Developer Cyanogen has modified Google’s Android 2.1 mobile operating system to endow Google’s Nexus One smartphone with multitouch, which lets users navigate the device with more than one finger at once. The absence of this function has been a the source of great consternation for some users, and many speculate the reasons are legal in nature. Some believe Apple has locked down multitouch patents and guards them. Erick Tseng, product manager of Android at Google, attempted to clarify Google’s position when in an interview with Engadget.

A developer has modified Google’s Android 2.1 mobile operating system to endow Google’s Nexus One smartphone with multitouch, which lets users navigate the device with more than one finger at once.

Wired found out that Steve Kondik, whose developer handle is Cyanogen, Jan. 21 released files and code to enable fellow developers to add multitouch to the device.  
Google began selling through its Webstore Jan. 5 and users quickly noticed that multitouch was not active on the device. Pinch-to-zoom, popularized by Apple’s iPhone, is the most common multitouch use case.

Many Android smartphone users want their Android devices to be the iPhone without actually being an iPhone. In other words, they want a quality smartphone that isn’t made by Apple and ruled by its Draconian application farm.

Some Android devices, such as the Android 1.6- based HTC Droid Eris, was released to the market with active pinch-to-zoom capability. However, neither the Android 2.0-based Motorola Droid nor the 2.1-based Nexus One were released with active pinch-to-zoom.

The absence of this function has been a the source of great consternation for some users, and many speculate the reasons are legal in nature.

Some believe Apple has locked down multitouch patents and guards them. However, Google Android creator Andy Rubin has said Google would consider activating multitouch on the Nexus One in the future.

Multitouch on the Nexus One looks like this.  However, there are two caveats to Kondik’s solution, one trivial, one serious. Kondik said hackers who modify their Nexus One will initially lose their bookmarks and browser settings by doing this. Second, hacking the phone could also void its warranty.

Phone makers don’t like it when their devices suffer jailbreaks. Google, which is imposing a $350 equipment recovery fee for Nexus One owners who buy the phone and cancel their T-Mobile service within the first four months, is likely no exception.

Meanwhile, Erick Tseng, product manager of Android at Google, attempted to clarify Google’s position when he told Engadget Jan. 19:

“When people say ‘why doesn’t Android have multitouch?’ it’s not a question of ‘multitouch’… I want to reframe the question. We have multitouch — what people are asking for is specific implementations in the UI that use multitouch, like pinch-to-zoom, or chording on the keyboard.”

Engadget’s Nilay Patel cut through the semantic tap-dancing, noting that the lack of specific multitouch implementations is still a huge issue and become a growing distraction for Android. In fact, he compared it to the brouhaha generated by the lack of copy-and-paste before iPhone OS 3.0 came out.

Some folks are just harder to please than others. Patel also asked the right questions about why Google didn’t use Motorola’s pinch-to-zoom code in the Droid, but used HTC’s code in the Droid Eris, only to not use it in its new Nexus One.

“Until someone can answer these questions in a reasonable way, they’re going to keep coming up over and over again,” Patel noted. “Google prides itself on transparency and openness, and a secret deal forbidding Android from having pinch-to-zoom flies in the face of that culture.”

Could be that Google has an agreement with Apple to not use pinch-to-zoom in certain instances, putting Google at a major disadvantage as it seeks to expand Android’s footprint in the uber-competitive smartphone market.

[via eWeek]

Google (NSDQ:GOOG)’s Android Market has crossed the 20,000 applications mark and is continuing to grow at a rapid clip, having nearly doubled in size in the last five months, according to a third-party portal.

A 20,000-app strong Android Market still puts Google well behind the titanic that is Apple’s App Store, but the progress suggests the Android Market is poised for explosive growth next year.

The 20,000 apps statistic comes from AndroLib, a portal and applications tracker that looked at the distribution of free and paid applications in Android Market and on Tuesday had the Android Market at more than 20,140 applications. Of those applications, about 62 percent are free and 38 percent are paid, according to AndroLib. Google’s Android Market saw the most software added in November 2009, around the time Motorola’s Droid smartphone was launched, AndroLib found.

Google CEO Eric Schmidt earlier this year suggested that Android’s growth would be explosive, and indeed, many of the fall’s hottest smartphones — from Motorola (NYSE:MOT), HTC, Samsung and others — run on the Android platform. Google itself has a Google-branded smartphone in the works called the Nexus One, scant details of which have started to emerge this week.

Most analysts suggest Apple (NSDQ:AAPL)’s App Store will hit 300,000 applications in 2010, with the Android Market expected to hit 50,000. In a presentation at the Raymond James IT Supply Chain conference in New York Tuesday, IDC Chief Research Officer John Gantz urged attendees to keep a sharp eye on how Google’s Android grows.

“Android is very distantly following the iPhone right now, but there will be some very interesting developmnts around the Google Android [platform] in the next 12 months,” said Gantz, who also predicted a “developer war like you’ve never seen” thanks to the number of mobile Internet users hitting 1 billion for the first time next year.

[via ChannelWeb]

Called the Nexus One, the Google phone is coming in January 2010 after Google admitted it had given employees devices to test. The Android operating system device resembles the unlocked HTC Touch, runs Android 2.1 on a Snapdragon chip and has two microphones. There is also reportedly voice to text features for the phone. Google crafted and customized the smartphone’s software and will sell the device online. This is a leap for Google, which has never sold hardware and has been content to furiously upgrade the Android OS and let carriers T-Mobile, Verizon Wireless and Sprint sell Android phones.

 

 

 

The Google phone is real and it is coming in January 2010 to challenge Apple’s vaunted iPhone, according to a deluge of press reports in the wake of Google’s acknowledgment that a special device with new mobile features and functionality is being tested by its employees.

The Android operating system-based device, which people are calling Nexus One, resembles the unlocked HTC Touch, lacking a physical keyboard. It is also apparently larger and thinner those devices, perhaps coming close to the screen size of the Motorola Droid phone.

The device runs Android 2.1 (the Droid runs Android 2.0) on a Snapdragon chip and has two microphones. There is also reportedly voice to text features for the phone. The Unlockr has pictures of the device here.

Google ignited an avalanche of coverage when it gave devices to employees Friday for dogfooding, part of the company’s test process for soliciting feedback and suggestions. TechCrunch uncovered several tweets from Google employees who raved about the device, even when they were not supposed to discuss it.

“A friend from Google showed me the new Android 2.1 phone from HTC coming out in Jan,” wrote the GreatWhiteSnark in a poetic tweet. “A sexy beast. Like an iPhone on beautifying steroids.”

Google felt compelled to respond to questions about whether this so-called Google phone, a device the company is creating with a hardware partner but selling itself as a GSM phone independent of carrier help, Dec. 12.

Mario Queiroz, vice president of product management at Google, wrote in a company blog post:

“We recently came up with the concept of a mobile lab, which is a device that combines innovative hardware from a partner with software that runs on Android to experiment with new mobile features and capabilities, and we shared this device with Google employees across the globe. This means they get to test out a new technology and help improve it.Unfortunately, because dogfooding is a process exclusively for Google employees, we cannot share specific product details. We hope to share more after our dogfood diet.”

Given Qeuiroz’ comments, it is quite likely the device is this very same Android Developer Phone 2 in a shadowy picture on the Android Developer Web site here. Google began offering SIM-unlocked gadgets for $399 a year ago this month to let programmers test and debug Android applications.

The Wall Street Journal meanwhile confirmed previous reports and added some details (paywall warning), confirming that it is an HTC-built smartphone upon which Google crafted and customized the software and will sell it online.

This is a leap for Google, which has never sold hardware and has been content to upgrade the Android OS and let carriers T-Mobile, Verizon Wireless and Sprint sell Android phones. That Google is allegedly eschewing the carrier crutch marks a bold step for the company for which there are many reasons.

Experts believe Google is doing this because Android is fragmenting — too many operating systems and custom firmware builds — and Google wants to make a device with which it is completely satisfied. Om Malik wrote:

Others say Google wants to “own” the device because carriers hew to the competition and and can get downright Draconian about what features run on devices they sell.

For example, the Google phone is expected to feature the company’s Google Voice phone management application. Verizon has said it would support Google Voice, though Apple rejected it from running on its iPhone, which is sold exclusively by AT&T.

Experts expect the iPhone to appear on other carrier networks in 2010; a Google phone such as the Nexus One could facilitate that move.

[via eWeek]

 

In my last post, “Smartphones’ biggest drawback? Terms of service,” I shared my experience with my previous smartphone, the HTC XV6800 (TyTN), and how I came to acquire Verizon’s new Droid.

As far as terms of service, Verizon has changed their stupid GPS policy with new devices. GPS is a sweet experience, despite the fact that Google MySQL DBs are surely recording every action of every moment of your everyday life and trying to figure out how to monetize all of those things by delivering ads that will make you spend more money.

The ads, which appear as you move from app to app within the Droid, are so non-intrusive that when you DO realize that there are ads on the screen, it’s somewhat startling. But the most surprising, unexpected thing about the Droid, is that it’s actually, truly, a stealthy Google Phone (gPhone). That fact seems to have been lost by the tech industry and journalists. You don’t really activate the Droid until you enter your Google account – and once you do, watch out.

My Droid grabbed all kinds of information – contacts from my corporate account, personal account, and Facebook – and integrated it into the most cohesive and well-organized address book I’ve ever had. And it did this without asking me, telling me, or with me even realizing that this was going to happen. It did this flawlessly, but it was also a little spooky going into my Contacts book and seeing profiles of friends from FB, along with their FB pictures, who had never been in my personal contacts list before.

Google has successfully consolidated and seamlessly integrated YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, plus GoogleDocs, GoogleVoice, and GoogleReader, which all come together within the cloud. In fact, my experience with the Droid illustrates how neatly Google has been working to position themselves as the central broker in all transactions that take place in your digital life.

For example, I decided to use my Droid to post a video to YouTube and share the YouTube post via FB. To my surprise, when I opened the YouTube app, it took me to a YouTube account I’d forgotten that I had. Google hadn’t forgotten this account, though. Google is the giant, pink cyber-elephant in the room – and Google doesn’t forget.

I’m convinced that Google’s master plan is to get you to use as many services and features as possible so that your smartphone is always turned on, in your hands, and in front of your eyes. Ultimately, Google isn’t a search engine or a cloud-based app delivery company – it’s an information warehouse. Google is advertising, as much as McDonald’s is actually a real-estate company.

If this sounds like a negative review, let me be clear – creepy invasion of privacy and being cyber stalked by a multi-national global company has never been so enjoyable. The Droid’s ability to integrate, organize, and consolidate your entire digital life — your accounts, apps, sites, and digital information – is super convenient. I’d even go so far to say that it’s the world’s most efficient, accurate, and effective PDA to date.

And that’s the one HUGE thing Droid does that the OTHER one – the one with the fruit on the back of it – DOESN’T. The iPhone cannot match the level of integration that the Droid delivers because of the nature of the Google-ness underlying the device, services, and features. And even if that weren’t the case, Google threw in the turn-by-turn GPS to seal the deal.

However, these benefits don’t mean that the Droid is an iPhone “killer.” Droid apps are rougher, less-polished, and there’s a lot more evidence of the DIY, home-rolled Linux community core in the Droid apps – and frankly, that isn’t going to appeal to the broader consumer audience in the way that iPhone apps do.

Despite that, the 10,000 or so apps in the official Android marketplace are overwhelming. There are also several sources for “non-market” apps that don’t require you to do any special “jailbreak” of your phone or otherwise bypass security. We’ll see if Verizon leaves this untouched in the future – but for right now, that’s a significant advantage to the Droid market.

Clearly, the iPhone is the primary competition for the Droid and vice versa. Having 100,000 apps versus 10,000 apps seems kind of like having 40,000 nuclear missiles versus 4,500 nuclear missiles, when 1,500 would be enough to wipe out life on the entire planet. I understand that there are some “special” titles on the iPhone, especially commercial games, that haven’t made their way to Android yet. Time will tell if this is a technical limitation or simply that Android didn’t have the critical mass to attract those game makers. I suspect it is more the latter than the former.

Here are a few drawbacks of the Verizon Droid:

• Application management seems a little clunky. Apps exist in a folder or drawer, and if you download an app, it goes into this bucket. You can drag and drop your apps onto one of three desktops, but there isn’t a lot of “management” or organization to the scheme.
• Having MultiTouch disabled, even though PicSay illustrates that the device is MultiTouch-capable, is probably an attempt to avoid a patent lawsuit by Apple – and the touch to zoom works ok, but it still sucks to have to make concessions like that.
• I also think Verizon’s insistence to charge an outrageous additional fee for tethering is ill-advised. Your 5GB unlimited data should be yours to use however you like, hooked up to whatever you want. However, if Verizon wants to put a “high-bandwidth usage” cap on anything exceeding the 5GB unlimited plan, that seems fair to me. What would truly be ideal is if some other major carrier (no, not T-Mobile… I said a MAJOR carrier) responded by allowing free tethering with an unlimited data plan.

Together, Apple and Google will begin to influence how wireless communications companies do business. I also think that Apple and Google will see the benefit in adding free and inexpensive features that are a value-add to consumers, whereas wireless carriers only have the incentive to monetize every bit of service they can in any way possible.

Frankly, I expect AT&T and Verizon will experience what it feels like to be a faceless customer that can easily be replaced and is only welcome as long as they are useful and generating positive growth and income (after all, Google wants to deliver ads – and they don’t exactly care where you are or what you’re using when you get those ads). I’m kind of excited by that prospect, because wireless carriers have got it coming.

The big change that the Droid brings isn’t the device itself, but rather how it positions Google – and how it exposes how carefully Google has been positioning themselves. The proof of concept is finally there in a way that’s going to start attracting people outside of the tech bleeding edge.

For good or bad, the experience delivers in a way that’s bound to appeal. I’m just not sure what we’re giving away to get to that point. At some time in the future, I may wish for the simple days back, when Verizon took advantage of me by charging me twice for the same service. Of course, that will be my last laugh – if Google, using Linux, delivers themselves to a place where they are far worse than Microsoft ever dreamed of being.

 

[via Tech Republic]

 

When Google announced its Chrome OS, there was one question we kept asking in the back of our heads: what’s going to happen to Android? Android, Google’s mobile operating system, is coming to netbooks next month. But Chrome OS is also starting with netbooks, so where does that leave Google’s other operating system?

Apparently, Android has found a new market for assimilation: home appliances. According to a report on Forbes, a wave of touch-screen devices are about to be unleashed on the market later this year. They will be capable of everything from controlling your lights to managing your stereo remotely. Oh, and all of these devices are going to run on the open-source Android platform.

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Android’s “Touch Revolution”

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Touch Revolution, a company that builds the touch screens and provides the Android features for these types of devices, makes the assertion that well-known companies are coming out with home management tools this year that will run on the Android OS. In fact, the company divides them into three categories:

1. Home control devices: These will be touchscreen platforms that can activate and manage security, control the house lights, or switch off the A/C
2. Media control devices: More adept remote control over things like DVRs and stereos
3. Home Phones: What Touch Revolution calls “smart phones for the home”

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A new purpose for Android

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While we see the utility in these types of devices, you may be wondering why they would pick Google Android for this sort of thing. The Forbes article touches on that too:

“Why use Android at all? Brown says its partners liked the operating system’s ease of use, openness and touch-centric features. They also regarded it as a bargain since Google is distributing it for free.”

Android was originally built for touch-screen phones, and thus a modified Android OS for touch screen tablets and devices seems only logical. Google Chrome OS, on the other hand, will focus on web applications and load speeds.

So it looks like Androids will soon be running our toasters and Chromes will eventually be powering our netboooks. That’s both really cool and a little scary at the same time.

by Ben Parr

Locale is an app that let’s you take control of the settings of your phone based on specific conditions that you can choose from. Locale essentially automates all of the functions that you would normally have to switch manually after you configure it to fit your needs.

There are two different areas of Locale that you’ll need to setup: Default and Situations. Each one has a series of conditions you have to choose from. They are: Battery, Calendar, Contact, Location, and Time. Each one of these has their own series of options for you to configure. Once you configure the conditions you can move on to the settings tab. In this area you can pair changes and updates to your Network, Ringer Volume, Ringtone, Twitter, and Wallpaper to that specific Situation.

Where situations covers specific instances, default covers everything else. In default you can configure the base settings for Network, Ringer Volume, Ringtone, Twitter, and Wallpaper without worrying about any specific catalyst to set them off.

This is a really great app that makes using your phone a lot easier. You’ll definitely need to spend some time configuring everything to just how you want it before you’ll truly enjoy this app. After that, you won’t even have to think about it until you need to add another situation to your list.

“HEY APPLE!!!…F-U” -Love, Google

Apple rejected Google Voice almost two weeks ago, removing it from the app store. Now under investigation by the feds, AT&T has pointed the finger at Apple for the rejection. In an exciting move, Google is moving its rejected application online in an effort to essentially negate any attempts by Apple to police the application.

You will be able to link to it with a shortcut icon on your home screen. The specially crafted iPhone-shaped web page will offer all the features of the original app. They could be accomplishing this with HTML 5 app caching. In other words, in a move akin to flipping the bird to Steve Jobs, Google has essentially highlighted a way for app developers everywhere to easily publish their rejected content.

The move could usher in a new era of freedom for iPhone users. Freed from what Apple dictates are fit and proper apps, the phone’s true potential could finally be achieved. Rejected apps like eBook readers (rejected en masse over piracy concerns) could simply move online. As the New York Times’ Dave Pogue puts it, “What’s Apple going to do now? Start blocking access to individual Web sites?”

Google’s decision to defying Apple is an exciting development. And one thing’s for sure — Apple’s likely not happy and is likely trying to scheme how to stop them.

Android users on the other hand have had seamless Google Voice service as soon as they download the app from the Market.

Android got off to an admittedly rocky start when it first debuted on the T-Mobile G1. Since then the OS has proved to be popular and a strong contender in the marketplace. More phones are being introduced that run Android than most other operating systems right now.

Android is also starting to gain ground on the class leading iPhone for apps according to Flurry. According to the research firm the iPhone owns 79% of the applications market on a platform basis while Android holds 15% of the market and Blackberry holds a mere 3%.

The iPhone has 74% of the developers working on its platform compared to 22% of them working on Android and a scant 3% working on Blackberry apps. The company also says that Android users are more loyal than those using the iPhone are. Application user retention on Android devices is 83% within 30 days and only 63% for iPhone users after the same period. Android consumers used their applications significantly more frequently than their iPhone counterparts. 37% of iPhone consumers who downloaded applications used those applications fewer than 5 times per month (”superlight users”) with Android having only 11% in the superlight usage category. Toward the other end of the spectrum, 35% percent of Android users can be defined as “heavy users,” using applications more than 50 times per month, compared to only 15% on the iPhone.

Does this mean Android users are more sophisticated than iPhone users? After all most people I know, that have an iPhone, is because it’s trendy. They don’t even really use the thing other than as a phone and texting device.

[Read the full story on Flurry]

That’s right you don’t have to download apps only from the Google Android Market for your phone. You can download apps at an increasing number of sites. The one site that is currently standing out in the crowd is a place called SlideME which is an Android Community and Marketplace where developers can show case and sell their apps. Currently the SlideME Marketplace has a little over 200 apps which is dwarfed by the 5,000+ apps in the Google Market but they offer some unique apps like tethering. Apparently even Google has agreements with the cell phone providers and cannot offer tethering apps on their site. Another benefit is that people from anywhere in the world can use SlideME to purchase apps, where as the Google Market is mainly limited to the U.S. and the U.K.. And for developers SlideME has a feature called SlideLock to help protect their paid applications from being freely shared.

 

Check Out the SlideME Website:
http://www.slideme.org/

 

HowTo Install the SlideME App (Slide Sam)
This first part is needed for any external app:
NOTE: USE THIS AT YOUR OWN RISK! We take no responsibility for you breaking your phone, yada, yada, yada.

Goto “Settings” -> “Applications”
Then check the box for “Unknown Sources”, Allow Install of non-Market applications.
Exit back to the main screen

 

Now open the browser and go to “http://slideme.org/sam2.apk” to download the Slideme Market App
Once finished click on the downloaded application “sam2.apk”
Click “Install”
Click “Done” or “Open” to try out the application.
You should now have an app installed called “Slide Sam”. It works just like the Google Market App.
That’s it, have fun downloading more apps for your Android with the easy to use interface!

 

There are other stores emerging as well although not as advanced, like:
http://andappstore.com/
http://www.androlib.com/
http://www.androidfreeware.org/
http://www.cyrket.com/

 

This is in no way a complete list and I am sure more markets and download sites will be popping in the near future. You can also look for the developer’s main website for the application and sometimes you will find newer versions and alpha products that have not been released yet. This is great if you are having a problem with an app and can’t or don’t want to wait for and official update.

 

Happy Android App Hunting!

 

Article By: Daryll Bennett
Article Source: Google Android Blog

Sherpa, the location-based service from Geodelic got released early and is now available for download on the Android Market. The service automatically learns about your habits and shows relevance based on your surroundings without needing to search. Sherpa features passive personalization which enables the app to create a unique interest profile. It learns things like your favorite coffee shops, banks, and food types.

 

 

Download this app by going to “Market” on your phone and “Search” for “sherpa”.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here is a good video review from Androinica.com