Wednesday, September 29, 2010
The 10 best smartphones - Android leaderboard
This ranking is primarily US-based. In each country/region, the telecom carriers tend to name these devices by different names. In many cases you’ll be able to find a close match between the devices on this list and devices in your area, but not in all cases.
1. HTC EVO 4G
Pound-for-pound and feature-by-feature, there’s still nothing out there in Android land that can hang with the HTC EVO 4G. With its 4.3-inch WVGA screen, 8 megapixel camera, 1 GHz Snapdragon CPU, front-facing VGA camera, Micro HDMI port, 3G Wi-Fi hotspot, and 4G WiMAX capability, the EVO has it all. And, with its large on-screen keyboard and handy kickstand for watching video, it’s a device that’s easy and pleasant to use. When I reviewed it, I called the EVO “The Hummer of smartphones” because it’s so huge and it’s such a power hog, but there’s no denying that it is the elite device of the Android fleet.
2. Google Nexus One
This was the first Android device that really knocked my socks off, and I still use it as the gold standard to measure every other Android smarty. Sure, it doesn’t have the best battery life and its screen isn’t as big and bold as the HTC EVO or the Droid X, but it is remarkably elegant and usable and it remains the one Android phone untarnished by the mobile manufacturers and telecom carriers. Google no longer sells it on the mass market but offers the N1 as a testing phone for Android developers. Still, as I said, it remains the gold standard and as long as Google keeps selling it in one form or another, it will likely remain on this list.
3. Samsung Vibrant
The Samsung Vibrant snuck up on a lot of people. Samsung hadn’t produced many good smartphones in recent years. In fact, the Samsung Omnia was so bad that I rated it as one of the worst tech products of 2009. So when Samsung announced the Galaxy S, its first line of Android devices, expectations were fairly low. But, despite the marketing confusion of naming the Galaxy S something different (and giving it a slightly different configuration) on every carrier, the product has been a big hit, selling over a million units in its first 45 days on the market. The best of the Galaxy S models is T-Mobile’s Samsung Vibrant, which is thin, powerful, has a great screen, and does the least amount of fiddling with the stock Android OS.
4. HTC Incredible
One of the most anticipated Android devices of 2010 was the Google Nexus One on Verizon. Unfortunately, it never happened — partly because Verizon dragged its feet to allow the unlocked Nexus One on its network and partly because Google was unprepared to handle the customer service responsibilities for the Nexus One. As a result, the maker of the Nexus One, HTC, released a very similar device called the HTC Incredible (sometimes referred to as the “Droid Incredible”). It’s not quite as elegant or high-end as the Nexus One, but the Incredible is the next best thing.
5. Motorola Droid X
With Sprint’s HTC EVO 4G drawing much of the attention of the Android world since its unveiling at CTIA 2010 in March, the response from Motorola and Verizon (the previous darlings of the Android world) was the Droid X. It matched the HTC EVO with a 4.3-inch screen, an 8 megapixel camera, a Micro HDMI port, and mobile hotspot functionality, but it lacked a front-facing camera, 4G connectivity, and the extra polish that HTC puts on Android with its Sense UI.
6. Samsung Epic 4G
This version of the Samsung Galaxy S is the one that departs most significantly from the standard form factor. That’s mostly because it integrates a full 53-key slide-down hardware keyboard. But it’s not just any keyboard. With it’s large keys and dedicated row for number keys, it is arguably the best hardware qwerty on any Android device. It also features a 4-inch Super AMOLED screen, a zippy 1 GHz Samsung processor, and Sprint’s 4G WiMAX service. I could certainly make a case for ranking this phone as high as number three on this list.
7. Motorola Droid 2
The fact that this phone is all the way down at number seven on this list is an indication of just how competitive the Android market has become, because this is an excellent smartphone. The original Droid really kick-started the Android revolution and remained one of the best-selling Android devices on the market throughout the first half of 2010. The Droid 2 simply updates the design slightly, improves the keyboard, and replaces the internals with more powerful hardware. For those who prefer a physical keyboard and Verizon’s top-notch coverage, the Droid 2 remains a great choice.
8. Samsung Captivate
The other Samsung Galaxy S to make this list is AT&T’s Samsung Captivate, which has virtually all of the same internals and specs as the Samsung Vibrant but has a flatter, boxier form factor. The thinness of the Captivate combined with lots of punch and high-end features make this a very attractive phone. I actually prefer the design of the Captivate over its cousin the Vibrant (No. 3 on this list). However, AT&T has loaded it up with a ton of AT&T crapware that users cannot uninstall, and even worse, has restricted the device so that users can’t “side-load” apps that are not in the Android Market. T-Mobile doesn’t commit either of those two sins with the Vibrant, and that’s what makes it a better choice.
9. HTC Aria
The HTC Aria might be one of the best kept secrets of the Android world. HTC could have honestly named this phone the EVO Mini. It looks a lot like the EVO, but in a far smaller package. In fact, while the EVO is the biggest Android phone, the Aria is the most compact, with its 3.2-inch screen. That’s its primary appeal — along with a low price tag (it retails for $129 but you can usually find it for much less than that, even free, based on promotions). The biggest problems with the Aria are the underpowered 600 MHz CPU and the fact that, like the Galaxy S, AT&T has loaded it up with lots of crapware and limited it to only the applications in the Android Market.
10. LG Ally
The LG Ally is not very pretty — except for being pretty underpowered — but it does have a few redeeming qualities that can make it attractive. It has a great little hardware keyboard — the best hardware keyboard on an Android device next to the Epic 4G. It’s also very compact, though not as compact as the HTC Aria, since the Ally has the slider keyboard that makes it a little more bulky. But, the best feature is the price: $49. And, like the Aria, many customers will get it for free with the right promotion. For 50 dollars or less, this phone is a nice value.
Also read
This article was originally published on TechRepublic.
1. HTC EVO 4G
Pound-for-pound and feature-by-feature, there’s still nothing out there in Android land that can hang with the HTC EVO 4G. With its 4.3-inch WVGA screen, 8 megapixel camera, 1 GHz Snapdragon CPU, front-facing VGA camera, Micro HDMI port, 3G Wi-Fi hotspot, and 4G WiMAX capability, the EVO has it all. And, with its large on-screen keyboard and handy kickstand for watching video, it’s a device that’s easy and pleasant to use. When I reviewed it, I called the EVO “The Hummer of smartphones” because it’s so huge and it’s such a power hog, but there’s no denying that it is the elite device of the Android fleet.2. Google Nexus One
This was the first Android device that really knocked my socks off, and I still use it as the gold standard to measure every other Android smarty. Sure, it doesn’t have the best battery life and its screen isn’t as big and bold as the HTC EVO or the Droid X, but it is remarkably elegant and usable and it remains the one Android phone untarnished by the mobile manufacturers and telecom carriers. Google no longer sells it on the mass market but offers the N1 as a testing phone for Android developers. Still, as I said, it remains the gold standard and as long as Google keeps selling it in one form or another, it will likely remain on this list.3. Samsung Vibrant
The Samsung Vibrant snuck up on a lot of people. Samsung hadn’t produced many good smartphones in recent years. In fact, the Samsung Omnia was so bad that I rated it as one of the worst tech products of 2009. So when Samsung announced the Galaxy S, its first line of Android devices, expectations were fairly low. But, despite the marketing confusion of naming the Galaxy S something different (and giving it a slightly different configuration) on every carrier, the product has been a big hit, selling over a million units in its first 45 days on the market. The best of the Galaxy S models is T-Mobile’s Samsung Vibrant, which is thin, powerful, has a great screen, and does the least amount of fiddling with the stock Android OS.4. HTC Incredible
One of the most anticipated Android devices of 2010 was the Google Nexus One on Verizon. Unfortunately, it never happened — partly because Verizon dragged its feet to allow the unlocked Nexus One on its network and partly because Google was unprepared to handle the customer service responsibilities for the Nexus One. As a result, the maker of the Nexus One, HTC, released a very similar device called the HTC Incredible (sometimes referred to as the “Droid Incredible”). It’s not quite as elegant or high-end as the Nexus One, but the Incredible is the next best thing.5. Motorola Droid X
With Sprint’s HTC EVO 4G drawing much of the attention of the Android world since its unveiling at CTIA 2010 in March, the response from Motorola and Verizon (the previous darlings of the Android world) was the Droid X. It matched the HTC EVO with a 4.3-inch screen, an 8 megapixel camera, a Micro HDMI port, and mobile hotspot functionality, but it lacked a front-facing camera, 4G connectivity, and the extra polish that HTC puts on Android with its Sense UI.6. Samsung Epic 4G
This version of the Samsung Galaxy S is the one that departs most significantly from the standard form factor. That’s mostly because it integrates a full 53-key slide-down hardware keyboard. But it’s not just any keyboard. With it’s large keys and dedicated row for number keys, it is arguably the best hardware qwerty on any Android device. It also features a 4-inch Super AMOLED screen, a zippy 1 GHz Samsung processor, and Sprint’s 4G WiMAX service. I could certainly make a case for ranking this phone as high as number three on this list.7. Motorola Droid 2
The fact that this phone is all the way down at number seven on this list is an indication of just how competitive the Android market has become, because this is an excellent smartphone. The original Droid really kick-started the Android revolution and remained one of the best-selling Android devices on the market throughout the first half of 2010. The Droid 2 simply updates the design slightly, improves the keyboard, and replaces the internals with more powerful hardware. For those who prefer a physical keyboard and Verizon’s top-notch coverage, the Droid 2 remains a great choice.8. Samsung Captivate
The other Samsung Galaxy S to make this list is AT&T’s Samsung Captivate, which has virtually all of the same internals and specs as the Samsung Vibrant but has a flatter, boxier form factor. The thinness of the Captivate combined with lots of punch and high-end features make this a very attractive phone. I actually prefer the design of the Captivate over its cousin the Vibrant (No. 3 on this list). However, AT&T has loaded it up with a ton of AT&T crapware that users cannot uninstall, and even worse, has restricted the device so that users can’t “side-load” apps that are not in the Android Market. T-Mobile doesn’t commit either of those two sins with the Vibrant, and that’s what makes it a better choice.9. HTC Aria
The HTC Aria might be one of the best kept secrets of the Android world. HTC could have honestly named this phone the EVO Mini. It looks a lot like the EVO, but in a far smaller package. In fact, while the EVO is the biggest Android phone, the Aria is the most compact, with its 3.2-inch screen. That’s its primary appeal — along with a low price tag (it retails for $129 but you can usually find it for much less than that, even free, based on promotions). The biggest problems with the Aria are the underpowered 600 MHz CPU and the fact that, like the Galaxy S, AT&T has loaded it up with lots of crapware and limited it to only the applications in the Android Market.10. LG Ally
The LG Ally is not very pretty — except for being pretty underpowered — but it does have a few redeeming qualities that can make it attractive. It has a great little hardware keyboard — the best hardware keyboard on an Android device next to the Epic 4G. It’s also very compact, though not as compact as the HTC Aria, since the Ally has the slider keyboard that makes it a little more bulky. But, the best feature is the price: $49. And, like the Aria, many customers will get it for free with the right promotion. For 50 dollars or less, this phone is a nice value.Also read
This article was originally published on TechRepublic.25 good iPhone applications for geeks
Mobile apps have become an embarrassment of riches. In a world with over 200,000 iPhone apps and over 100,000 Android apps, the toughest part is finding the most useful stuff.
For iPhone users, I'm going to throw you an assist by sharing my top 25. These are third-party apps that can help you be more productive, streamline several of your activities, reduce the number of gadgets in your life, and take advantage of the best benefits that mobile computing has to offer. I'm also going to follow up with similar lists of the best apps for Android and iPad.
The best way to view my list of the top iPhone apps is in the screenshot gallery, which includes 2-3 screenshots of each app and a short description of why I chose to include it in the list. However, you can also view the entire list below, along with a link to download each app in the App Store.
The list
1. Dropbox
Dropbox is a great cloud service that automatically syncs a folder of files between multiple computers (Windows, Mac, or Linux). This app extends Dropbox to the iPhone and includes a built-in reader within the app for PDFs, image files, and Microsoft Office files.
2. Evernote
Once you get used to typing on a virtual keyboard (and it honestly took me over a year to do it), then these devices are great for note-taking, and Evernote is a great note-taking app. It is similar to Dropbox in that it saves data locally but syncs it across all your machines and devices.
3. 2Do
There are a ton of to-do apps on iPhone but I prefer 2Do because of the great interface and the fact that it can sync with the online service Toodledo.
4. Tripit
I love Tripit. It is by far the best app I've found for keeping track of all my travel itineraries. It runs off some great backend systems. You simply forward your confirmation emails for your flights, hotels, rental cars, and more to Tripit and it automatically organizes them into trips with all your details and confirmation numbers.
For some reason Google doesn't have an official app (for either iPhone or Android) for Google Analytics. The best one I've found to get deep into all of the data is Analytics App.
6. Ego
Even better than Analytics App for a quick-glance dashboard is Ego. It shows basic data from Google Analytics as well as a bunch of other sources, including Squarespace, Twitter, and Feedburner.
7. Twitter
The official Twitter app (formerly known as Tweetie) is still the best Twitter client on iPhone (although Osfoora is catching up), and Twitter is an amazing instant-intelligence engine.
8. MobileRSS
Twitter has largely replaced RSS for me for finding and filtering the latest news. However, I still track some RSS feeds and the best tool I've found to do it with is MobileRSS Pro, because of its clean UI and integration with Google Reader.
9. ProPublica
I don't use many specific publication apps to get news. I mostly get news from Twitter and RSS, but the one major exception is ProPublica, the non-profit investigative journalism site. Excellent reporting and a very good app.
10. Amazon Kindle
I never warmed up to the Amazon Kindle e-reader, but I'm a big fan of the Kindle iPhone app. Since it was released I've read a lot more books simply because my phone is always with me and I can pull it out and read a few pages anytime I've got a couple minutes free.
11. Audible
As much as I like the Kindle ebooks, I actually consume more books as audiobooks via Audible. In the past you could download these and sync them via iTunes. But Audible now has its own app, which lets you connect to your Audible library and download over the air, and even gives you a self-contained player optimized for audiobooks.
12. Photoshop Mobile
Photoshop is, of course, the best known photo editor in the world and its mobile app doesn't do anything to hurt that reputation. But while the desktop version is known for having a zillion features, the mobile app is distinguished by its simplicity. It's the best iPhone photo editing app for simple crops, brightness adjustments, and sharpens, for example.
13. Pano
Pano makes it easy to take excellent panoramas with the iPhone. It helps you line up your shots and it automatically corrects many of the imperfections. My wife is a photographer with a big, expensive camera and she's regularly jealous of some of the shots I can get with the iPhone and Pano.
I'm always running speed tests to check my bandwidth in various places, both to see 3G fluctuations and to check the quality of Wi-Fi. The Xtreme Labs test is my favorite (it's also available on Android). It is very consistent, although sometimes its upload speeds seem a little lower than reality. That's why I'd recommend that you verify it by using other speed tests such as the FCC Speed test, Speedtest.net, and the Cisco speed test app.
15. RedLaser
This is a great app for shoppers. It turns the iPhone camera into a barcode scanner and it's pretty accurate. You simply scan a product's UPC code and let the app go to work to find it in Google Product Search and TheFind. For food it will even look up allergen information and for books it will scan to see if you can get it in a local library. You'll be amazed at how fast it works. A similar product is SnapTell, which not only scans barcordes but you can also take a picture of the cover of a book or DVD and it can look them up that way. These apps are great when you're shopping at a retail store and want to check the prices of products online before buying.
I used to carry a separate Garmin GPS unit for turn-by-turn directions but I eventually got rid of it and decided to just use the iPhone instead. In researching the various apps, I eventually decided on NAVIGON, which is a company that makes a lot of the built-in navigation systems for many cars. Tip: Make sure your iPhone is plugged in to power when you run a GPS navigation program like this because otherwise it will quickly drain your battery.
17. Where To?
A great companion to a GPS system is the app "Where To?" which lets you quickly look up various types of shops and services, from Cuban restaurants to medical specialists to animal hospitals to local museums and much more.
This terrific little app can save you from buying a pedometer. It uses the iPhone's accelerometer to track the miles you've run or walked, and it also throws in data about your pace and the number of calories you've burned.
19. Pandora
Pandora is a streaming "radio station" for the Internet age. You simply search by an artist or song and it will create a running playlist based on that one piece of information. It intersperses an occasional ad between songs but the ads tend to be fairly localized and occasionally even useful. On iOS 4, Pandora can even run in the background, just like the iPhone's native music app.
20. Shazam
If you want to impress your friends with an iPhone app, the best one to do it with is Shazam. Ever hear a song being played at a store or on the radio and ask yourself, "Oh, what song is that?" That's where Shazam comes in. Just hit the button and let it listen for 15 seconds, query its database, and then return the name of artist and the song. It has about an 80% success rate.
21. GroceryGadget
This is an app plus a website and you can quickly sync between the two. The way it usually works for me is that my wife makes a grocery list, enters it into grocerygadgets.com, and then it syncs to my iPhone so that I can swing by the grocery store on my way home from work.
22. Boxee Remote
Boxee is a great little program that lets you turn any PC into a multimedia PC and brings social networking to the experience so that you can see what your friends are watching. It runs on Mac, Windows, Linux, and AppleTV. However, if you use an existing PC then you probably don't have a remote for it. This Boxee app turns your iPhone into a remote with two modes, a straight arrow mode and a gesture mode.
23. Scrabble
This classic game has gotten a rebirth in the digital age and the iPhone version is part of that. You can pass the phone around or you can play online against your Facebook friends.
I'm not usually an avid gamer (beyond Scrabble) but when it involves an X-wing Fighter attacking the Death Star, I'm in. Star Wars: Trench Run is a fun game that's easy to play and takes advantage of the iPhone 4's new gyroscope. A cool feature of Star Wars: Trench Run is that you can also connect it with your computer using a wireless technology called Brass Monkey and then you can have the game playing on a PC or Mac while you use the iPhone as a controller. However, be prepared to install a plug-in on your computer and you might have to open ports on your firewall to make it work.
25. AppAdvice
There are even apps to help you find more apps (that's what happens when a platform has over 200,000 apps). A great resource is AppAdvice. Its AppGuides and AppLists are great ways to discover new apps. I especially like that it ranks similar apps in order to help you find the best ones.
This article was originally published on TechRepublic.
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Android-Based Home Surf Touch Tablet in India - By Binatone
Binatone, a UK-based provider of telecom products, has entered the Indian market with the launch of its Android-based Home Surf Touch Tablet. The new tablet, which is almost as slim as the iPad, runs on Google's Android 1.6, has an 8-inch resistive screen, Wi-Fi, 2 GB onboard storage, 128 MB RAM and is powered by an ARM 11 667 MHz processor.
Binatone said the Home Surf Touch tablet is priced at Rs. 9,000/-, which is less than half that charged by other Android tablets available in the market today. The 8-inch Home Surf Touch Tablet based on Android technology powered by Google.
"Binatone plans to invest Rs. 50 crores in the next 12 months in technology, product development and marketing. Our products are specifically 'Indianized' with special features like 'Audio boost', 'Power saver' and 'Binatone Zone', which all have been carefully market researched and implemented to address the specific Indian needs," added Murthi.
Murthi outlined the company's development of futuristic products with solar charger mobile handsets to address the frequent power outages in rural markets. "Binatone is also bringing in the low cost 3G handsets by end of the year to cater to the deployment of newer technologies in India," said Murthi.
Dino Lalvani, Chairman Binatone Communications Group, said, "The Home Surf Touch Tablet is the first of its kind in India. To reinforce this excitement it will be aggressively priced at Rs. 8,995/- in retail. The Home Surf Touch Tablet, with its ultra slim design can access the Internet on Wi-Fi. The battery operated device can retain its charge for several hours in video, Web browsing and many other applications for daily use."
"India deserves the best of technologies in communication and we at Binatone, with our 50 years of experience, will harness the latest in innovative technologies and bring them to market affordably. Our India software team, based out of Bangalore, is always exploring newer technologies and our collaboration with semiconductor partners helps us to work on cost effective solutions, given our economies of scale which is supported by our global reach," added Lalvani.
Ref: http://www.itnewsonline.com/news/Binatone-Launches-Android-Based-Home-Surf-Touch-Tablet-in-India/21243/3/1
Monday, September 27, 2010
Oracle finally outlines roadmap for mobile Java
Oracle finally outlines roadmap for mobile Java
There has been considerable criticism of Oracle since it acquired Sun Microsystems, and with it, the Java technology. In particular, the database giant has been accused, by Google and others, of failing to provide clear direction and leadership for the mobile version of the open source software, which underpins a huge percentage of low-end and midrange handsets, as well as media players and other devices, and many mobile apps and content delivery systems.
Oracle went some way to address its critics at the OpenWorld JavaOne conference, promising hardware accelerated graphics and web integration for mobile Java. Its plans are particularly interesting in light of the firm's quarrels - including Android-related patent litigation, with Google, which uses its own Java virtual machine, Dalvik, on its OS.
Java's mobile iteration, ME, is now to be brought firmly into the world of modern web apps and development, and will be able to render the key web standards – HTML, CSS and Javascript - by default. Java ME will also gain engines for Javascript and for WebKit browsers, and a Java-to-JavaScript Bridge. This will allow Java ME handsets to access web services and apps outside the browser and without the current performance issues in this area.
Oracle also promised a Java rendering engine to enhance 2D and 3G graphics, available next year. This will plug into the virtual machine and into Java FX, one of the most important technology layers Sun added to open source Java, supporting the creation of rich graphics and user interfaces. As The Register describes, the engine will support "modern graphics hardware accelerators", notably Direct X for Windows and OpenGL.
Java ME will be optimized for the ARM7 and ARM9 processor designs commonly used in handsets, and the stack will be upgraded to support mobile phone APIs handling functions like telephony, payments and location. This will enable Java developers to create apps that tap into those phone functions directly, rather than relying on less optimized web-based alternatives.
All this should bring Java, which usually lives in featurephones, closer to the smartphone experience, a goal also pursued by the other major midrange apps platform, Qualcomm Brew, and by Java-based software players like Myriad. Such initiatives are important as mass markets and developing economies start to demand support for mobile apps and browsers, but on low cost, contract-free handsets. Many operators – like AT&T and Verizon with their support for Brew – see this as a way to get more value from the prepaid base; to attract low end users who may later upgrade to full smartphone plans; and control the user experience. Many carrier app stores, like the one from Orange, support Java apps as well as products for fully blown operating systems like Android or Symbian.
By belatedly setting out Java's roadmap for the next generation of mass mobile apps, Oracle is staking a claim to considerable influence over the mobile experience. It also aims to achieve a more prominent role for Java FX, a hugely promising technology that was sadly underpromoted by Sun, rather like Java in general. Oracle will now open source FX and the Java user interface controls, under the GPL process used by the main Java platform, to get it the same visibility among programmers as Flash or Silverlight.
"We want the nine million Java developers in the world to never have to chose a different environment to build a great looking UI ever again," SVP Thomas Kurian told the conference. The next release of FX, in Q311, will introduce generics, annotations and multithreading, and continue work started by Sun to open the VM to non-Java languages including JRuby, Groovy and JavaScript, says The Register.
Instead of Java ME, Android uses a subset of the Apache Software Foundation's Harmony and runs the Dalvik VM, claiming this delivers better performance than ME. Oracle will clearly be trying to take any sting out of these claims now.
Ref: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/09/26/mobile_java_oracle/
Saturday, September 25, 2010
iPhone OS 4 vs Android
Why Apple just lost the game
Multitasking
The biggest news, it seems, is multitasking. For iPhone users, this is huge. A true multitasking ability, instead of just push notifications, has been sorely missing since day 1. In fact, it was Palm's entire attack with WebOS versus the iPhone. Sadly, we see how that battle is going.
But for those of us with Android devices, this isn't news; this is expected. If I have to close my applications in order to use another one, I'd get annoyed. Now, points go to Apple for how OS 4 will handle the tasking. I have to give genuine kudos to the priority-based functions. I think that Android could certainly see a benefit in following suit.
The problem that I see, though, is that the iPhone is still locked (unless you want to take its life into your own hands and jailbreak) to the App Store. In fact, the multitasking capability will be based upon App Store classification that might not allow an application as much processing power as you'd like for it to have. For my money, I'll take Android's way of doing things when it comes to multitasking.
Folders
Sure, on my iPod Touch, I'll use them. I have so many games that it's just plain stupid not to. But really, this is big news? Oh yes. I forgot. I can also rename a folder. You know, like I've been able to do in Android OS all along. Even my Apple-loving brain has a hard time getting truly excited about this.
Email Changes
I have to give Apple some credit here. The unified inbox feature sounds very nice. It's something that's been a thorn in my side with Android's base features. Likewise, simple methods for encryption would be great.
Again, though, one of Android's main features shines here. Open source. I honestly haven't done much digging, but I'd almost bet that there's an application in the Android Market that can give me unified inboxes. Oh, and my guess is that there's an encryption application too.
But as for the rest, on Android? Threaded messages? Check. Multiple Exchange accounts? Check. Attachment handling? Check. Sorry Steve. I'm just not excited.
Enterprise Features
Wireless delivery of applications, great data encryption, Exchange Server support. When you're in a business world, with today's technology, these things become expected. These are no longer seen as value-added features of any OS, mobile or otherwise.
Now, in fairness, Android OS is not at the top of the Enterprise game. But neither is Apple. For years, RIM has set the standard. Even today, other companies have a lot of work to do in order to catch up. I have to call this an even draw.
All the Rest
I'm going to wrap the Game Center and iAd into one section, because both features really come down to making more money for developers. This is something that both of my brains can stand behind. The development community for Apple products is stellar, if crippled. But that's not anything of their own doing.
With the new Game Center, and integrated iAds, developers will really be able to monetize their applications without the risk of becoming annoying. This is important, and should continue. I sincerely hope that Apple gives the developers the autonomy that they need to let this happen.
At the moment, the vast majority of games on the Android platform suck. But I think that has more to do with a less-explored platform than with the OS itself. As time goes on, and as more Android devices sell, I firmly believe that we'll see more features and better games.
Wrapping Up
So if I'm giving Apple points on a couple of features, and calling another one a draw, how can I still declare Android the winner? It's simple: the open-source method just works.
Android market share is going through the roof. With it, we're seeing developers shifting their attention to Android, and releasing applications that are higher quality every day. Instead of getting wrapped up in politics, Android developers have the autonomy that Apple needs to give. Because let's face it, approving every application does not mean that every application will be of good quality.
For those who have crossed over from iPhone to Android, today's announcements likely come as too little too late. We users shouldn't have to wait years for basic features, or for nagging problems to be fixed. We should have the ability to find something that works better, if we don't like what you're offering, and we should be able to use it on our existing device.
The Apple xenophobia, in this case, might be alienating iPhone OS 4 from gaining buyers.
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