Android 4.1 Jelly Bean is now available • Hacker News Board

Re: Android 4.1 Jelly Bean is now available

#111

Post by rprasad » Thu, Jun 28, 2012, 1:16 AM UTC

zmmmmm wrote: post #105

rprasad wrote: post #76

My phone, purchased brand-new last summer (the model itself is almost, but not quite a year old), still runs Android 2.3. It will run Android 2.3 forever, even though Google owns the company that made it. Jelly Bean, released last year, is still on less than 10% of all Android phones, and may never even exceed 15%. If Google can't get its act together on the update situation, a lot of people, myself included, will no…

What I find disingenuous about this line of argument is that you (and everybody who argues it) know full well that you will not be keeping your current phone "forever", and in fact, it's almost 100% certain you will replace it within 2 years if not 12 months simply because of the 2 year upgrade cycle that exists in many carriers or if not, because of the lure of next generation hardware will convince you to buy a new…

Whoops you are right. I meant Ice Cream Sandwich, not Jelly Bean.

But my point stands. Most people buy new phones on a 2 year cycle when their contract expires. I buy phones on a 2-year cycle.

I am not expecting tremendous engineering resources to be spent on porting on bleeding edge OS to an obsolete phone. I am expecting some resources to be spent on porting my phone to an OS that was announced and available to OEMs when my phone was released. I am expecting an OS to be released on a phone which has the hardware to support it.

I am stuck with an outdated OS thanks to Google, becaues they won't do a damn thing to pressure carriers or manufacturers to remedy the update situation.

And you know what? The money I use to buy my phone is my money. When the time comes to vote with my wallet, if Google has not fixed the update situation it created, I will vote for something other than Android.

Re: Android 4.1 Jelly Bean is now available

#112

Post by bmunro » Thu, Jun 28, 2012, 1:23 AM UTC

nilliams wrote: post #52

sigkill wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. I've got the Old Transformer 101, and the Galaxy S2. Both are totally smooth which is why I was confused as to what you were referring to.

Not trolling, but as a followup to my above post, I can't believe you think the S2 is smooth, have you compared it to an iPad 2/3?

The Galaxy S2 is a phone. I think that you are thinking of the Galaxy Tab 2, a tablet.

Re: Android 4.1 Jelly Bean is now available

#113

Post by nickpresta » Thu, Jun 28, 2012, 1:40 AM UTC

Audio chaining

MediaPlayer supports chaining audio streams together to play audio files without pauses. This is useful for apps that require seamless transitions between audio files such as music players to play albums with continuous tracks or games.

Best feature by far!

Re: Android 4.1 Jelly Bean is now available

#114

Post by caf » Thu, Jun 28, 2012, 2:03 AM UTC

javajosh wrote: post #5

Until the fragmentation problem is fixed, every new Android release only fills me with dread. Normally when new versions of frameworks or software that I use come out, I like it. Except Android, because every new version of Android has lots of nice features that I won't be able to use and it is guaranteed to further fragment of the marketplace. Android is the (old) Internet Explorer of mobile. I've never seen one app…

It seems to me that the easiest way that Google could do this would be to create a "Perfect Android" branding or similar, which has some tight rules around licensing - to qualify, a device would have to meet a set of minimum hardware specs and the manufacturer and carriers would have to sign up to providing timely updates to the latest version that Google produces over the next N years. Google, for its part, would guarantee that those newer versions for the next N years will run well on the minimum hardware specs agreed to.

Re: Android 4.1 Jelly Bean is now available

#115

Post by cookiecaper » Thu, Jun 28, 2012, 2:20 AM UTC

taligent wrote: post #46

cookiecaper wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW you can get ICS on that phone, just not officially. If you aren't going to buy a Nexus, you have to accept the fate of sparse official/OTA updates if you're lucky enough to get any at all. This is the fault of carriers and the ignorant masses that prop them up. An alternative exists if you're interested; buy Nexus line.

I've never understood this ridiculous "it's the carriers" argument. Apple doesn't have a problem with releasing timely updates. So how come the Android OEMs can't ?

>Apple doesn't have a problem with releasing timely updates. So how come the Android OEMs can't ?

Because Android doesn't have the same ridiculous cult around it that Apple does. The iPhone made enough money to make carriers beg Apple to let them carry their phone -- more often it's the other way around, which is why bloatware and disabled features and all that other stuff infects every non-Apple phone. The demand for iPhone is astronomical, and that is the only reason Apple is in a position to instruct the carrier. If normal OEMs try this, the carrier will simply destock their items, remove the subsidy, and the OEM will never get any meaningful sales.

Re: Android 4.1 Jelly Bean is now available

#116

Post by galadriel » Thu, Jun 28, 2012, 2:38 AM UTC

rprasad wrote: post #111

zmmmmm wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I find disingenuous about this line of argument is that you (and everybody who argues it) know full well that you will not be keeping your current phone "forever", and in fact, it's almost 100% certain you will replace it within 2 years if not 12 months simply because of the 2 year upgrade cycle that exists in many carriers or if not, because of the lure of next generation hardware will convince you to buy a new…

Whoops you are right. I meant Ice Cream Sandwich, not Jelly Bean. But my point stands. Most people buy new phones on a 2 year cycle when their contract expires. I buy phones on a 2-year cycle. I am not expecting tremendous engineering resources to be spent on porting on bleeding edge OS to an obsolete phone. I am expecting some resources to be spent on porting my phone to an OS that was announced and available to OEM…

Google will never fix the situation on devices it doesn't sells itself, because it cannot. They cannot force manufacturers to provide update, because most consumers don't care. If you want a well updated phone, get a Galaxy Nexus. Apart from it, the only other phone in market guaranteed to be updated is iPhone.

Better yet, consider switching to prepaid, and you will be less annoyed every time your carrier withholds the update. Most of the international versions do get updated, even if their record is not as stellar as Google/Apple.

Re: Android 4.1 Jelly Bean is now available

#117

Post by andrewfelix » Thu, Jun 28, 2012, 2:54 AM UTC

javajosh wrote: post #8

drivebyacct2 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There's a lot of money to be made and they'll get in line The fact that that's not true is precisely why timely upgrades aren't done. Verizon and Motorola sold you that Droid RAZR. They get nothing from spending engineer time to update it. Also, what is this implication that Google is just being lazy or has some incentive to not have everyone running the latest OS. You really think Google so powerful that they can…

Apple gets "nothing" from engineering their upgrades to be backwards compatible. That is, if "nothing" means being incredibly successful. People are actually rather smart about things like this, and they know that the iPhone "just works" and will continue to work, and that is a huge competitive advantage. And long-term competitive advantage is one of the classic components of "maximizing shareholder value". So yes, p…

This isn't your personal email account. Hacker News is about informed discussion and debate. If you don't want people to engage you I have two suggestions; 1) Don't post your comments here. 2) Stop being intentionally provocative.

Re: Android 4.1 Jelly Bean is now available

#118

Post by rbanffy » Thu, Jun 28, 2012, 3:10 AM UTC

jsz0 wrote: post #85

glogla wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really. First of all, free/open source software is not really "alpha/beta quality software from untrusted source" and suggesting it is, is pretty much trolling. Second, Google is not the only one manufacturer (in the borad sense) that keeps it's phones up-to-date, for example Sony recently released 4.0 upgrade for it's 2011 models. Third, I know it tends to be pretty common in the US, but if you are buying subsid…

CM9 is only at the release candidate stage for ICS so by their own definition it's beta / un-stable. For my device it's not even officially supported so I rely on random zip files I find in forums for updates. Pretty sketchy stuff.

Why don't you read the howtos and compile your own version? It's not that scary and you get bleeding edge.

And I trust a open-source beta more than I trust most "production grade" proprietary tools.

Re: Android 4.1 Jelly Bean is now available

#119

Post by yelkeew » Thu, Jun 28, 2012, 3:56 AM UTC

saurik wrote: post #3

Really? I thought the keynote explicitly said the SDK would be available today, but that neither the source code nor the binary updates would be pushed to the public (as opposed to hardware manufacturers, who now have ahead-of-time PDK access) until mid-July. (edit: In addition, the Nexus 7, running Jelly Bean, while available to purchase today, will itself not be shipping until mid-July. I really don't think it is a…

I cloned the manifest project and checked the tags; there aren't any 4.1+ tags present yet. I'd imagine there would be a JBQ post (like this, https://groups.google.com/group/android-building/msg/c0e01b4...) announcing Android 4.1 availability if the source were already available.

Re: Android 4.1 Jelly Bean is now available

#120

Post by zanny » Thu, Jun 28, 2012, 4:51 AM UTC

timdorr wrote: post #69

javajosh wrote: post #67

Let me offer a solution: It's time for Google to offer a Google+ Certification for Android. These certified devices would have two important characteristics: 1. They are guaranteed to run the latest version of Android for 5 years. 2. They are guaranteed to have a clean version of Android, without any carrier or device maker modifications. No doubt the marketing people can come up with other things to add to the list,…

This is great. The only thing I have a gripe with is: > They are guaranteed to run the latest version of Android for 5 years. 5 years is too long. The HTC Dream, the first Android phone, was released less than 4 years ago. It only has a 528Mhz processor and 192MB of RAM. I don't want to know what the ICS or JB experience would be on that device... Keep in mind the iPhone only turned 5 this year (the App Store turns 4…

The problem with this argument is that we don't have any more extreme strides in mobile performance in the next 5 years. We already have phones that can effectively run any intensity of "eye candy" with spiff - by the time such a policy came to market in 2 years, it would be 2014 - unless we have a revolution in tech that lets us crank up the ghz without dramatically increasing the voltage to match, any arm based device for Android will be able to run any degree of eye candy they can add in in the "short term".

Back in 2008, we could easily see that the 500mhz single core ARM chip was going to be short lived. We had tremendous strides in performance available to us in just upping core clocks, and then we had the mobile multicore revolution.

We are done with both the main vein and the secondary digs of the mobile CPU goldmine (in reference to Herb here) and we are already pretty deep into heterogeneous computing. Remote processing is next, when the telecom monopoly is torn down so we can get the data speeds we are actually capable of today without paying monopoly rates.

The hardware WILL get significantly better between 2014 and 2019 - a 2019 smartphone will almost assuredly be as powerful as the 2014 consoles that will be coming out for gaming - but we can actually predict that. A 2014 console will have approximately a GCN 7850 graphics card and quad core 3.5 ghz cpu of some sort. So expect the mobile chip of 2019 to operate at ~4ghz with some number of cores and a lot of compute nodes approximately equivalent to modern mainstream desktop graphics at similar wattages to what we have now.

If the version of Android in 2019 can't run on an Android device of 2014, then that isn't the hardware not keeping up with software - that is just terrible design. Just like how desktop hardware peaked in 2006, mobile hardware will peak soon as well, after which performance is "good enough" for average joe consumer, and the UX won't change.

Another good example is how Google can keep pumping out new versions of Chrome without hesitation that the last version's user can run the new version. The browser is not getting exponentially more power or resource hungry, and in many ways they optimize its performance as much as they sacrifice it each release for better experience (of course things like webgl are pressuring browsers upwards with new usage in an environment without resource contraints) but the basic device, or in this case application, is not growing more and more computationally intensive by large jumps each release, or they would not be able to push out silent updates like they do.

Same thing with Android. Once it plateaus, there is no excuse not to use the silent continuous always backwards compatble update model, because the device is now "good enough". Just like how a dual core 3ghz pc from 2005 with 4gb of ram is still good enough today for 95% of use cases.