But to be fair it was released with 4.0 and got 4.1, 4.2 and 4.3 - 3 major releases and more minor ones. So yeah I think I'll give them a pass and hope CM team will have 4.4 for the GNex sometime down the line.
Also no news on the integration of French startup they bought - forgot the name, but they had a native code converter for Android apps which helps further with low RAM low power devices - hoping that they release it to the Play Store (DroidBooster?).
> But to be fair it was released with 4.0 and got 4.1, 4.2 and 4.3 - 3 major releases and more minor ones
It only received one major update: ICS to Jellybean. If google calls all of 4.1, 4.2 and 4.3 "Jellybean", getting updates from one version of Jellybean to another can hardly be called "major".
This is different from how Google did things back in the Gingerbread era, where these incremental updates were version 2.3.3, 2.3.4 etc.
But just because Google changed numbering scheme for Jelly Bean doesn't change that these were indeed minor updates. Almost nothing changed in the OS.
The Galaxy Nexus is the first and only Nexus device so far (sans the pointless Nexus Q) to only receive one major upgrade. That's less than most consumer-devices receive.
That's an insult to each and every buyer of that phone. I doubt you'll see them lining up for a new "Nexus" anytime soon.
Hopefully they get it working for the Galaxy Nexus somehow, mine has been a crapshoot for memory recently with Chrome just randomly restarting at times.
So it seems it may not be just OEM's fault, if their component suppliers won't support their components for longer either, although I guess you could make an argument for OEM's making their own drivers for everything, or Google trying to introduce another layer of abstraction for hardware, and upgrade everything themselves.
Im aware of the torrent of weak excuses why this wont happen, save it.
God bless CyanogenMod.
http://developer.android.com/about/versions/kitkat.html
Highlights:
* WebView is now based on Chromium * KSM and zRAM integrated into stock kernel * Public SMS framework * Printing framework * Storage access framework
Does that mean that there will no more be stock 'Browser' app? I refuse to use Chrome on Android because of brain-dead, non-disablable 'font-boosting' that makes (among many others) Hacker News absolutely unusable.
If that means that the same engine is the only one officially supported on 4.4 forwards, then that's really sad and unfortunate.
Once that list gets shorter, it's slated for inclusion in Webkit, though. It's a useful feature if it works consistently. Prevents needless scrolling from side-to-side on tiny screens. (It's a lot less useful on my 21" Android Slate, however)
WebView is the UI class for displaying webpages as a native Android view. The Browser app contains much more than the WebView class itself.
https://devsite.googleplex.com/chrome-developer-tools/docs/r...
I clicked on that link and got a page that says "moma: inside google. Single Sign On" and asks for a Google login, password, and OTP. It also appears to display a random image; I wonder if that random image is used as part of the authentication process, perhaps as an authenticator that this is a valid Google login page (perhaps something you can verify with your OTP device).
And there's no need to negotiate/buy access to secure elements, or get involved with TSMs etc -- as long as the issuer looks after its own security.
This is going to blow NFC wide open :)
2013 definitely seems to be the year of memory compression.
This sounds remarkably similar to the M7. This functionality of Android 4.4 requires hardware support, which initially is only provided by the Nexus 5. It allows for continuous sensor measurements, only waking the application processor when it delivers a batch of them.
Is that marketing speak for, "We're moving the Phone app into Google Play Services"?
And the discussion, much of which involves explaining why this tendency is maybe not as sinister as the Ars article implies: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6582494
However this is not bad news at all for startups like myself because of two things.
1) Google will spend about a year or two on refactoring Android to fully cope with PLAY dependence allowing some spare "time" for third party ideas on features that can advance outside Google internal teams.
2) Third party developer a are now in equal position to compete with Google applications to win terrain into Android future tiny out of the box. Basically on future ex-activated apps like mail for example.
I experienced the nexus 4 a little bit and though it's a great phone I'm afraid the next OS updates are going to ruin it just like it happened to the poor Nexus S.
My next phone is going to be an iPhone as I had a rather pleasant experience on the iPad.
Yes, old hardware will always fare poorly when running operating systems that are generations ahead. Try running Windows 7 on a 286... Nexus 4 and I'm loving it. I anticipate no issues moving between 4.3 and 4.4.
Oh, and I suspect your battery is torched. my wi-fi only nexus s reports on average a solid day of battery with moderate/heavy use.
To be fair, that was during the iPhone 4 period.
The iPhone has since gone to the iPhone 4s, iPhone 5, and then iPhone 5s. Many users report an absolutely miserable experience with iOS 7 (and even 6) on the iPhone 4.
The mobile industry has moved very, very quickly, and devices are a magnitude more powerful+ than just a couple of years ago. As a developer with an interest in mobile, I've gone through literally seven different smartphone devices in the past three years.
It removes the 'fly in' 'fly out' animations for opening folders or apps, and greatly improves performance.
Same for the iPad mini.
I thought "ach why not", but bought it at least partly out of surprise that the online store was working :)
Selling at 28k where HTC one, note3 and Lumia 1025 are being sold at around 50k!. If distribution channel is properly organized it will just blow away the likes of samsung,nokia and HTC
Doing dev and debug on a device I don't actually use has been effective. My most productive features have been having the device in a dock, and using wifi adb so I don't have to bother with cables.
Yep, definitely another high-grade Google Play user experience....
Come on.
I knew it was coming and got in early, finding it the most enjoyable Nexus purchase yet -- available in many markets the day it is announced, the Play store didn't crash and functioned speedily, and it will ship in days? I'd say it was a fantastic user experience.
That said, a couple of things in the API, especially the storage framework, could be really good. That may provide a way forward to get apps working with the cloud or self hosted servers with a common API, which would be a great development.
Cyanogenmod usage may get a big spike when they get on to Kitkat, and that might be just what the Android ecosystem needs.
...but Android is slowly becoming less open. Scares me a little. Why shouldn't it?
Are you an developer at an OEM? I'm just not sure why this would worry you. It sure beats not getting timely updates for core pieces because of silly carriers.
I'm confused, PDFs, games and movies already are full screen on previous android versions.
Edit: More comments here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6648976 and here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6648664 but not seeing links, feels like hearsay.
senior VP of Android Sundar Pichai told us that "the Nexus 5 will not be on Verizon."
http://www.theverge.com/2013/10/31/5051304/google-nexus-5-wo...
Already appears to be down.
What's the point of having google.com/nexus/5, when people are going to be purchasing it from the play store (splitting traffic, rather than sending it all to the store)?
Edit: www.google.com/nexus/5 is live now.
How about a real battery test, where you simulate someone reading HN or reddit, opening gifs, images, web pages with crappy flash video. I'm tired of the same 3 hours of useful battery life I've had since the HTC evo. Maybe I'm just bitter because my galaxy nexus has around 8 hours of idle time if I have 4G on (this after doing a clean wipe not 1 month ago).
https://developer.android.com/about/versions/kitkat.html#44-...
This is a huge step forward for the development of HTML5 hybrid apps if it allows us to debug our app's embedded webviw. Good riddance console.log(*) debugging.
32gb black was available when only the 16gb white was available previously.
Also note that mine is a Google Play Dev Account, which may or not affect availability.
Or is it for the billion people who buy a phone from now on?
I just bought a n5 to upgrade. I love the keyboard, but I also want a more modern device.
> Sorry! Devices on Google Play is not available in your country yet.
Oh, wait, their "all" means "U.S., Canada, U.K., Australia, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Japan and Korea", ie 10 out of 200ish countries in the world.
If I wanted to waste half my screen on a keyboard I'd buy an iPhone.
Also, site's down I think, but apparently there's a new camera, haven't heard of much else