zippo said:
I can't believe it, my hero will never die!
This is indeed great news and I can't wait!
I just wanna thank everyone involved, all the developers are doing a fantastic job bringing us things i never thought was possible on the hero, and I totally agree Hacre, it's a real shame that HTC ditched ther hero when there's still juice left in it!
Cheers!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not to mention juice they never, ever bloody gave us. Grr.
Just telling you guys the story first.
I have this spare HD2 lying around after getting the Sensation which also has a severely cracked screen (LCD working, and screen protector on top to prevent injured fingers when using ). A thought occurred to me: Why not build Android to function like an iTouch? I.e: Remove anything related to the SIM card/ remove everything that involves making calls, SMS, etc but retain the functionality of Android apps etc(As I will be using DATA SIM). Most importantly, I want it to be fully optimised for those (I believe that the phone/sms functions running in the background would affect the full potential for the HD2 running music, video, and other apps). I do know how to flash ROMS, and customise downloaded ROMS (e.g: Slipstreaming apps I want, remove some apps I don't want, customise build.prop, etc) and also some programming (a bit of obj-C, a bit of C#, and lots of VB.NET). However, I do not know how to build Android from scratch. Hence I would appreciate if:
-I can get devs to assist me in building Android from source code and customise it so it fits my expectations
-I can get support for this project as I plan to release my work to the public when its done
I will give credit to those who helped. Thanks.
Reserved for future use.
Reserved again.
arikyeo said:
Just telling you guys the story first.
I have this spare HD2 lying around after getting the Sensation which also has a severely cracked screen (LCD working, and screen protector on top to prevent injured fingers when using ). A thought occurred to me: Why not build Android to function like an iTouch? I.e: Remove anything related to the SIM card/ remove everything that involves making calls, SMS, etc but retain the functionality of Android apps etc(As I will be using DATA SIM). Most importantly, I want it to be fully optimised for those (I believe that the phone/sms functions running in the background would affect the full potential for the HD2 running music, video, and other apps). I do know how to flash ROMS, and customise downloaded ROMS (e.g: Slipstreaming apps I want, remove some apps I don't want, customise build.prop, etc) and also some programming (a bit of obj-C, a bit of C#, and lots of VB.NET). However, I do not know how to build Android from scratch. Hence I would appreciate if:
-I can get devs to assist me in building Android from source code and customise it so it fits my expectations
-I can get support for this project as I plan to release my work to the public when its done
I will give credit to those who helped. Thanks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
arikyeo said:
Reserved again.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
arikyeo said:
Reserved for future use.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sir, i seriously doubt your state of mental stability.
And as for your request, the best you can do is use in Airplane mode and switch on wireless. Works for me when i don't want to waste my battery.
Just so that you know, the Qualcomm processors have 2 ARM CPUs on the die, 1 for Radio(Wireless/bluetooth/GSM etc) and 1 for the General purpose/Logic etc... I don't think GSM functions and the phone app running in the background would even mean or translate into anything near a burden or even something which would affect the performace for the CPU in your HD2.
you're pretty much dead-end on this one mate.
android is built ground-up for use in mobile phones. look at those cheap shenzen tablets..they all have no network icon in top bar, and com.android.phone must be running. removing this will only result not working phone as these also include core services-market access etc
only hope you have for doing what you want is to somehow get honeycomb workin' on qsd8250 and tiny fingers to interact with it.
imho best bet would be to just install CM or MIUI, and hide phone etc from launcher.
refer to post above for "very exact explanation" of everything you are trying to do
Does any one else think that Google should be spending a lot more time here on xda and learning from the devs?
Just little features like being able to hide and unhide the nav bar, and edit the buttons of the nav bar...
Getting the smoothness of the stock launcher sorted once and for all that some custom rooms have managed...
The few extra targets on the lock screen.
You get the idea. Just little tweaks that are missing from stock that I feel should have been added from the start.
A company that large with that much resource should surely b thinking of these things before Joe bloggs comes along and adds it for them.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using XDA
zolah said:
Does any one else think that Google should be spending a lot more time here on xda and learning from the devs?
Just little features like being able to hide and unhide the nav bar, and edit the buttons of the nav bar...
Getting the smoothness of the stock launcher sorted once and for all that some custom rooms have managed...
The few extra targets on the lock screen.
You get the idea. Just little tweaks that are missing from stock that I feel should have been added from the start.
A company that large with that much resource should surely b thinking of these things before Joe bloggs comes along and adds it for them.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using XDA
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If I recall correctly some of the new features in ICS from the Cynogenmod team (the only one that I can recall is the swipe away notification menu list).
But yea I agree, those little tweaks that you mentioned would be sweet to have in future releases of android...and who knows maybe they are paying attention and in the next (major) update of theirs we might get new features.
Yes/No.
I'm sure some Google employees might check sites like this from time to time, but more often than not they're aware of bugs before most of the XDA population notices them. Legitimate issues will be reported to their bug tracker quickly I'm sure.
People may get impatient waiting for a fix, thinking, the Big G is oblivious, but the majority of the time they're a few steps ahead of most users here and a fix has been in the pipe for a while. I'm sure it's someone's, or someTHING's job, to harvest pertinent info; Google is in the information biz after all. I doubt any Google (or AOSP) presence would ever be officially declared here; I can't picture that going well.
There is a gerrit for code submissions. If they are not submitted, good luck in seeing them considered for implementation.
However, devs like us tend to introduce problems as well. Unless it can fit into the master branch for all supported AOSP devices and appears to not cause issues with other items, it will be immediately thrown out.
Ever read rom threads? At least half the posts stem from problems that were created from tampering with code/adding features.
..and I don't want to hear "insert rom" is bugless, because it is not true for any rom.
adrynalyne said:
There is a gerrit for code submissions. If they are not submitted, good luck in seeing them considered for implementation.
However, devs like us tend to introduce problems as well. Unless it can fit into the master branch for all supported AOSP devices and appears to not cause issues with other items, it will not be immediately thrown out.
Ever read rom threads? At least half the posts stem from problems that were created from tampering with code/adding features.
..and I don't want to hear "insert rom" is bugless, because it is not true for any rom.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Good point for sure. I definitely do not want my phone to ship with the instability custom ROM lol.
And people won't be satisfied either way. They're gonna ROM their phone anyways, not all of these things need to be included in the shipping software.
Um...Google knows man. Come on, they are the largest search engine in the world. They know what CM team has added, they know what people dislike about their products, they know EVERYTHING.
I'm sure they are learning from the devs, also have to realize a lot of the things CM adds and the fact Google doesn't include a lot of the stuff is good for the mass, a lot of my friends have a Android phones.
I always root their phones and add toggles and the extra features and they don't even realize or use them because they don't care, but I'm sure they know what people do want and what people don't based on their search histories.
I thought about this the other day...
If any of these ROMs and Kernels were actually significantly better without compromising stability then the Google devs would be out of a job pretty quickly.
I think the main advantages of custom ROMs and kernels are:
- customization above and beyond standard - but Google wants too keep a uniform ICS theme.. and adding too much detracts from this... not to mention over complicating menus and settings
- performance from overclocking - again something Google doesn't want to do for stability and hardware reasons
- getting new releases and sources before OTA updates - for the phones that are Samsung controlled which have to wait ages for them.. and you can flash a stock image for this anyway.
So custom ROMs don't really add that much that Google would want in its stock builds
Maybe I'm missing something. People talk about The Google Experience a lot in this forum. For me that sounds like saying "I don't install programs on my PC because I like the pure Windows experience."
I guess for me, the Google Experience just means that AT&T doesn't get to molest my phone with their apps, weird settings or worst of all, imprint their name indelibly on the front of my phone. To a much lesser extent, it means that I don;t have to worry about TouchWiz.
Is there more to it than that? What does it mean to you?
For me, it means Android as Google designed it, rather than how manufacturers think it should be to separate their phones from the competition and it means an unlockable boot loader out of the box without having to register with the manufacturer. It also means no carrier pre installed apps except stuff necessary for the phone to operate on their network.
When you buy a PC, you don't get manufacturer customized versions of Windows. You get the same Windows no matter what system you buy, so manufacturers compete on hardware, extras, etc. Sure, manufacturers pre load apps on Windows installations, but the fundamental UI remains the same.
Unfortunately the only way to get Android the way Google designed it is to either get a Nexus, or get some cheap budget Android device that uses the stock UI because its hardware can't handle anything more than that.
It's a shame that for each new major version of Android, Google needs to issue a Google-experience de ice to showcase the raw vanilla UI, but alas that's reality.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2
You mean pure Android Experience.
But I agree with you on most counts.
Pure Google experience is just that, pure.. Foundation for customization. Everything is built on top, if you strip any android phone down to the bones you''ll get get pure android, AOSP sitting on top of the Kernel. Some like it, some don't, some prefer something else. That's the way I look and understand it maybe I'm wrong in thinking this way.
Most of the replies have focused on the Android experience. I think the Google experience can also mean that you use many of the Google services (search, reader, drive, gtalk, voice, etc). Using all of this is easier on an Android phone vs iOS because of the apps and single sign on.
Simply put, not only do carriers install apps and themes, such as their custom interfaces (touch wiz sense); but they go further into the operating system. They edit and tweak various code in the underlying OS (framework kernel mods), block stock features like AT&T removing the option to install non market apps. Install tracking software however invasive you allow yourself to believe it to be (carrier iq). Ultimately these developers for the carriers and manufacturers might not be as good as the Google developers. Having used a phone both with and without having carrier iq installed (og epic) i know it performed significantly faster sans the carrier code. Pure google is just that, the code and features that Google released, not touched by outside developers which a majority of its code is still in every spin off to be found. The question is does your potential rom enhance that experience or hinder the phone from what it performed stock.
Sent from my Sprint Galaxy Nexus
-Everything i post is opinion based on my experiences and should be taken a such.
dreamsforgotten said:
Simply put, not only do carriers install apps and themes, such as their custom interfaces (touch wiz sense);
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Carriers do not install custom interfaces, the OEMs do. The carriers can decide the layout, color scheme, and features of the interface, but the skins and overlays are all on Samsung, HTC, Moto, etc. There was a regional carrier that had a phone with the stock Google experience on a device that was skinned on other carriers, so the carrier can also specify to remove the overlays as well.
As for what Google Experience is, look at stock ICS and that is the Google experience. Nothing on the phone that isn't coded by Google,except for a couple items from VZW on their Nexus, which are easily disabled and removed with no change in functionality. All apps come from Google that are installed, and if you want more features or functionality, you choose it from the market or elsewhere. You don't use other services if you don't want to, and you aren't forced to have them either.
Its more of a minimalist philosophy. Simplistically having nothing but the core functions I use, which happen to be a load of Google apps, is what its all about. Then having all that extra ram resources not wasted on crap and fully available to my usage needs only. Its the less is more theory, elegant yet functional on the basic core stuff.
RogerPodacter said:
Its more of a minimalist philosophy. Simplistically having nothing but the core functions I use, which happen to be a load of Google apps, is what its all about. Then having all that extra ram resources not wasted on crap and fully available to my usage needs only. Its the less is more theory, elegant yet functional on the basic core stuff.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is pretty right on. I think you will find, generally, that the people who like stock Android like it because they subscribe, as Google does, to the design philosophy that less is more. Therein lies my problem with custom Android implementations, both at the OEM and open source level. So many of them throw in everything AND the kitchen sink. I find that pointless.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2
Archpope said:
Maybe I'm missing something. People talk about The Google Experience a lot in this forum. For me that sounds like saying "I don't install programs on my PC because I like the pure Windows experience."
I guess for me, the Google Experience just means that AT&T doesn't get to molest my phone with their apps, weird settings or worst of all, imprint their name indelibly on the front of my phone. To a much lesser extent, it means that I don;t have to worry about TouchWiz.
Is there more to it than that? What does it mean to you?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Google Experience:
GSM Quad/Pentaband
Completely Unlocked (fastboot oem unlock)
No bloatware or custom skins
Instantly getting the newest Android version
----
This is basically what defines the "Google Experience"
There are also many specific things about the phone that add to the Google Experience.
oldblue910 said:
This is pretty right on. I think you will find, generally, that the people who like stock Android like it because they subscribe, as Google does, to the design philosophy that less is more. Therein lies my problem with custom Android implementations, both at the OEM and open source level. So many of them throw in everything AND the kitchen sink. I find that pointless.
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It actually goes with Google's whole design. Ever notice how most Google services like Gmail are functional but not really flashy so much and sometimes a tad bland, like Gmail for many years in the beginning. More about simple to use rather than fancy and fully loaded. This is slowly changing though.
In my opinion, having a Nexus device is a much better experience than using a device that has had an AOSP ROM ported or kanged. I can't remember which phone(s) it was but I remember a carrier adding apps to an AOSP ROM as well as another one themeing their overlay to look like it AOSP. Lame.
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DeezNotes said:
In my opinion, having a Nexus device is a much better experience than using a device that has had an AOSP ROM ported or kanged. I can't remember which phone(s) it was but I remember a carrier adding apps to an AOSP ROM as well as another one themeing their overlay to look like it AOSP. Lame.
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The HTC G2 (great phone BTW) and LG G2X both ran stock Android builds, but they were loaded up with T-Mobile bloatware. Maybe those are the phones you were thinking of?
Google Experience to me:
Turning a phone on without having to see a app draw full of apps that are trial versions or just plain bloat (Verizon loads Tunewiki on my Thunderbolt by default, I will never touch this app but unless I root there is absolutely no way to remove it, it will inevitably launch and eat up my resources, not cool).
Not seeing some OEM skin. I like android's stock look, I like that I can get different launchers to change it up a bit but stock android is still the best to me. If I need extra features there is always the Play store, where I can download what I WANT, not be forced to have widgets out of the ass that I will never use.
I really feel like I could go on forever but I will stop there and just get to the point, when I turned on my Nexus I saw an open canvas, there was nothing on it but I could see the potential. If I wanted to keep it to only a few apps I could, if I wanted to load it with features and apps and go the whole 9 yards I also could. Basically to me the "Google Experience" is choice. Being able to turn the phone on and just do what I want with it without being told you have to use this skin or you have to have these apps preinstalled. Yes I know I can root (And always do) to remove the bloat but that doesn't remove the OEM skin (Unless I install a kanged AOSP ROM which almost always have a bug or two) but why should I have to? This is my phone, right? I just payed up to $700 to own it, I should be able to do what I want with it from the get go, and make it mine.
Sadly, not enough people see Android for what it is. The see bloated up phones, that run slow 2 months down the road, they see 4 different "Versions (OEM skins)" of Android and don't know which is which. They don't experience Android as it was meant to be experienced, which to me is way better than any iProduct could ever be.
For me the Pure Google Experience means being a good 'lil soldier and using my phone in such a way that adds useful info to their databases.
My Google Experience :
US first
Rest of the world : months later