Why are new Android phones still being announced and released without ICS?

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MrCrispy

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It's like someone selling a pc today with Vista instead of Windows 7.

It's absolutely ridiculous that someone can buy a new top of line Android phone today, and not know when, or even if, they'll get an ICS update.

Do the oem's/carriers even make any money from Sense/Blur/TouchWiz ? They spend months developing it, and these skins are almost universally hated. They have some nice features (esp Sense) but these should be a separate Market app (which they could even limit to their phones).

Blame for this must lie on Google, they simply don't care how fragmented the Android ecosystem gets. Just imagine how nice it would be if all apps were guaranteed the latest OS.
 
It's more the timeline of phone development. The Droid RAZR for example. ICS wasn't released when RAZR went into development. Motorola can't simply compile ICS for the RAZR and drop it on all the devices before being sold. Now shitty things like Sense, Blur and Touchwiz do come into play but there are also lib files that need to be updated to work correctly with ICS and what not. You should see some of the hacks the devs are using to get ICS to work on older phones without updated libs.
 
MrCrispy said:
Blame for this must lie on Google, they simply don't care how fragmented the Android ecosystem gets. Just imagine how nice it would be if all apps were guaranteed the latest OS.
Click to expand...

Well you are correct in that this is Google's fault. A while ago they mentioned that they were going to start a policy where new phones would have to be supported with OS updates for X months after release. OEMs and carriers start complaining and claimed high cost, but the fact is they are more concerned about planned obsolescence. Google immediately dropped the initiative and never mentioned it again.

Heck a lot of phones are still sold without even getting Froyo or Gingerbread updates...
 
The shitty stock roms like Blur/Sense/etc, aren't really made for the "power users" like us. They exist for the average joe that doesn't really like messing around with his phone and just wants everything to work out of the box. Also why they're loaded with a bunch of apps.
 
Vermillion said:
It's more the timeline of phone development. The Droid RAZR for example. ICS wasn't released when RAZR went into development. Motorola can't simply compile ICS for the RAZR and drop it on all the devices before being sold. Now shitty things like Sense, Blur and Touchwiz do come into play but there are also lib files that need to be updated to work correctly with ICS and what not. You should see some of the hacks the devs are using to get ICS to work on older phones without updated libs.
Click to expand...

The OEMs have the updated libs. This type of works looks hard as hell when non employees need to jump through hoops trying to get things to function correctly. For a company will full access to everything, the process of building a new phone release for basic Android isn't difficult. The problems (from the OEM side) come when they start including their bundled junk apps and new interfaces. Then shit starts to fall apart and no one wants to pay to fix it.
 
All about development, as Vermillion said, they made the phone and all teh software side prior to ICS's source code being released .... now you can a) delay product until you redo it all... or b) launch it and update later ....



and the blame probably isnt Google's fault .... the biggest point behind ICS is to lower the fragmentation of Tablets/Phones, i've also had little/no issues running any app on ICS that wasnt released specifically for ICS ....


As for the launchers, no they do not make money off of it to my knowledge, however it is one of the ways they differentiate their phone to the dumb masses who dont care about hardware other than "dual core" ... Sense IMHO is a pointless pile of shit and would love to never have it or any of it on my phone (thankfully i've got a nexus S), ..... as for them being universally hated i think that is a HUGE overstatment......pretty much EVERYONE I know that has an android device has not changed it , and do not bitch about their stock launcher......ranges from Moto -> Sammy -> HTC......even on sites like XDA there is a large percentage who still like Sense/Touchwiz (Blur no so much :D ) .
 
W.Feather said:
and the blame probably isnt Google's fault .... the biggest point behind ICS is to lower the fragmentation of Tablets/Phones, i've also had little/no issues running any app on ICS that wasnt released specifically for ICS ....
Click to expand...

Which is backwards, because releasing another new version of something causes fragmentation... :p Though I am glad to see that Google has basically eaten crow and had to admit that Honeycomb was a total disaster.
 
I love android and I do some development. That being said it's incredibly annoying that Google expects people to drop the menu button, got rid of the search button, and are trying to change things for ICS when NO ONE has it.

As far as I'm concerned, I target my apps for Froyo and would rather exclude ICS people if I had to until the market share caught up.
 
Catch 22, if they dont do it, then it stays fragmented :D But from this point on pretty much fragmentation *should* be better......shit ton of fragmentation > iOS shit though ...

ocellaris said:
Which is backwards, because releasing another new version of something causes fragmentation... :p Though I am glad to see that Google has basically eaten crow and had to admit that Honeycomb was a total disaster.
Click to expand...
 
vsboxerboy said:
I love android and I do some development. That being said it's incredibly annoying that Google expects people to drop the menu button, got rid of the search button, and are trying to change things for ICS when NO ONE has it.

As far as I'm concerned, I target my apps for Froyo and would rather exclude ICS people if I had to until the market share caught up.
Click to expand...

can't you do just that? skip ICS support and only target earlier versions? Or do you always have to use the latest SDK to publish apps on their store (which omits the other buttons)?

Maybe I'm the only one, but I'm actually psyched that some 'em are being dropped. It seems that EVERY SINGLE time a friend or family member hands me an android phone to look at a picture or whatever, I end up messing it up by accidentally touching one of the buttons on the front of the phone. Maybe you just need to get used to having them there, but it never fails... every time.
 
dr.stevil said:
can't you do just that? skip ICS support and only target earlier versions? Or do you always have to use the latest SDK to publish apps on their store (which omits the other buttons)?

Maybe I'm the only one, but I'm actually psyched that some 'em are being dropped. It seems that EVERY SINGLE time a friend or family member hands me an android phone to look at a picture or whatever, I end up messing it up by accidentally touching one of the buttons on the front of the phone. Maybe you just need to get used to having them there, but it never fails... every time.
Click to expand...

There will still be buttons there, just different buttons than they have on the phones now (and 3 buttons instead of 4).
 
This bothers me, too. It isn't Google's failure, not anymore. It is the manufacturers' and carriers' fault - they don't care what old software is running on their phones, and they're most certainly not going to put much energy into updating existing designs to support new software. It would cost them money that they aren't willing to spend just to increase customer satisfaction.

As someone who used to love HTC's phones for HTC Sense - right until the arrival of GB, stock Android sucked - it saddens me to see a new phone being released with old software every week. Not because the old software is bad, but because the new software is better and seems to be ignored. Other manufacturers (I'm thinking Motorola here) are making fools of themselves as well.

My next phone is going to be a Nexus - or a non-Android.
 
dr.stevil said:
can't you do just that? skip ICS support and only target earlier versions? Or do you always have to use the latest SDK to publish apps on their store (which omits the other buttons)?
Click to expand...

Yeah, you can do that. I guess what I'm whining about is more of a larger issue of that now I have to write differently for >= ICS and for < Honeycomb becasue of fragments, actionbar, and lack of buttons. I'm cool with the hardware buttons going, but it's annoying that the search and menu buttons are gone because I use those in my apps all the time. I now have to take up screen space to put in a search button.

But yeah, all Google's docs talk about how to build a great ICS app ... but no one has ICS and an ICS app won't work on pre-ICS devices.
 
I am sure Google supplied info on ICS, sdk etc to all their licensees and partners a long time ago, just like other software companies like Microsoft do. It's not like Samsung/HTC/Verizon all found out ICS details when it was released on Oct 19.

There is no excuse for not having ICS versions of their software ready now. And there is no excuse for Google not demanding that $300 Android devices run the latest software. Android is like the bastard stepchild - no one wants to spend any time truly caring for it.

I can't even imagine MS/Apple letting their partners release outdated devices and mismanage releases.
 
And I forgot to mention the hardware button thing - if Google want us to stop using menu/search (questionable decision since they differentiate Android from iOS/WP7) then why the hell are they not telling hardware makers to not include physical buttons? Why is the Nexus the only phone without them?
 
MrCrispy said:
Blame for this must lie on Google, they simply don't care how fragmented the Android ecosystem gets. Just imagine how nice it would be if all apps were guaranteed the latest OS.
Click to expand...

No, it's because there is a ~6-9 month lead time to bring up a new device (*NOT* including Sense, Blur, etc... I just mean bringing up the hardware and drivers). The world of ARM fucking sucks, it's not at *all* like a PC.

MrCrispy said:
I am sure Google supplied info on ICS, sdk etc to all their licensees and partners a long time ago, just like other software companies like Microsoft do. It's not like Samsung/HTC/Verizon all found out ICS details when it was released on Oct 19.
Click to expand...

They didn't find out the details then, no, but that would be about when they would have a source they could start building off of. Google releases it pretty much as they finish it.
 
kllrnohj said:
They didn't find out the details then, no, but that would be about when they would have a source they could start building off of. Google releases it pretty much as they finish it.
Click to expand...

Technically Google picks a OEM partner and starts working with that partner in advance, while also getting paid by the OEM partner. The end result is the Nexus phones and carrier exclusives blocks of time when there is only one way to get the latest OS... Buy the new Nexus phone.
 
ocellaris said:
Technically Google picks a OEM partner and starts working with that partner in advance, while also getting paid by the OEM partner. The end result is the Nexus phones and carrier exclusives blocks of time when there is only one way to get the latest OS... Buy the new Nexus phone.
Click to expand...

Yes, but Google is the one building the ROM, not the OEM. The OEM is just a hardware supplier at that point. And the OEM isn't going to waste much time devoting their own engineers to getting a not-yet-finished and constantly-changing code base up and running on another device.

And Google isn't paid by that OEM partner, why would they?
 
I am not aware of the exact details of Android partnerships, but I would assume the following (which would apply for any professional software development) :-

- partners would have access to source code earlier under NDA
- partners would be be given finalized binary API's and sdk
- partners would write their own device drivers to work with the new OS sdk

Even if they didn't have full source, it's still possible to port the rom to a new device. Google should have hardware labs which test for compatibility and oem's can submit their pre-final hardware and software for testing. Although knowing how many of their products are made, I wouldn't be surprised if they left it all to the oem's. That's the difference between owning a platform and merely giving away source code.
 
The competition between the major players in the smartphone OS wars mimics what went on back in the 80s when PC's were beginning to get popular.

In the 80s:

Apple - Exercised complete control over their PC's. Built both hardware and software and never sourced their OS to any other PC manufacturing OEM. Created some revolutionary stuff in modern computing such as the GUI. Charged top dollar for all of their hardware and software.

Microsoft - Took many of Apple's ideas and incorporated them into the early versions of Windows. Then proceeded to whore out Windows to every OEM they could, starting with IBM and saturated the entire PC market in the 90s and beyond. Plunged Apple into obscurity. Microsoft's strategy was simple: get every OEM that they could to adopt their software so that developers would be forced to develop for the well known and widely used platform. As people began to adopt computing, they pretty much had to go with Windows if they wanted a tool that can be utilized to its maximum potential for both business and personal use.

Now, today:

Apple - Kept the same strategy as before except they patented the shit out of everything they did to prevent what MS did in the 80s. (results of this is yet to be seen but it is currently being played out in courts worldwide) Their prices are also much more competitive than they were the first time around. Today, you have many more people accustomed to the digital world and quickly picked up iPhones as they were the first modern-day smartphones and much more functional then the previous Palm Treos and Blackberries. Apple still practices closed system policies but they do that in order to keep the experience from their devices intact. They appeal to a wide range of users, mainly non-technical people who simply want stuff to work as well as developers who only have to develop for 1 device on 1 OS. They also managed to turn the iPhone into a device that is fashionable to have which is another plus for them.

Google - Trying to do the same thing Microsoft did in the early days - whore all of their shit out for free and saturate the entire market to OEMs looking to profit off of the hardware. Unfortunately for Google, smartphones are different than PC's - not all hardware is generic. This means that you need developers spending time writing binaries and kernels to get the phones working properly. You also have an added factor this time around - carriers. They mandate what can be put on their network and pretty much have all of the OEMs by the balls. It has been said multiple times that VZW and the like force OEMs to come up with these skins for their phones because they don't want to be selling 10 phones with identical software. No one would really be able to tell the difference other than screen size and H/W features. Therefore, you get MotoBlur, TouchWiz, and Sense. All different skins that all present different obstacles for developers to overcome as some skins can cause bugs in their apps while others do not. (read the change logs on the market, it happens ALOT) Besides that, these skins all present a wide variety of bugs which kills the experience for the average user. I've only dealt with MotoBlur and I can say that it is absolute shit. Slows down the phone, has a shit load of background processes that I don't need sucking up RAM and has a sluggish UI compared to stock Android. Now the beautiful thing about Android is that I can change all of this through 3rd party ROMS. The problem - the vast majority can not and will not do this. They simply give up on the phone. There are other problems as well such as OS fragmentation, etc.

Other contenders:
RIM - RIM made its impact before iPhone launched as the first phone of the "modern" smartphone revolution. They kicked the shit out of the old Treo smartphones and took over the corporate market. However, they failed to adapt and are paying the price. The only real worth left in the company is their BBM and secure e-mail services. Just a matter of time before they die.

Microsoft - MS has no where near the foothold that Android, iOS, or even RIM has on the market. Being the big mothership that they are, they were very slow to adapt. I saw a Nielsen chart stating that the old Windows Mobile OS has greater share than Windows Phone 7. Absolutely pitiful. My guess is that they will use Windows 8 to pioneer the new "ultrabooks." We'll see how that works out.

webOS - Wasn't taken care of by HP. They are taking the Android route but I fear it's too late.

Bottom line: The next era in computing is going to be very interesting. Kind of exciting times when you step back and look at it all.
 
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MrCrispy said:
It's like someone selling a pc today with Vista instead of Windows 7.

It's absolutely ridiculous that someone can buy a new top of line Android phone today, and not know when, or even if, they'll get an ICS update.

Do the oem's/carriers even make any money from Sense/Blur/TouchWiz ? They spend months developing it, and these skins are almost universally hated. They have some nice features (esp Sense) but these should be a separate Market app (which they could even limit to their phones).

Blame for this must lie on Google, they simply don't care how fragmented the Android ecosystem gets. Just imagine how nice it would be if all apps were guaranteed the latest OS.
Click to expand...

Are you gonna be OK? You want us to call you a waaaambulance lol. Just buy an iphone or windows phone instead. No use crying over a phone for christ sake.
 
MrCrispy said:
I am not aware of the exact details of Android partnerships, but I would assume the following (which would apply for any professional software development) :-

- partners would have access to source code earlier under NDA
- partners would be be given finalized binary API's and sdk
- partners would write their own device drivers to work with the new OS sdk

Even if they didn't have full source, it's still possible to port the rom to a new device.
Click to expand...

Yes, but I don't think you guys appreciate just how late things become finalized. If you look at the git history of ICS, you'll see patches going in at all levels of the system all the way up to the last minute. It's not like a desktop OS where there are a couple months of betas, then an RC, then another RC, etc... It looks more like about a week or two of beta before shipping it.

Google should have hardware labs which test for compatibility and oem's can submit their pre-final hardware and software for testing. Although knowing how many of their products are made, I wouldn't be surprised if they left it all to the oem's. That's the difference between owning a platform and merely giving away source code.
Click to expand...

They have all that: http://source.android.com/compatibility/index.html
 
Vermillion said:
It's more the timeline of phone development. The Droid RAZR for example. ICS wasn't released when RAZR went into development. Motorola can't simply compile ICS for the RAZR and drop it on all the devices before being sold. Now shitty things like Sense, Blur and Touchwiz do come into play but there are also lib files that need to be updated to work correctly with ICS and what not. You should see some of the hacks the devs are using to get ICS to work on older phones without updated libs.
Click to expand...

ICS was available on Windows Mobile 6.5 so this is kind of not really the case...that os is coming up on 2+ years old...

MS also released it for WP 7 so it can't be THAT difficult to back port it into the OS.


The more obvious explanation is that the carriers want to charge for ICS and thus didn't want it on the phone when released....and make it an "app" that you purchase.

I seem to remember t-mobile charging $15 a month for the privledge at the same time the HD2 had it buit in (Wifi and USB tether). T-Mobile chose to remove the wifi portion and left the ICS tether in.

Other carriers also were charging at the time as well...
 
YeuEmMaiMai said:
ICS was available on Windows Mobile 6.5 so this is kind of not really the case...that os is coming up on 2+ years old...

MS also released it for WP 7 so it can't be THAT difficult to back port it into the OS.

The more obvious explanation is that the carriers want to charge for ICS and thus didn't want it on the phone when released....and make it an "app" that you purchase.
Click to expand...

...what?

ICS stands for Ice Cream Sandwich and is the code name for Android 4.0. It doesn't run on Windows Mobile 6.5, nor does it run on WP7, nor has MS ever released anything using it. It is its own OS that has nothing to do with Microsoft, and it can't be run "as an app".
 
YeuEmMaiMai said:
ICS was available on Windows Mobile 6.5 so this is kind of not really the case...that os is coming up on 2+ years old...

MS also released it for WP 7 so it can't be THAT difficult to back port it into the OS.


The more obvious explanation is that the carriers want to charge for ICS and thus didn't want it on the phone when released....and make it an "app" that you purchase.

I seem to remember t-mobile charging $15 a month for the privledge at the same time the HD2 had it buit in (Wifi and USB tether). T-Mobile chose to remove the wifi portion and left the ICS tether in.

Other carriers also were charging at the time as well...
Click to expand...

/facepalm. please sit back down since you have no clue what you're talking about.
 
kllrnohj said:
...what?

ICS stands for Ice Cream Sandwich and is the code name for Android 4.0. It doesn't run on Windows Mobile 6.5, nor does it run on WP7, nor has MS ever released anything using it. It is its own OS that has nothing to do with Microsoft, and it can't be run "as an app".
Click to expand...

ICS also stands for Internet Connection Sharing......
 
ocellaris said:
There will still be buttons there, just different buttons than they have on the phones now (and 3 buttons instead of 4).
Click to expand...
I thought Google was transitioning to on-screen buttons for everything?

ComputerBox34 said:
In the 80s:

Apple - Exercised complete control over their PC's. Built both hardware and software and never sourced their OS to any other PC manufacturing OEM. Created some revolutionary stuff in modern computing such as the GUI. Charged top dollar for all of their hardware and software.
Click to expand...
Correction:
Apple did not create the GUI... and the creation of the GUI predates the 80's by a pretty wide margin. Both Apple and Microsoft ripped off Xerox.

1. The fundamentals for the modern GUI originated in XEROX's Palo Alto Research Center between 1972 and 1973. They produced a workstation computer called the Xerox Alto that was used internally at many Xerox facilities.
2. Steve Jobs was given a guided tour of the Xerox Alto computer (and its GUI) in 1979.
3. The Apple Lisa engineering team was privy to the introduction of Xerox Star in 1981 (word has it that after seeing Xerox's offering, the team rushed back to Cupertino to redo their desktop manager).
4. Between 1980 and 1981, Xerox engineers that had worked on the Alto and the Star left the company and joined both Apple and Microsoft.
5. Bill Gates purchased a Xerox Star in 1981 (obviously also interested in its functionality).
6. More engineers from Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center joined Microsoft in 1983.
7. Apple went on to release the Lisa in 1983 and the original Macintosh in 1984 (both with a familiar looking GUI). Microsoft released Windows 1.0 with its own GUI in 1985.
 
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Do you really go around referring to Internet Connection Sharing as "ICS" ? I mean seriously? In the mobile forum it should be blatantly obvious that if you see "ICS" that is Ice Cream Sandwich, same with "GB" being Ginger Bread........

YeuEmMaiMai said:
ICS also stands for Internet Connection Sharing......
Click to expand...
 
Getting back on point.

Let's take the Nexus S for example. The ICS for the Nexus S is already out. The Nexus S 4G (one with the wimax radio) isn't...

So why does it take over a month longer to update the Nexus S 4G?

A. Adding a driver complicates things... Yeah, right...
B. There are other issues plaguing the Nexus S 4G that Sprint wants Google to fix.
C. Sprint also requires more time to test the firmware.

Is it a case of the carrier looking out for us? Maybe...

I'm kind of hoping that the next Nexus would be a world phone. Maybe that would speed up the updates.
 
@ CHANG3D last i knew the Nexus S one was pulled, the issue was battery drain, not OS.

atleast i havent seen an official update pop up for my Nexus S ;)
 
MrCrispy said:
It's like someone selling a pc today with Vista instead of Windows 7.

It's absolutely ridiculous that someone can buy a new top of line Android phone today, and not know when, or even if, they'll get an ICS update.

Do the oem's/carriers even make any money from Sense/Blur/TouchWiz ? They spend months developing it, and these skins are almost universally hated. They have some nice features (esp Sense) but these should be a separate Market app (which they could even limit to their phones).

Blame for this must lie on Google, they simply don't care how fragmented the Android ecosystem gets. Just imagine how nice it would be if all apps were guaranteed the latest OS.
Click to expand...

So buy an iphone and stfu.
 
W.Feather said:
@ CHANG3D last i knew the Nexus S one was pulled, the issue was battery drain, not OS.

atleast i havent seen an official update pop up for my Nexus S ;)
Click to expand...

No it wasn't. They only updated the T-Mobile ones, though.

CHANG3D said:
Getting back on point.

Let's take the Nexus S for example. The ICS for the Nexus S is already out. The Nexus S 4G (one with the wimax radio) isn't...

So why does it take over a month longer to update the Nexus S 4G?

A. Adding a driver complicates things... Yeah, right...
B. There are other issues plaguing the Nexus S 4G that Sprint wants Google to fix.
C. Sprint also requires more time to test the firmware.

Is it a case of the carrier looking out for us? Maybe...
Click to expand...

A. It does, actually. Radio firmware bugs are tricky beasts, and it's much more than just a driver. Especially if ICS changed the interface, which would require an updated firmware and can expose new bugs, etc... WiMax is also pretty Sprint specific on top of the CDMA stuff.

B & C are both definitely possible as well. Heck, they could even be issues with the radio :p

I'm kind of hoping that the next Nexus would be a world phone. Maybe that would speed up the updates.
Click to expand...

The Galaxy Nexus is about as world phone as you can get. The HSPA+ one is pentaband, meaning 3G everywhere (including AT&T and T-Mobile in the US).
 
vsboxerboy said:
I love android and I do some development. That being said it's incredibly annoying that Google expects people to drop the menu button, got rid of the search button, and are trying to change things for ICS when NO ONE has it.
Click to expand...

+1

It's ridiculous that they keep harping on that UI aspect when manufacturers come along with their own UI (touchwiz, etc) and change the UI anyways. My wife's Evo Flyer just got a honeycomb update... first reboot came with a message effectively saying "you know those useful off-screen buttons that your device has? forget they exist since they no longer work." Seriously- wtf. Google either needs to say "get of my lawn" and require a stock UI that's consistent across manufactures, or they need to accept the fragmentation and work to mitigate and minimize the end-user impact. They can't have it both ways while claiming that fragmentation isn't a problem.... to joe-average on the street, the OS on a S2 is fairly different than a HTC device... in fact, joe-user would probably deny that the stock android UI is actually 'android' because in their mind, touchwiz IS android...
 
Unknown-One said:
I thought Google was transitioning to on-screen buttons for everything?
Click to expand...

I don't think Google has said either way at this point, and it's likely is up to the manufactures. The whole button thing was a fanboy jab at iphone users. I personally hope they don't go away as I find it's way too easy to accidentally call or open apps by sliding the phone out of your pocket.
 
kllrnohj said:
The Galaxy Nexus is about as world phone as you can get. The HSPA+ one is pentaband, meaning 3G everywhere (including AT&T and T-Mobile in the US).
Click to expand...
If Apple can fit CDMA and GSM pentaband radios in the iPhone 4S, why can't Samsung?

Only reason for me to consider the iPhone 4S is its world capabilities.
 
Ryokurin said:
I don't think Google has said either way at this point, and it's likely is up to the manufactures. The whole button thing was a fanboy jab at iphone users. I personally hope they don't go away as I find it's way too easy to accidentally call or open apps by sliding the phone out of your pocket.
Click to expand...

Android is transitioning to 3 physical buttons, Home, back, and menu.

They are not going onscreen.
 
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