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Android overtakes Windows as the internet’s most used operating system

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Re: Android overtakes Windows as the internet’s most used operating system

#241

Post by dpark »

geodel wrote: post #190
dpark wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I imagine that's a purely business decision since Google owns the code and can open-source it if they wish. There's no reason that the code to talk to Google's servers needs to be closed source.

One reason is API change. For closed source solution they do not have to worry about API changes but open Android has to have much more elaborate API deprecation and change process.

This is incorrect for multiple reasons. The two big ones off the top of my head:

1. They could release source and provide no guarantee of supporting API backwards-compatibility, exactly as they do today, only with the source available publicly.

2. They already deal with API deprecation. Owning the client doesn't get it to every device instantly. Even logic pushed into Google Play Services requires a (sometimes lengthy) rollout and relies on customers to approve the install.

To be clear, the discussion isn't about whether Google should pull things out of AOSP and put them into Play Services. The discussion is about whether Google can open the source for those components. So long as Google owns the copyright, the answer is a clear yes.

Re: Android overtakes Windows as the internet’s most used operating system

#242

Post by bighi »

ezoe wrote: post #220

When I was a kid, I was frustrated for most of the adults can't use the computer so our society is very inefficient at daily life. I was thinking, since our generation has affordable personal computers, when our generation become adults, the world will finally embrace the efficiency of computer where everything is computer-friendly and everyone can write code. I was wrong. The birth of so called "smartphone" made eve…

> I refuse to own a smartphone.

That is your loss. You're blaming the tool instead of the people.

And then you renounce said tool, when it could be used (as the tool it is) to improve your life and your work. To create greater things.

Before the smartphones, people were made dumb by the TV. And before that, by the radio, and before that it was something else, and something else.

People that want to passively waste their time could always do that, and will keep doing.

Re: Android overtakes Windows as the internet’s most used operating system

#243

Post by dpark »

ksk wrote: post #150
rtkwe wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's kind of a demon of necessity though. Originally they did things more in the base OS but getting manufacturers to actually push updates was horrible. Now they can do bug, (minor) security and feature updates through a side channel that bypasses the carriers who don't want to update their older phones when people might go buy new ones instead.

Well, for one they got manufacturers to adopt Google branding for Android phones, but then we're led to believe that getting them to update on time was hard. But from Google's POV, the only "necessity" here is that Google gets your data and tracks you.

> but then we're led to believe that getting them to update on time was hard

"Led to believe"? Is there any dispute about the fact that most Android manufacturers deliver major updates very slowly and often not at all?

Re: Android overtakes Windows as the internet’s most used operating system

#244

Post by digi_owl »

thinkling wrote: post #114
ReverseCold wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Qualcomm distributes firmware blobs. Once the blob is out of date you cannot use it on a newer version of Android. (And device manufacturers do this too, but it's a ton easier to, say, fix flash with a shim than it is to fix networking.)

Pardon my ignorance, but... doesn't Android run on top of the firmware? You're saying newer versions of Android are breaking backward compatibility with older firmware?

Its a bit more complicated than that.

Quite often these days when a part is initialized, the driver uploads firmware as part of that.

If you look at most Linux distros they have a package of firmwares that various companies have allowed to be distributed with the kernel.

Meaning there is a small part of the Qualcomm blob that needs to interface with the kernel to upload the firmware.

And the interface changes as the kernel changes. This because Linux devs don't want the hassle of trying to debug a kernel panic only to find that it is happening inside a third party blob, and thus they can't fix it. Instead they want companies to either work with them to maintain drivers or hand them the information needed to maintain a open driver within the kernel source.

Re: Android overtakes Windows as the internet’s most used operating system

#245

Post by floatboth »

ezoe wrote: post #220

When I was a kid, I was frustrated for most of the adults can't use the computer so our society is very inefficient at daily life. I was thinking, since our generation has affordable personal computers, when our generation become adults, the world will finally embrace the efficiency of computer where everything is computer-friendly and everyone can write code. I was wrong. The birth of so called "smartphone" made eve…

Come on, you're exaggerating.

> tried so hard to prevent me to replace OS, modify the software, writing code and text

It's pretty easy to install a new OS on a typical Android phone. 1 million registered LineageOS installations already, many many millions of CyanogenMod installations before that.

How do smartphones try to prevent you from writing code and text? Apple even made this: https://www.apple.com/swift/playgrounds/ For the iPad, of course, because phones are small… but not impossible to use for code. I have edited websites over SFTP with https://textasticapp.com/iphone.html on an iPhone 4 back in the day! Also don't forget http://omz-software.com/pythonista/ And you can make Android apps on an Android phone: http://www.android-ide.com

Honestly the worry about "omg smartphones are turning everyone into consumers who don't create anything" is ridiculous. People write blog posts, edit photos and videos on smartphones a lot. A LOT.

> a handful of people who can use efficient input device, the keyboard

I really like my mechanical keyboard with blank keycaps, but I do type a lot on my phone's onscreen keyboard as well, and it is pretty efficient!

Re: Android overtakes Windows as the internet’s most used operating system

#246

Post by bighi »

georgeecollins wrote: post #18

When I was younger there IBM, Apple, Be, and Microsoft were all working on these amazing new operating systems. Now the #1, #3, #4 most popular operating systems are all some variation on Unix. What happened? Why did no one except Microsoft come up with a new operating system worthy of mass adoption?

Linux and others are indeed new operating systems. They just decided to follow some of the standards used in Unix.

Re: Android overtakes Windows as the internet’s most used operating system

#247

Post by dmitrygr »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #109
rb808 wrote: post #20

Does that mean google can't bundle a web browser with the operating system now?

Google now has: The dominant operating system, the dominant web browser, the dominant search engine, and the dominant email service. They bundle all of these together and make them relatively independent, and there still isn't an antitrust suit in the US. This is where all the money Google pours into government comes into play.

On Android on most phones Chrome does not come preinstalled. Samsung, LGE, etc all ship their won browsers. Users must actively seek out chrome and install it themselves...

So no at all like IE/MS in the 90s

Re: Android overtakes Windows as the internet’s most used operating system

#248

Post by digi_owl »

ezoe wrote: post #220

When I was a kid, I was frustrated for most of the adults can't use the computer so our society is very inefficient at daily life. I was thinking, since our generation has affordable personal computers, when our generation become adults, the world will finally embrace the efficiency of computer where everything is computer-friendly and everyone can write code. I was wrong. The birth of so called "smartphone" made eve…

Writing code, outside of spaghetti BASIC and similar, is a full time job. It requires hours and hours of thinking and planning.

People already have full time jobs, sometimes two or more. The last thing they want is another, likely unpaid one, when they come home and sit down before the computer.

Re: Android overtakes Windows as the internet’s most used operating system

#249

Post by yokohummer7 »

Shank wrote: post #185
narrator wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just to play devil's advocate: Windows became the dominant platform when it had terrible security. Android became the dominant platform when it had terrible security. Maybe people don't care that much about security vs other features. At it's low point, Windows security was a lot worse than Android security. At one point, a fresh Windows XP machine plugged into the Internet would be compromised within a couple of min…

I don't really understand this metric at all. I've heard it colloquially, but I highly doubt anyone was scanning IP address ranges so often that you could be passively attacked on the internet without any interaction by two minutes in. Even more so, people are often behind NAT, which acts as a good firewall on its own. Maybe it's related to browsing habits? IE? I mean, you aren't going to get hit by a drive-by attack…

It may sound crazy, but I did suffer from it myself. My Windows XP installation was guaranteed to be infected by the worm, because like you said, without any interaction (I didn't even open up the browser, to make sure I was not crazy), the Blaster worm was often sent from somewhere in the Internet during the installation procedure. Even if it wasn't, there was not enough time for me to run Windows Update before my computer being infected, because the infamous "your computer should restart now" message always displayed several minutes after the installation was done. So back in the days, I always made sure to turn off the DMZ before reinstalling Windows XP.

You could check how frequent the attacks were by yourself. I was using a custom firewall software, called ZoneAlarm, to see how many attacks I was receiving in a day. The log said literally every few minutes, the infectious Blaster worm packet was received. It was like how frequent your SSH server is attacked with random passwords - you can see this from the SSH server log too.

Re: Android overtakes Windows as the internet’s most used operating system

#250

Post by digi_owl »

floatboth wrote: post #245
ezoe wrote: post #220

When I was a kid, I was frustrated for most of the adults can't use the computer so our society is very inefficient at daily life. I was thinking, since our generation has affordable personal computers, when our generation become adults, the world will finally embrace the efficiency of computer where everything is computer-friendly and everyone can write code. I was wrong. The birth of so called "smartphone" made eve…

Come on, you're exaggerating. > tried so hard to prevent me to replace OS, modify the software, writing code and text It's pretty easy to install a new OS on a typical Android phone. 1 million registered LineageOS installations already, many many millions of CyanogenMod installations before that. How do smartphones try to prevent you from writing code and text? Apple even made this: https://www.apple.com/swift/playgr…

that is highly dependent on how close to "flagship" your brand and model of phone is.

For every S7 (or S8 these days) there will be 100s and 100s of cheap ones sold that nobody over at XDA or similar with ever grace with an alternative firmware.

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