Today, Google announced Chrome OS, a light-weight, Linux-based OS that is designed to get users online as quickly as possible.
The OS supports multiple accounts, offline access via HTML5 (if the web app supports it) and even cloud-based printing.
The iOS and Android universes are all about apps. Instead of using a browser to do simple tasks, most users prefer to use apps instead, since apps are far more powerful. Back in October, I wrote:
Lots of goodies for our Android brethren.
The iPad is a companion device, but a companion device that is both large enough and powerful enough to serve as a primary computer for many people. Just take a look around the web and you will see a good number of Geeks like myself who have left behind their laptops on recent travels, preferring instead to take along their iPad only.
The Tab is not that type of device, it is not able to span the category of both companion and possibly a primary computer. As I see it the Tab isn’t even a secondary computer. That does not make it a bad device, I actually rather like it under the right circumstances.
As I’ve written about plenty of times before, I used a Droid for the better part of 2010.
About 8 weeks ago, I sold my Droid and have been carrying a dumbphone, making my Wi-Fi iPad my only mobile device.
Since then, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about Android, and my time with what was (for now) the last completely stock Android handset.1
There are a lot of things to like about the Droid. The hardware is great, and Verizon’s coverage in the Memphis area is simply stunning. Android itself, however, ended up leaving me a little disappointed. Parts of Android are great. Other parts are seriously lacking.
Chris Nuttall over at the Financial Times:
Mr Wilson, author of the popular A VC blog and a managing partner at Union Square Ventures, said Google had not come up with anything truly transformative that was a home-grown product since Gmail, introduced in 2004. It had relied on acquisitions instead to develop new services.
Wow. Once I stopped and actually thought about it, Wilson is right. Innovation is key in this industry, and eventually, growth via acquisitions can’t keep up.
Greg Peters, from Netflix’s product development group, about the company’s forthcoming Android app:
The hurdle has been the lack of a generic and complete platform security and content protection mechanism available for Android. The same security issues that have led to piracy concerns on the Android platform have made it difficult for us to secure a common Digital Rights Management (DRM) system on these devices. Setting aside the debate around the value of content protection and DRM, they are requirements we must fulfill in order to obtain content from major studios for our subscribers to enjoy. Although we don’t have a common platform security mechanism and DRM, we are able to work with individual handset manufacturers to add content protection to their devices. Unfortunately, this is a much slower approach and leads to a fragmented experience on Android, in which some handsets will have access to Netflix and others won’t. This clearly is not the preferred solution, and we regret the confusion it might create for consumers. However, we believe that providing the service for some Android device owners is better than denying it to everyone.
After spending the last couple of days with the Galaxy Tab, we can confidently say it’s the best Android tablet on the market. Now, that’s not saying much given the state of the Android competition, but we can also assuredly say that the Tab is the first true competitor to Apple’s iPad. Its crisp display, compact form factor, touch-friendly software and dual cameras undoubtedly have what it takes to win over the average tablet seeker. However, we still have some reservations right now. Google hasn’t yet provided any direction on Android as a tablet platform, which means that the Tab is held back by lagging application support and software that doesn’t fully take advantage of the extra screen real estate. Remember, that when the iPad launched many developers were already working on tablet specific apps and Apple had an iPad app store in place. Put simply, without that ecosystem and support from Google, Samsung is left to its own devices – literally. Just today Samsung rolled out an emulator for the Tab that uses the Android SDK and the company says it’s working with Google and plans to use future iterations of Android, so we’ll have to see what happens – but for now it looks like the saga of the Samsung Galaxy Tab still has several chapters to go.
Had Google simply focused on a few key features — lightning-fast browsing and perfect search results, for example — we’d have readily excused the missing pieces with the assumption that they’d soon arrive in an equally polished way. Indeed, the most disappointing thing about Google TV is the immediate realization that it could be so much more if only Google given itself some more time.
I feel like a lot of Google services and products have this half-done feel about them. Most of Google services can be greatly enhanced with some fine-tuning, but that isn’t something most consumers want to do. Of course, changing Gmail settings is one thing, but shipping a half-baked product that costs hundreds of dollars are two different things. People forgive a lot less when they are paying for something.
Anand Lal Shimpi & Brian Klug, on carrier-bundled apps on Windows Phone 7 devices:
While Microsoft won’t enforce a clean install on every Windows Phone, it does ensure that anything your carrier/OEM installs on top of the OS can be uninstalled. My Samsung Focus for example came with a bunch of AT&T apps. Not only can they be unpinned from the start menu, they can also be completely uninstalled. Carriers get the option to differentiate, but users get the option to say no, it’s a win-win situation. If you do a factory reset of your phone however, it will restore the phone to its original state - which will include reinstalling carrier/OEM installed apps.
As we bring our initial Android TweetDeck beta period to a close, we wanted to quickly reflect on the Android ecosystem and what might be considered extreme fragmentation. To date we’ve had 36,427 active beta testers and below you can see the massive variety of phones and Android OS versions everyone is running. We were really shocked to see the number of custom roms, crazy phones and general level of customization/hackalicious nature of Android. From our perspective it’s pretty cool to have our app work on such a wide variety of devices and Android OS variations.
Edit: This blog post is very old and probably not very helpful anymore.
So, you want to use Mac OS X Mail with Gmail, which is an excellent, free webmail service from Google? While Snow Leopard makes the default setup is very easy, there are some rough edges of Google’s somewhat-wonky IMAP setup that need to be smoothed off for a better experience.
I’ve written out the steps to reach “Gmail IMAP in Mac OS X Mail” nirvana. While that doesn’t roll of the tongue, it does soothe the soul of the Gmail-using Mac lover.
The crucial part of Microsoft’s new phone strategy is the quality control it imposes onto its hardware partners. Rather than code an operating system and allow manufacturers to do whatever they want with it–like Google is doing with Android–Microsoft is requiring hardware partners to meet a rigid criteria in order to run Windows Phone 7.
Each device must feature three standard hardware buttons, for example, and before they can ship with Windows Phone 7, they have to pass a series of tests directed by Microsoft.