Google tackles Android fragmentation to - Automation Guide

The patchwork of Android Versions appbouwers which should take into account.

Google admits that the growing fragmentation of Android is a problem. The company wants to prevent more and more versions and variants of the operating system into circulation.

Google engineers have said that the so-called ‘open-fire conversation “during the annual I / O conference users of the company in San Francisco. By making use of as many smartphone and tablet models, the same updates of Android available hope to achieve that fewer variants simultaneously in use.

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Fragmentation always been an issue with Android

Fragmentation has from the outset been a problem with Android. Not only are hardware manufacturers slow to roll out new releases for existing equipment, also add these manufacturers often have their own software layer that interchangeability in the way. That is a thorn in the eye of application developers, which take into account more and more variants of the system.

Hardware Manufacturers could the rate at which new releases of Android Google rolled out the last few years often not keep up. So it can happen that smartphones a few years old still on Android 2.2 (Froyo) or Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) operating while later releases significantly modified application program interfaces (APIs) have been given.

Cheap phones with scant memory are part of the cause

According to Dave Burke, engineering director for Android, there is the problem especially in emerging markets where Android devices because of the lower price but have a small memory. Android itself is not a problem that according to him, but for getting ‘richer’ apps more memory to run smoothly. According to Burke Google Android tries to make new apps also work on cheap smartphones.

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Matias Duarte, responsible for ‘user experience’ with Android, advises users that no compatibility issues to a device with a ‘pure’ to buy. version of Android This applies in particular to the Nexus series of Google itself. Also for the Samsung Galaxy S4 is a variant available without additional software Samsung TouchWiz, he.

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Google does not want to slow down

Anyway Google is not going to slow down the development of future versions. Before that Android is still too much of a “baby” who has to grow up, find Burke. There, he says much work to be done at the hardware level, in particular to increase. The capabilities of the cameras He also sees opportunities in the transfer of some strong calculations of the central processor to the graphics chip, a practice that has been previously introduced. In the PC world

also trying to make. developers at Google user interface smoother It is regularly performed. Before changes on screen in fits and starts Especially on devices with a not so powerful processor is still a problem. The term ‘project Butter’, which has been going on since the advent of Android 4.0, will therefore continue.