News - 736/943 - Android Police - Android News, Apps, Games, Phones, Tablets

Apr

Unhappy Developers: 86% Say Android Fragmentation Is A Problem

Posted by Cameron Summerson in Android OS, News

A recent study by William Powers of Baird Research has revealed that a whopping 86% of developers think that Android fragmentation is a problem. While only 24% of devs described it as a "huge problem," it doesn't discredit the fact that the overall percentage was so outrageous.

Venture capitalist Fred Wilson still recommends developers write for Android before iOS, as he predicts that iPhone vs. Android is just a remake of Macintosh vs. Windows. Of course, there are a certain number of developers that write for both platforms, many of whom found that it was easier to get exposure on iOS than Android, citing the amount of "junk apps" in the Android Market as the reason.

Apr

Sony Xperia X10 Bootloader Finally Gets Cracked, Now Accepts Custom Kernels

Posted by Cameron Summerson in Development, News, Xperia X10 (es209ra)

Owners of the Sony Xperia X10 around the world are rejoicing, because after a long wait, the previously locked bootloader has finally been cracked. What does this mean, you ask? In a nutshell, it means that the X10 can now handle custom features that other Android devices have had for some time, like kernels that allow for overclocking/undervolting, native USB/Wi-Fi tethering, removal of the 32fps cap, and a myriad of other tweaks.

This wondrous deed was achieved by XDA member zdzihu and announced late Thursday night, but no one was quite sure if it was an April Fools' Day joke at the time.

Apr

Google Bids Almost $1 Billion On Patent Portfolio To Protect Android, Chrome

Posted by David Ruddock in Android OS, Development, Editorials, News

Well, not solely for Android and Chrome - but presumably those products are the headliners affected by this patent bid. Google is currently bidding on a collection of over 6,000 patents held by Nortel Networks, which is selling the portfolio as part of bankruptcy proceedings. Google tossed its name in the hat with an initial offering of $900,000,000 - not exactly chump change.

Many of the patents relate to wireless technology (such as LTE) and data networking, but undoubtedly Google found some of them to be in the particular interest of protecting Android and Chrome, as Google's General Counsel indicted on the company's blog.

Apr

Zipcar Is Working On An Android App, Car Rental Is Going To Get Even Easier

Posted by Cameron Summerson in Applications, News

According to its Twitter account, car rental company Zipcar appear to be working on an Android app. This is pretty good news for Android owners out there that use Zipcar for their transportation needs, as an iOS app has been available for quite some time.

That means you'll be able to find a Zipcar, book it, and unlock it - all with your Android phone. If you live in San Francisco or another big Zipcar town, you'll know just how useful this will be.

If you are not familiar with Zipcar or how it works, take a look at their official site.

Apr

ASUS Compares Eee Pad Transformer To Duct-Taped iPad And Keyboard

Posted by David Ruddock in ASUS, Eee Pad Transformer, Honeycomb 3.0/3.1/3.2, News

Well-known budget electronics manufacturer ASUS has a big splash-page promo up on Best Buy's website right now for the upcoming Eee Pad Transformer, the manufacturer's first Honeycomb (Android 3.0) tablet, and it's not exactly subtle:

It's a fair comparison - both will probably break their hinges around the same time

The (unintentional) irony here being that ASUS's product aren't exactly known for their top-notch materials (I'm not saying their products are faulty - just a little flimsy). Still, the Transformer is a kind of neat idea - we'll have to reserve judgment on how ASUS's execution of the concept fares in the real world.

Apr

PowerAMP Updated With App To SD, Dolby/SRS Support, Open API For Developers

Posted by David Ruddock in Applications, Apps/Games, Development, News

The popular Android music player PowerAMP received an update this morning with new features and numerous bug fixes. Take a look at the change log below:

New:
- PowerAMP now has open API for 3rd party developers. Please check PowerAMP site for reference, samples, and complete Widget Pack sources
- PowerAMP now can be moved to SD card. You can still use PowerAMP widgets if you install PowerAMP Standard Widget Pack
- added Dolby/SRS support for HTC Desire HD (and few other HTC phones with Dolby/SRS) (Equalizer => DHD button)
- added song number/total counter (Settings => Look And Feel Tweaks => Show Track Counter)
- auto-advance option for queue (Settings => Auto-Advance Settings)
- PowerAMP now re-shuffles lists on repeat
- playlist/queue reordering can be now toggled on/off via special icon in list headers
- PowerAMP now shows embed lyrics from tags in its Album Art area.

Apr

Honeycomb On A Budget: 7 and 10" Acer Aspire ICONIA TAB A100/A500 Pre-Order On Amazon UK

Posted by David Ruddock in Acer, Deals, Honeycomb 3.0/3.1/3.2, Iconia Tab A500, News

Last Updated: April 29th, 2011

Update: The 10.1-inch big brother of the A100, the A500, is also available for pre-order and ships on April 20, though it will cost you the substantially larger sum of £449. Why? It's packing an LED-backlit display (as opposed to LCD), 32GB of HDD space, and 1GB of RAM.

This one only applies to our friends across the pond for the moment, but Acer's first attempt at an Android 3.0 tablet has just gone up for pre-order on Amazon UK. It will ship on April 20, and it'll set you back a paltry £299.

With 512KB of RAM, my printer is giving the A100 a run for its money (Amazon typo much?)

This is without a doubt the most competitively priced piece of Honeycomb hardware we've seen to date, but its specs appear markedly different from the 7" prototype Android tablet we saw at one of Acer's press conferences last year.

Apr

Android Developers Helplessly Fuming Over App Publishing Console Downtime - 4 Days And Counting

Posted by Artem Russakovskii in Apps/Games, Development, News

On March 31st, the Android Developer Console, which developers use to publish their apps to the Market, started experiencing issues that ranged from 404s and disappearing applications to missing statistics and apps that no longer obeyed.

As more and more panicking developers chimed in with similar experiences to multiple support threads, the only response from Google so far came from an employee named Ash back on the very first day, apologizing for the inconvenience and then shortly after announcing that all issues had been fixed.

Except they weren't.

The next day was April Fools' - nice prank, Google. Reports from devs all over the world kept flooding support forums, but Google was not responding anymore, even though April 1st was Friday - a workday, and this was no laughing matter (although they did fix something obviously more important).

Apr

AT&T Samsung Nexus S Shows Up On Samsung.com, Now All But Officially Confirmed

Posted by Artem Russakovskii in AT&T, News, Nexus S (Crespo/Soju), Samsung

Samsung's Nexus S, the first Gingerbread device, was a T-Mobile exclusive in the U.S. until last month, when Sprint announced the Nexus S 4G - a CDMA (and WiMAX) counterpart of this sleek stock Android device. Can Samsung pull the same trick it did with the Galaxy S phones that came to all U.S. carriers? It sure looks like it.

We've already seen a Nexus S with model GT-I9020A (as opposed to T-Mobile GT-I9020T) hit the FCC with AT&T bands, and now the same exact model has shown up on Samsung's own site, citing AT&T as the carrier. Whether Ma Bell will subsidize it or not (they didn't offer subsidies for the Nexus One) remains to be seen, but now the AT&T Nexus S is all but officially confirmed.

Apr

T-Mobile myTouch 3G Slide Finally Sees The Froyo (Android 2.2.1) Update, Sets HTC's Servers On Fire

Posted by Artem Russakovskii in Froyo 2.2, HTC, myTouch Slide (Espresso), News, T-Mobile

MT3G Slide owners, you won't believe your eyes today. April Fool's has passed, and T-Mobile is not trolling you - the Froyo update is indeed available for the poor younger brother of the original myTouch 3G which already received Froyo almost 6 months ago. Don't let the name fool you, as there are, apparently, quite a few differences between the 2 devices - enough to tie up the release for such a long time.

The update is not over-the-air (OTA) - you will have to download it from HTC's servers, which are coincidentally on fire right now, barely pushing out the file at 6-7 KB/s.