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Nov

ADT (Android Dev Tools) Source Code Commits Suggesting Imminent Gingerbread SDK Release?

Posted by Artem Russakovskii in Gingerbread 2.3, News

Today, I was looking at the Android Development Tools (ADT) commit history, as I normally do on a Tuesday morning at 3am, and I noticed something that made my heart skip a few beats. But let me back up for a second.

Every Android SDK release is normally accompanied by an ADT release that adds support for the new functionality and fixes existing bugs. ADT, in turn, is an Eclipse plugin, which is essentially a set of developer tools for one of the best free open source editors out there (that's Eclipse), which also happens to be the IDE of choice of Android core developers.

Nov

Eric Schmidt At Web 2.0 Summit: Gingerbread Coming "In The Next Few Weeks," Will Support NFC, Aim For Location And Payment Processing

Posted by Artem Russakovskii in Gingerbread 2.3, News

Eric Schmidt, the CEO of Google, was scheduled to appear at the Web 2.0 Summit today, and while some speculated that he might finally announce Gingerbread to the world, I had my doubts about whether he would actually announce the update rather than talking about it on some tangent. Unfortunately, the truth ended up being somewhere in the middle, with Eric only brushing up on a few things and then going off about the general strategy.

Here's what went down, in my favorite bullet point style:

Eric came out and was asked about Android right off the bat.
He then pulled out a device that he said he was carrying with him for a while, which by the looks of it was none other than the Nexus S.

Nov

We're Pretty Sure The Samsung February 2011 Flagship Device Renders Are Fake - Here's Why

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in News, Samsung

Engadget - whose record on these things is usually among the best in the business - seems to have pulled the trigger on one that's pretty obviously fake. Check it out:

The spec sheet reads like a dream phone (which, again, it very well may be):

Gingerbread (Android 2.3)
4.3" or 4.5" (Depending on which part you read) SAMOLED2 screen
February release
8 MP Camera
1080p video recording
14.4 Mbps HSPA
1.2 GHz CPU
16 GB of storage
Insanely thin

Cool, right? Well, not so fast. Here's the stuff that makes at least the render seem like a mockup done in MSPaint.

Nov

Samsung Nexus S Appears On Best Buy Mobile's In Store Website Running Gingerbread

Posted by Jaroslav Stekl in Nexus S (Crespo/Soju), Samsung, T-Mobile

It's a wild day for Best Buy Mobile and the Samsung Nexus S, and from the looks of it, it's only going to get wilder.

No, it's not just you - the device on the right-most side of the screenshot above is indeed running Gingerbread (at least judging by the notification bar and its revamped icons), and it is indeed what we've come to know as the Nexus S. Unfortunately, there's no pre-order link in sight this time around, but at least we now know what the phone will actually look like outside of fake Photoshop renders. Damn, Best Buy, just release the thing already.

Nov

OHA Team Member Confirms Gingerbread Version As 2.3, Hints At Dev Nexus Ones Receiving An OTA Update In The Next Few Days

Posted by Artem Russakovskii in Gingerbread 2.3, News, Nexus One (Passion)

This week promises to be huge for Android - we've been hearing about the Gingerbread SDK possibly coming out on November 11th, and today an Open Handset Alliance team member Alvaro Fuentes Vasquez announced 2 very important details via his twitter account, namely:

Gingerbread will indeed bear version number 2.3, not 3.0
it will be hitting developer versions of Nexus One handsets in the next few days

Direct translation of the above, according to Google, is:

Prepare your Nexus One (Developer version) for Android OTA update 2.3 (Gingerbread) for the next few days:-D

The Open Handset Alliance (OHA) was announced on the same day Android was revealed to the world a bit over 3 years ago, with the sole purpose of promoting the open and free mobile platform.

Nov

Pro Android 3, The First Book To Cover Gingerbread APIs, Goes Up For Presale, Offers Gingerbread Hints

Posted by Artem Russakovskii in Gingerbread 2.3, News

If you want to find out all the new goodies Android's newest upcoming OS, codenamed Gingerbread, is going to bring, you may want to ask Satya Komatineni, Sayed Hashimi, and Dave MacLean. These 3 writers are the co-authors of the Pro Android book series, and, thanks to a tip from @brodduncan, we now know they've definitely been playing with Gingerbread, likely for quite a while.

The new 3rd edition of Pro Android, which recently showed up on Amazon, mentions the Gingerbread SDK in its description:

Pro Android 3 shows you how to build real-world and fun mobile applications using the new Android SDK, codename "Gingerbread."

Learn what’s new with Gingerbread: improved UI across all Android platforms, integration with WebM, the latest Flash integration techniques, and more

The above confirms our earlier suspicions of user interface improvements that Gingerbread is bound to bring as well as reaffirms the WebM integration that Google promised at Google I/O this year.

Nov

First Hints At Gingerbread UI Given By Latest Google Maps Update

Posted by Brian O'Toole in Applications, Gingerbread 2.3, News

Google Maps was updated to version 4.60 last week, and you may not have noticed it on the surface, but contained inside were some interesting resources providing an early glimpse at the style direction Gingerbread is set to take. Freenode IRC member canadiancow rather astutely spotted that there was a folder contained within the 4.60 APK that included icons and styling for API level 9, whilst we're currently on level 8 with Froyo. He changed all references to level 9 down to level 8 and recompiled the APK, and voilà, this is what Maps will look like (on left):

Obviously not a great deal has changed, but we are liking the new styling on the buttons, and the slight-transparency on the pop-up dialog.

Nov

36% Of Android Devices Now Running Froyo - Donut And Cupcake Continue Steady Decline Into Dessert History

Posted by David Ruddock in Android OS, News

Google, as it does every month, has released updated Android platform version distribution charts today. What's changed? From last month, not a whole lot. Froyo expanded a solid 3%, from a little over 33% of the Android-verse at the beginning of October to over 36% as of yesterday, with Donut and Cupcake both losing more ground.

Pac-Man hungers for donuts and cupcakes

Éclair actually gained a few tenths of a percent, most likely due to continued sales of Samsung's Galaxy S phones, which are all shipping with Android 2.1 installed. Much of this will probably change come January, however, as Samsung has stated they hope to get all Galaxy S devices running 2.2 before the end of the year.

Oct

Android Gingerbread, Next Nexus, Information And Speculation Round-Up

Posted by Brian O'Toole in Android OS, Devices By Manufacturer, Gingerbread 2.3, Samsung

These last few days the Android blogosphere has been awash with excited spluttering, dubious rumours and hopeful conflation. Kicking things off was City A.M., a "London-based free daily newspaper that specialises in financial news". According to an article on their website, Google had struck a deal with the popular phone retailer Carphone Warehouse. CPW were to sell Google's next phone, the Nexus Two by any other name. Their position as a reseller of phones and contracts on most if not all networks in the UK and wider Europe makes them a logical choice, right? Nexus One sales online didn't exactly break records, so it makes sense to try the next carrier-agnostic option.

Oct

Sony Ericsson PlayStation Phone Is Real, Looks Just Like Renders & Packs Some Solid Hardware

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Gingerbread 2.3, News, Sony Ericsson, Xperia Play (Zeus, PlayStation Phone)

Last Updated: January 11th, 2011

Remember that Sony Ericsson PlayStation phone we heard about back in August? Turns out it's not only real, but a prototype is out and about in the wild - and Engadget has landed themselves some surprisingly clear and detailed pictures of the device. Better still, it looks pretty close to the renders we saw in August - surprising, given the track record for Android rumors.

Between the PlayStation moniker and the slide-out gamepad, I think it's pretty clear that this beastie will be marketed as a gaming phone. In support of that fact, word has it that the phone will support a custom Sony Marketplace with games specifically designed for the platform - if they can garner enough developer support, that should be a fairly nice selling point.