Android Today

Boot up: WhatsApp privacy bust, iOS parents, H.265 comes closer, and more

Plus Mayer's plans for Yahoo (redux), the challenge of Office365 for CIOs, AppleTV gets Bluetooth, Samsung's commission payments and more

"Deleting mum's work emails is a great game!" Photograph: Dimitris Legakis/D Legakis Photography/Athena

A quick burst of 8 links for you to chew over, as picked by the Technology team

WhatsApp breaches privacy laws >> CBC News

The popular mobile messaging app WhatsApp breaches Canadian and Dutch privacy laws by forcing many of its users to grant access to their entire address book in order to use it, Canada's privacy watchdog has found in a joint investigation with Dutch authorities.

Doubt that Germany or France or even the UK will be thrilled either.

Dear Tim: Open letter from an iDAD, Apple iOS parental controls needed >> Anewdomain

For starters, I need to be able to lock down apps -- and please let me select exactly which ones. And I need to be able to lock them down to a master time limit and maybe even a time limit of daily use per app. I need to be able to tell my son's Apple iPod and Apple iPad that he should only be able to use these devices and the apps on them during times I specify.
And that's not all.
I want to tie this functionality down to a parent-child related account -- separate from my Apple ID. It should know, for example, the relation between my Apple devices and his -- for instance, if message limitations are close or if time limits like the ones I suggest above run out. Can you do that? I also want same controls to work if I later get my son an iPhone. That would allow calls to certain numbers at all times - and others at certain times - and it would work even if I turn off games and text that calls and email could be checked during certain time frames.

If only Windows Phone were available on tablets, his problem would be solved.

Ubuntu phones to come with a terminal -- prepare your command line skills >> Ars Technica

The Ubuntu phone operating system will come with a terminal application. That's right: experienced users will have access to the full power of the Linux system running underneath the phone's shiny graphical user interface.

"Yes, grandma, type 'sudo rm -rf', and we'll be finished."

Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer to bring company back to its roots: "It's the web ordered for you" >> TechCrunch

Yahoo plans to compete on mobile by way of partnerships, not hardware or operating systems, Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer told Bloomberg at the annual World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Switzerland, where the subject of the talk was the future of Yahoo's business. The talk also delved into other areas of focus, including Yahoo's homepage, media properties, and where it could compete on search and personalization going forward.
"I think that's it's really important," Mayer said of competing on mobile. "If you look at what's happening in terms of the shift to mobile, the number of mobile phones and smartphones in the world has tripled in five years. Tablet sales will outsell laptops this coming year, if predictions hold true," she added.

As someone else observed, it's hard to win if you're in a three-legged race.

British retailers recommend Samsung over Apple >> Telegraph

Apple and Samsung were just as likely to be promoted by advertising in the store or the shop window but sales assistants were far more likely to recommend Samsung.
In a press release, Informa said it was "likely that sales assistants see the Samsung devices as a safe bet to earn greater commissions".

More than likely.

Apple TV Software Update 5.2 adds Bluetooth input, more >> iLounge News

Apple today released Apple TV software version 5.2 for the second- and third- generation streaming media players. Arriving alongside iOS 6.1, the update brings enhanced support for iTunes in the Cloud, the addition of the Up Next feature introduced in iTunes 11, and long-awaited Bluetooth keyboard support. Apple notes that the Apple TV can now be controlled by Bluetooth wireless keyboards--the first official feature to unlock Bluetooth hardware that sat unused in the devices up until now.

Hmm, keyboards, huh?

What CIOs need to know about Office 365 Home Premium >> ZDNet

Ed Bott:

Like it or not, Office 365 Home Premium is going to show up in your business on consumer devices: Your employees are likely to be using it on their own laptops and tablets, and they'll probably be connecting to your company network from their home PCs.
The trouble is, the license for Office 365 Home Premium specifically excludes those uses. Here's the relevant portion of the license agreement:

Only one person at a time may use the software on each licensed computer or licensed device. The service/software may not be used for commercial, non-profit, or revenue-generating activities.

If that prohibition sounds familiar, it's because the same issue arose when Microsoft released its Surface device, which includes a similar prohibition in the Office 2013 RT license agreement. That issue was eventually resolved with a change to the terms of Microsoft's Volume Licensing program.

Wonder if the same move will save it this time.

New video codec to ease pressure on global networks >> ITU

A new video coding standard building on the PrimeTime Emmy award winning ITU-T H.264 / MPEG-4 AVC was agreed by ITU members today [25 January 2013].
The new codec will considerably ease the burden on global networks where, by some estimates, video accounts for more than half of bandwidth use. The new standard, known informally as 'High Efficiency Video Coding' (HEVC) will need only half the bit rate of its predecessor, ITU-T H.264 / MPEG-4 Part 10 'Advanced Video Coding' (AVC), which currently accounts for over 80 per cent of all web video. HEVC will unleash a new phase of innovation in video production spanning the whole ICT spectrum, from mobile devices through to Ultra-High Definition TV.
ITU-T's Study Group 16 has agreed first-stage approval (consent) of the much-anticipated standard known formally as Recommendation ITU-T H.265 or ISO/IEC 23008-2. It is the product of collaboration between the ITU Video Coding Experts Group (VCEG) and the ISO/IEC Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG).

Great news. Though you feel sure there will be court battles over it at some point in the future. (Thanks @Clarkeviper for the link.)
You can follow Guardian Technology's linkbucket on Pinboard. To suggest a link, either add it below or tag it with @gdntech on the free Delicious service.

source:guardian.co.uk

The google Nexus 4

Google white Nexus 4

Phone Arena apparently got its hands on image showing whitewashed back of google/LG-made phone.While thre's no way to tell for sure if its real deal,the site ran some photoshop test and the pic passed,lending some credence to its authenticity.

Phone in white satin

Another sign the phone is the pearly partner to the slate Nexus 4 currently on the market is its reflective back pattern.

Google will not oppose clampdown on tax avoidance, chairman says

Eric Schmidt says company which has been using Bermuda as a tax haven to will pay whatever they owe for business in the UK

Google's Eric Schmidt says it will be harder for corporations to 'simply be focused on shareholders'. Photograph: Sean Gallup/Getty Images

Google would not oppose any moves by the government to tighten up the tax regimes that has allowed it to use Bermuda as a tax haven, its executive chairman Eric Schmidt said on Monday.
Speaking at Cambridge University, the chief of the world's biggest search engine reiterated his position that Google would abide by any changes the UK imposed: "Our tax strategy is that whatever the tax regime, we would pay that."
It comes just days after David Cameron called on other world leaders at Davos to crack down on tax avoidance. "When some businesses aren't seen to pay their taxes, that is corrosive to the public trust," he said. "I want this year's G8 [meeting of the largest economic powers] to bring a new focus on … tax [and] transparency. Those are the issues we are going to be driving for this year … We want to use the G8 to drive a more serious debate on tax evasion and tax avoidance." He added that "people across the planet are rightly calling for more action".
Google used the tax haven of Bermuda for £6bn of transactions, while paying just £6m in corporation tax in the UK, in 2012. It defines the UK staff and operations as a "service arm" of the business, and uses an Irish subsidiary to collect advertising revenues from the UK and other countries. That pays royalties to another Irish subsidiary, which passes payments to a holding company in the Netherlands with its tax base in Bermuda. Google legally avoided paying around £200m on £2.6bn of UK revenues through the arrangement.
In Davos, Cameron said that "there's nothing wrong with sensible tax planning … but there are some forms of avoidance that have become so aggressive that I think it is right to say these raise ethical issues."
Schmidt declined to comment directly on Cameron's comments, but did acknowledge that corporations now had to recognise that they were dealing with a very different world from before. "It will be harder and harder for corporations simply to be focused on shareholders" – who are meant to be the beneficiaries of tax avoidance arrangements that maximise company profits.
"The reason why they won't be able to is their employees. In Google, we're there because we all talk about a shared vision of making the world a better place. Employees work in a company not for shareholder value but because they feel a need to be there. That model is how corporations everywhere are going to have to work."
He suggested that the traditional corporate model "is in some ways outdated" because employees now are better educated about what the business they work for is doing.
Other companies to have come in for criticism over their tax planning arrangements in the UK include the internet retailer Amazon and the coffee chain Starbucks, which said that it would pay an extra £20m in taxes.

source:guardian.co.uk

Siri was meant for Android phones before Apple stepped in

American carrier almost added Siri to its Android handsets 

 

Ask Siri where she was born and she'll say that she was "designed by Apple in California," but that's only the half truth. She almost belonged on Android phones.
The brains behind this voice-activated personal assistant had signed a deal with American carrier Verizon in the fall of 2009, according to a lengthy Huffington Post feature.
The objective was to make Siri a default application for all of the carrier's Android smartphones, which are of course powered by Apple's chief rival, Google.
Apple, seeing the potential in Siri, didn't just make a counteroffer, it bought Siri, Inc. This ensured exclusivity and killed any hope of Siri for Android phones in the future.
The most interesting part is just how far Verizon's deal for Siri is said to have gone.
"Somewhere in the vaults of the wireless giant, there are unreleased commercials touting Siri as an Android add-on," reported The Huffington Post.

Before Siri for Android, iOS phones

Truthfully, Siri should credit the United States Department of Defense and its $150 million budget for its origin.
Apple's artificial friend was spun out of a five-year, 500-person project by the Pentagon and Menlo Park, California's non-profit research institute, SRI International, according to the expose.
The undertaking was "by any measure, the largest AI program in history," said lead researcher David Israel.
As a start-up, Siri, Inc., initially launched its application as an independently developed iOS application before it was pulled from the App Store.
Apple then bought the 24-person company for a reported $150 million to $250 million.

Siri updates in the future

Siri was updated with the launch of iPad 4 and rollout of of iOS 6 last year, adding new languages and the ability to open third-party apps, look up personalized sports stats, and send tweets.
In addition to expanding the way this personal assistant app is a "do engine," Apple is looking to tweak the responses that Siri gives to commands.
The company is searching for a new writer to invoke a little more personality into its voice-activated application.
One thing that Siri will never properly respond to are questions about her almost-in-the-bag deal with Verizon that would have brought her to Android handsets.
She'll just play coy and direct users to the nearest Verion stores in the area. Sly.

 

source : techradar.com

Google Nexus 4 review

For

• Beautiful, elegant design
• Excellent screen
• Android 4.2
• Unbelievable price

Against

• No expandable memory
• No flash internet
• No 4G
• Camera could be better

Google Nexus 4 review

Impressive specs at an even more impressive price point

By Phil Lavelle January 16th

63 comments

Page 1 of 13Introduction

Recommended award

Google's Nexus (ten points to anyone who can tell us if Nexi is the correct plural) smartphones have always set the standard when it comes to a pure Google experience.
The first Nexus One was a true geek device. Sold only through Google directly (apart from a brief flirtation with Vodafone), it never achieved massive sales. But it gave the world the true raw power of Android without the bloatware of other variants. As of January 2010, the ball was well and truly rolling.
We've had several now – and everyone, it seems, had a go: HTC, Samsung, Asus and LG – though strangely, not Motorola, which is now part of Google itself.

Some handsets we look forward to with much anticipation – only to feel deflated when we actually use them. Others, we wait for with little expectation – and they absolutely blow our socks off.
A stealth surprise. We'll lay our proverbial cards on the table here from the outset. The Nexus 4 is one of those rare devices.

LG's not had the best track record of late. Sure, we thought the Optimus 4X HD was a pretty decent offering, but too little, too late compared to what was already out there by the time LG got it to market.
And whereas LG did have good form when it came to innovation back in the day (who remembers the Chocolate, the Shine – and even the dubious widescreen BL40?), the mojo seemed to have passed.
That's not a dig at the South Koreans – far from it. But just to set the scene to show why we weren't expecting much from the Nexus 4.

Perhaps the worst kept secret since the iPhone 5, the Nexus 4 even got left in a bar in true cliché style. And from the pictures, we weren't alone in thinking it looked like a copy of the Samsung Galaxy Nexus.
The difference is, when we took the Samsung model out of its box this time last year, we thought it was nice. When we took the Nexus 4 out of its box last week, we thought it was beautiful.

Size wise, the Nexus 4 comes in at 133.9 x 68.7 x 9.1 mm – which means it is similar to its predecessor. But it is far more stunning to look at and hold.
The front is all glass in piano black. Extra tough too thanks to the Corning Gorilla Glass 2. Think iPhone 4 territory, but just a little nicer looking (we are aware that is a matter of opinion, iFans!)

The whole front is set within a dull chrome bezel and the shininess even extends to the rear of the handset, which has an attractive, though unusual sparkly pattern adorning it - although newer shipments seem to be shorn of that element now.
Think the glittery kind of jacket that you could see Cilla Black, Joan Rivers or Shirley Bassey in at an awards ceremony, and you catch our drift.

At 139g, the Nexus 4 isn't the lightest handset in school – but it's just about solid enough to get away with carrying that extra weight and puts those who say Android devices look like toys firmly in their place.
The screen is invisible when off – but when it lights up, you're treated to 4.7-inches of True HD IPS Plus beauty. That's 768 x 1280 pixels with a pixel density of 318. It is razor sharp – blowing Retina out of the water and we'll venture it is one of the best we've seen on a handset.

Another reason for this is because there is such little space between the glass and the display. So where we berated the Optimus 4X HD for leaving enough room here to park a small car, the Nexus 4 leaves no gap at all.
It exudes a clarity that has to be seen to be believed. Colours look beautiful, icons and text are razor sharp and everything floats perfectly.
We find it hard to see how this could be beaten. When you're looking at icons on a black background (like in the app drawer), you can't even see the black, if that makes sense. It is so deep, that icons just float. Beneath the screen, in the centre, but hidden until needed, lies a pulsating notification light.

Another element worth pointing out here is the way the phone curves at the sides, from the main panel into the bezel. It seems to make the screen look even more realistic and beautiful. It's one of those things you really have to experience to appreciate.
Round the edges, you'll find the usual adornments. A 3.5mm headphone jack on top, volume rocker and micro SIM tray on the left, micro USB port plus a few dubious screws on the bottom, and a perfectly placed lock/unlock/power button on the upper right hand side.
It's just in that sweet spot where it's easy to press with the thumb if you're right handed and not impossible if you're a leftie.

There's no way of getting the back off – so you know what that means, peeps. No removable battery and no expandable storage. The former doesn't faze us too much since the 2,100mAh battery pack is no slouch but the lack of memory card allowance is annoying.
Yes, we know that ever since the Nexus S, expandable memory is out. Google's said that it doesn't offer it because it's confusing. But for those with lots of content who can't or don't want to stream, it's a real pain. We don't quite buy Google's argument.
As for the innards, LG has cut no corners here. Make no mistake, this is a premium handset. DC-HSDPA, the very latest iteration of Jelly Bean 4.2, a Qualcomm Snapdragon chipset, quad-core 1.5GHz processor, A-GPS with GLONASS, NFC and so forth.

But what makes this so sweet is the price. Let's just point out that sim-free, a HTC One X with similar specs will set you back around £399 (around $637/AU$611) – even the 18-month old Samsung Galaxy S2 retails at £329 (around $525/AU$503).
And while last year's Galaxy Nexus will leave your wallet £299 (around $477/AU$458) lighter, this brand new model, the Nexus 4 is priced – almost unbelievably – at £239 ($299/AU$349) for the 8GB version and £279 ($349/AU$480) for 16GB. Yes, the newer Nexus is cheaper than the year old Nexus. Word!
We can't overestimate just how revolutionary this is and it leaves us open-mouthed at how Google is doing this. Either it's selling the Nexus 4 at a loss – or the mark-up on handsets is now shown up as being ridiculously high. Whichever it is, it means the Nexus 4 has a distinct advantage over the competition.

Bizarrely, in the UK Google has promised O2 that it can sell the Nexus 4 as an exclusive for the first month. We can't understand why – especially because you could end up paying £800 for the device over the course of the contract.
Virgin Mobile has also joined the Nexus 4 brigade by offering LG's handset on a contract - but with prices starting at £31 a month, it's not going to be a decent way to get a cheap Google phone in your hand.
Most people with sense (and a bit of spare cash) will buy the Nexus SIM-free and get themselves a cheap as chips SIM-only plan. The only downside is that LG has been a little slow on actually making these devices, despite Google subsidising the cost of the handset to the tune of hundreds of pounds per device.
In fact, a Google exec called the supply 'scarce and erratic' and could explain why there are only 400,000 in circulation at the end of December 2012, despite the low price and popularity.
But anyway, with an early November release, that means there'll still be plenty of networks marketing this heavily pre-Christmas once that month-long deal with O2 expires. And we can see the Nexus 4 being on a lot of Christmas lists.

source : techradar.com

Sony Xperia Z – the ultimate super phone

Bursting with features

The Sony Xperia Z touched down in style at CES 2013 in Las Vegas with a fabulous 5-inch full HD display, powerful quad-core processor and stand out 13MP camera.
With so much on offer we've rounded up the best features of the Sony Xperia Z for you to digest as your leisure.

The ultimate viewing experience

The Xperia Z pulls in expertise from Sony's TV, camera and computing divisions to deliver a phone with a beautiful, full HD 5-inch display.
Sony's heritage in the TV industry comes into play with the Mobile Bravia Engine 2 which is created by specialist engineers to really make you feel like you're part of the action.
With a wealth of power under the hood, highly functional Android Jelly Bean operating system and dazzling CyberShot camera with an EXMOR RS sensor, the Sony Xperia Z is well equipped to bring you the best mobile viewing experience.

A wealth of content

Whatever your vice may be, from movies to music, downloads and steaming the Xperia Z has you covered from head to toe.
With a vivid 5-inch full HD display, powerful 1.5GHz quad-core processor, slick Android Jelly Bean operating system and optimised 2,400mAh battery the Xperia Z is ready, are you?

Super connectivity

On top of offering the ultimate viewing experience, fantastic performance and stunning design the Sony Xperia Z also features a wealth of great connectivity options.
The Xperia Z provides you with one-touch connectivity, giving you the easiest and fastest way to wirelessly share music, photos and videos from your phone.
With the NFC technology built into the Sony Xperia Z, you can easily pair the handset to other compatible devices such as your NFC-enabled BRAVIA TV or wireless headphones.

Always working, come rain or shine

The Sony Xperia Z manages to marry a dust- and waterproof design with a stunning 5-inch full HD display and powerful 1.5GHz quad-core processor for a truly super-phone experience.
Carrying IP55 and IP57 certificates, you can take the Xperia Z for a dip in fresh water up to 1 metre for 30 minutes, meaning a trip into the bath or a slip into the toilet shouldn't end your phone's existence.
You can also rest easy when you next head to dustier climates as these are no problem for the tough Sony Xperia Z, which laughs in the face of such danger.

source: techradar.com

Instagram asking some users for photo ID over suspected 'violations'

But what are these violations?

Instagram wants real deets on suspected cheats

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Instagram has confirmed it is requesting photo ID verification from users its thinks have violated its terms of service.
In a move pushed by Instagram's sugar daddy Facebook, the photo sharing company has been asking the suspected offenders to confirm their identities.
This is something Facebook itself has been doing since last February, but as Instagram allows users to have pseudonyms instead of their real names, it's unclear what these "suspected violations" could be.
An Instagram spokesperson added: "This is just a general practice for both Facebook and Instagram to request photo IDs for verification purposes depending on what type of violation may have occurred."

More controversy?

The company has not yet expanded on those comments, but given the controversy over its recent bid to update its terms and service, it may be wise to serve up a little clarification here.
Late last year, the company attempted to make sweeping changes to its policies, effectively giving Instagram ownership of users' photos and the right to use them in advertising without compensation.
Following a public outcry and high profile boycotts, the app was forced into a climbdown, largely reverting to its original documents, barring a few changes.

source: techradar.com

30 best Android apps this week

Temple Run 2, Gogobot, Super Hexagon, ESPN X Games, Banjo, Pebble, Smart Data and more

Temple Run 2 leaps (and runs, slides...) onto Android

Welcome to this week's roundup of the newest and most notable Android apps and games released on the Google Play store.
As ever, the pricing refers to the initial download: when you see (Free) it may well mean freemium, with in-app purchases or subscriptions. The weekly iOS roundup will be published later in the day.
For now, here's this week's pick of new Android apps:

Temple Run 2 (Free)

A week after its iOS release (and more than 20m downloads of that later) Temple Run 2 makes the leap to Android. As explained in our full review, this sequel bumps up the graphical quality and adds more depth to the original endless runner, as you swipe to jump, slide and turn your way through the scenery to escape an angry giant monkey.

Gogobot (Free)

Social travel service Gogobot wants to help you discover interesting places to holiday based on other people's experiences, with an app to browse their virtual "postcards" and reviews, scout out more than 60k destinations and then book hotels to stay in.

Super Hexagon (£0.59)

Super Hexagon has a devoted fanbase on iOS, where its super-tough "minimal action" gameplay and pulsating chiptune soundtrack have been keeping gamers occupied.

ESPN X Games (Free)

ESPN's extreme-sports X Games events have their own Android app now, offering video highlights, news, results, schedules and a "TrickTrack" feature that gives more data on the tricks that athletes are pulling off during the competitions. The link above is for Android smartphones, but the separate tablet version is here.

Banjo (Free)

Social app Banjo has been around for some time on iPhone and Android, but it's just got a dedicated tablet version. The app pulls in friends' updates from Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Foursquare and LinkedIn, tying it to real-world places to show you who's where.

Pebble (Free)

Pebble is the companion app for the Pebble smart-watch, which has just started shipping to the people who crowdfunded its $10.3m Kickstarter campaign. The watch connects to this app using Bluetooth, enabling it to show incoming calls, emails and messages on the watch.

Smart Data (Free)

This is interesting from MasterCard: an app to help people keep better track of work expenses, taking and uploading photos of receipts, tagging them with date, amount and description details. It ties into the existing Smart Data service.

FilmOn Family TV (Free)

Online video service FilmOn has been controversial in the past, and its new Android app could cause a stir too. It promises to enable anyone to stream live TV channels from the US, Europe, Latin America and Asia. Standard-definition streams are free, but it charges for HD feeds.

Pool by Miniclip (Free)

Miniclip reckons this is "the world's best multiplayer pool game", which is quite a claim. Now Android gamers have the chance to test it, as the game is available on Android. It sees you sinking balls in practice, 1-vs-1 and tournament modes, with a level and ranking system ensuring you're matched against similar opponents, competing for virtual currency to upgrade your skills.

Ikaruga (£5.62)

Best known in recent years for its Xbox Live Arcade incarnation (and in the past for its Dreamcast and GameCube versions), Ikaruga is an excellent-looking shoot 'em up with all the ships, enemies and bullets you could wish for on a smartphone.

NASCAR Mobile '13 (Free)

Good news for fans of NASCAR racing – in the US and abroad – there's an official app for the 2013 season. It promises news, video clips, photos and social media feeds, as well as upcoming fantasy games and even live footage and in-car audio – although it remains to be seen if non-US users will get all those features.

LifeKraze (Free)

Focused more on Americans, although it is available elsewhere, LifeKraze wants to get people posting 160-character messages about their daily accomplishments, while distributing 300 virtual points a day to other people's updates that they think are worthy. The idea: those points can then be spent on discounts from brands like The North Face and Skullcandy. Bragtastic.

Mood O'Clock Alarm (£1.67)

Music startup Stereomood has a new alarm clock app for Android, which promises to let you "choose the morning mood you want to be woken up to" and get a suitable soundtrack for it, along with an image. Moods include calm, dreamy, energetic and even "furious".

Galaga Special Edition Free (Free)

Here's more retro shoot 'em up action on Android with a new version of Namco Bandai's Galaga. This Special Edition offers 25 levels and boss battles, with advertising funding the action – something that's causing some debate in its Google Play reviews over where the ads appear during the game.

House Of Hell (£3.99)

It's a nostalgic week on Android for sure. This app from Tin Man Games is the latest in its interactive remakes of the Fighting Fantasy gamebooks from the 1980s. It puts you in the position of a hero battling through monsters and traps through dice-rolling skills alone.

Restaurant Story: Valentine's (Free)

This is a topical (well, it will be in February) game from social games publisher TeamLava based on its popular Restaurant Story. This Valentine's edition involves building a romantic restaurant, customising its menu and visiting those of friends – all funded by in-app purchases.

Hushed (Free)

Hushed is one of a wave of apps promising "disposable, anonymous, private phone numbers" for use, including anonymous text messaging. "Perfect for dating, job searches, short-term projects, craigslist, Twitter, Tumblr, and other social media," as its developer claims. Although also more nefarious uses, obviously.

BlueBox (£0.50)

BlueBox's inspiration is clear, and indeed explained in its Google Play listing. It's an electronic-instrument app based on Yamaha's Tenori-On, enabling you to play melodies by tapping dots arranged in an on-screen grid.

Old School Defense (£0.63)

Based on Will Ferrell movie Old School, this is a tower defence game from developer Big Blue Bubble that sees you trying to fend off gatecrashers to a college party, with two modes and more than 30 maps to play on.

Whip (Free)

Whip wants to be the way you create "social photo albums" from your Android device, gathering them into templates with up to 24 pics at a time, then sharing them with friends via email, Facebook or Twitter. Music and text can be added too.

Ski Tracks (£0.79)

Ski and snowboard-tracking app Ski Tracks has been a wintery hit on iPhone, but is now available for Android too. It runs in the background and tracks your snowsport activities throughout the day, while also showing maps, stats and geotagging any photos you take. A useful feature stops it running if your battery is getting low, to avoid nasty mountainside surprises.

Climate Defense (Free)

More tower defence, but this time tackling the real-world issue of climate change. It involves placing trees to absorb clouds of carbon dioxide before they reach the atmosphere. It's the latest game from Game the News – recently in the news when its Endgame: Syria game was rejected by Apple.

DriveBit (Free)

DriveBit has one use, but it could be a good one for people using the Fitbit health tracking gadget. The app helps you stop Fitbit from misinterpreting a rattly drive as a steps.

Line Runner 2 (Free)

The first Line Runner game was a big hit with more than 25m players, but now it's got a sequel. It's an endless runner with stick-men, with power-ups, social leaderboards and – a feature that more mobile games should have – an easier "Kids Mode".

AMP+ (£0.66)

AMP+ is a music player for Android devices that aims to be simpler and more intuitive than the default app. You can create and edit playlists, switch music using lockscreen controls, and use a persistent "Now Playing" bar to keep tabs on what you're listening to, among other features.

Merge Records (Free)

Indie label Merge Records' artists have a firm following, so this catch-all app should be pretty popular. It offers news, gig details and streaming music from the label's roster.

Mobile World Congress 2013 (Free)

This is one for mobile-industry readers really: the official app for February's Mobile World Congress trade show in Barcelona. Expect venue details, conference session info and exhibitor data, for use while at the show.

Snap Pad (£0.59)

Snap Pad is limited to working on certain Samsung devices – it uses the company's S-Pen SDK for stylus control. It's a scribbling app for "moderately important, temporary thinkings" – not important enough for full memos and more important than simple doodles. Well worth checking out if you have a Galaxy Note device.

Anycabs (Free)

Anycabs is one of a clutch of minicab price-comparison and booking apps in the UK, working in London, Manchester and Birmingham at the time of writing. It promises more than 10k licensed minicabs in its database, to provide a range of quotes for journeys.

Brian Blessed Alarm Clock (£0.69)

The title says it all: wake up with Brian Blessed shouting at you, with a pick of 30 alarms – "a mix of shockingly bad Shakespearean hacks, silly songs and motivational encouragement". Perhaps check your volume settings before going to sleep, mind...
That's our selection, but what apps have you been enjoying on your Android smartphone or tablet? Make your recommendations or give your views on the apps above in the comments section.

source:guardian.co.uk

Android Market News

Apple and Samsung have won the smartphone wars. What's next?

The latest figures from IDC show that smartphone are approaching 50% of the total phone market, and that two companies dominate it. There's room for growth - but no obvious reason for displacement of the top two

Meet the smartphone overlords: an Apple iPhone 4S and a Samsung Galaxy S. Photograph: Pawel Kopczynski/Reuters

The smartphone wars are, essentially, over. Samsung and Apple have won the battle of the manufacturers; Android has won the battle for market share, though it remains to be seen which of the two giants - the South Korean manufacturer or the Californian designer - will win the battle for profits.
The latest figures from research company IDC for the mobile market for the fourth quarter of 2012 and the full year show that the smartphone market now belongs to Apple and Samsung. By IDC's reckoning (because Samsung does not publish figures, but gives "guidance" to analysts), Samsung shifted 63.7m smartphones in the fourth quarter, while Apple shipped 47.8m. Together, they comprised more than 50% of the whole smartphone market - which itself comprised 45.5% of the whole mobile market.
Apple and Samsung combined percentage of smartphone sales in fourth quarter of 2012 (source: IDC) In other words, one in four of all phones shipped during the fourth quarter was a smartphone from either Apple or Samsung. In the smartphone space, Samsung had a 29% share, up from 22.5% a year ago, and Apple a 21.8% share (23% a year ago), IDC says. The next biggest was Huawei, with just under 5%.
There's no particular reason to think that either Samsung or Apple is going to pack up their bags and go home. Despite all the noise around Apple's "disappointing" results (because it did pretty much what analysts forecast - always a mistake), the murmurs about another iPhone, or even a lower-cost but new iPhone model (rather than the lower-cost but old iPhone model using the iPhone 4 casing) do make some sense if the company wants to expand its presence in markets unlike the US, where the carrier subsidy model distorts the market in the iPhone's favour.
Given that, and given that Nokia hasn't shown any signs of breaking the market (it sold just 770,000 Lumias in the US in the fourth quarter of 2012), it seems reasonable to say that the war is over. Windows Phone will get some share, RIM's BlackBerry will get some share, but Android has the majority - anywhere from 60% to 70%, depending - and Apple has about 20%.
Year-on-year growth in all mobile phones, featurephones and smartphones. (Source: IDC) The figures also show how rapidly smartphones are taking over the market.
The featurephone market is shrinking, quite fast: it has gone from around 300m phones per quarter during 2011 to about 250m in 2012 (and fell by 15% year-on-year in the fourth quarter), while smartphone numbers keep growing, rising by about 40% per quarter. Some time this quarter, smartphones will make up more than 50% of the world total.

But what's "smart"?

You can argue about whether some of the low-end Android handsets being sold in the US, Europe or China ever get used as smartphones; many as just used as pay-as-you-go (aka "prepaid") phones.
Equally, should Nokia's Asha range should be included as a smartphone? Presently it isn't, because you can't install third-party apps, a key measure that companies such as IDC and Gartner use to define "smartphones". but they can connect to the internet for browsing and email, which is why the Opera browser shows up so much in mobile statistics.)
On Nokia's measure, it sold just 6.6m smartphones (4.4m Lumias running Windows Phone, and 2.2m running Symbian) but also 9.3m Asha handsets - which would, if you include those, mean 15.9m "smart" phones, and make it the third-biggest smartphone seller.
Instead, though, the top five smartphone sellers on IDC's measure are Samsung, Apple, Huawei (10.8m), Sony (9.8m), and ZTE (7.5m). It's telling that RIM, Nokia, HTC and Google-owned Motorola have all dropped out of that and that LG, supplier of the Nexus 4 for Google, isn't in there either. While Nokia managed to eke out a profit from the fourth quarter (bolstered by the sale of Vertu, patent licensing and Microsoft's injection of cash to push Windows Phone) there's no sign of a sudden ramp in sales. And almost all of those companies are loss-makers, apart from HTC and Sony, which have just managed to keep their handset businesses in profit.

The barbell-shaped market

During ARM chipmaker Qualcomm's fourth-quarter results call its chief financial officer William Keitel offered this insight: "The OEM [mobile handset] market is kind of getting to be a barbell, where you have one end of the barbell with names that we all recognise. But the other end of the barbell has a lot of names that very few people recognise concentrated in Asia. And it's that visible name in one end of the barbell that people tend to focus on and where data is more readily available. The other end of the barbell, the data can be hard to come by."
Barbells, of course, are large at both ends and thin in the middle. Keitel was talking generally about the proliferation of handset makers, where there are enormous numbers in Asia churning out cheap handsets (increasingly, using Android, or AOSP - the Android Open Source Platform, which doesn't "call home" to Google when the phone is activated).
The dominance of Samsung and Apple in terms of volume leaves few pickings for the rest. "HTC makes beautiful phones running Android. But it's in terrible trouble," says Benedict Evans, telecoms and technology analyst at Enders Analysis. Just offering Android isn't a guarantee of success for anyone except Google, and even it has challenges in the Chinese market, where AOSP phones make up an increasing number of the "Android" phones recorded in statistics.
Market share of manufacturers in smartphones and overall mobile market, 2Q 2011 - 4Q 2012. (Source: IDC) In this barbell market, Apple is firmly ensconced at the high end, though its policy of keeping older iPhone models which can be sold by carriers for lower upfront prices on contracts means that it's not confined to the very top niche. Samsung makes a colossal variety of phones and smartphones; it's a company that gives the lie to the idea that you can't be vertically integrated. (In fact Apple and Samsung are a fascinating contrast: one owns pretty much no manufacturing facilities, but outsources all manufacture; the other owns everything, from silicon fabrication plants right up to phone assembly plants. It certainly shows that there's no point in being didactic about the best way to win in the market.)
Samsung's fourth-quarter results don't break out its revenues in any useful way; there's no clue about how many phones or tablets it produced, or what they produced in revenues, or their average selling price. In that sense, Samsung's a financial black box.
We know it's a behemoth. But it's easy - and wrong - to see its flagship devices such as the Galaxy S3 and Note 2 and think that those made up pretty much all of the 63.7m sold. They don't; Samsung's own figures, from its announcement on 10 January that it had shipped a total of 100m Galaxy phones, was easy to misinterpret.
But Samsung was clear about it: the Galaxy S3 shipped 30m in five months, 40m in seven months. The Galaxy S2 had shipped more than 40m in 20 months. (Which logically leaves the original Galaxy S at somewhere under 20m.) Compared to the number of smartphones Samsung has shipped since the launch of the Galaxy S in March 2010 - which total 321m - it's clear that Samsung isn't just at the high end. It's everywhere - high, middle and low end. And it has the marketing muscle and spend to shove lesser players such as HTC out of the picture through promotions that put its phones (and tablets) in front of anyone who steps into a phone store. Nothing wrong with that; it's the reality of the modern market, where sheer scale is the determinant.

Small pickings

When Steve Jobs introduced the iPhone in January 2007, he said it was "five years ahead of anything else out there". Those five years have elapsed, and some; and the rest have caught up, so that there's more homogeneity out there than ever before. Even RIM's new BB10 interface (shown in this video) is based around a black slab touch screen with a grid of icons (for app collections), with the addition of two screens - one dedicated to email, the other to showing running applications. The swipe-to-switch gestures aren't that dramatically different from what you'd find on Android or iOS. Only Windows Phone offers a genuinely different interface.
The dreams that companies and operating systems such as Jolla and the Firefox mobile OS are nice, but in essence they're experiments. Jolla might have a vague chance of getting some traction in China, but then again, it has to attract a developer ecosystem around it - and why would you write for Jolla when there will be hundreds of millions of Android/AOSP phones to target there?
It's true that Nokia said there would never be another open mobile OS after Symbian - and look what happened to that. Does that mean there will be nothing after Android? Not at all; we're going to want smarter OSs to handle, for example, the wearable computing that's coming along (think of the Pebble smartwatch and Google Glass) as well as the explosion in addressable devices coming with IPv6. What will that be? Hard to know, but it won't necessarily be Android. It might even - who knows? - be QNX, which underpins RIM's BB10.

Room for growth

Smartphone share of mobile market to 4Q 2012. (Source: IDC) How much bigger can the smartphone market grow? Given that the overall mobile market is pretty stable at around 450m units per quarter (varying seasonally), and that as a rule of thumb you can usually expect that there will be 20% of any market that will stubbornly stay with simpler (cheaper, longer-lived) phones, smartphone shipments could probably hit 360m per quarter in 12 to 18 months.
That implies that there's room for another 140m smartphones to be sold every quarter - an increase of 63% on the market as it stands now. But much of that will be at the lower end of the barbell, in China and the rest of Asia; the US market is pretty much saturated (80% of phones sold there now are smartphones), and Europe is headed that way, with smartphone usage above 50% in many countries.
But as above, it will be slim pickings for any company that isn't Samsung or Apple. Samsung in particular shows an ability to carpet any market with its handsets - apart from China, where "white box" handset makers are prospering.

Next stop: services

As Microsoft is discovering in the PC market, hardware is the new software - being able to offer an integrated product makes the real difference (hence its efforts with the Surface). But in smartphones, services are the new hardware and software.
Having a great screen and great camera isn't a differentiator any more. Having lots of apps in your app store is a given. What now distinguishes smartphone platforms is having really good services. Google of course has not just maps, but also email, cloud storage and Google Now - a feature that really marks it out from all the other platforms. Apple has iMessage, as well as its iCloud mail and document service, the iTunes Store (with all those films, books and music) and its own maps (you could put those on the plus or minus ledger). Nokia has Maps and Nokia Music.
It's noticeable that Samsung is making its own effort to split from the rest of the Android pack, by offering services such as S-Voice (powered by the same backend as Apple's Siri) and its Samsung-specific Android apps (for the Galaxy Note's stylus, for example). For Android rivals such as HTC, LG and Motorola, any adoption by Samsung owners of those apps makes them less likely to change to another handset maker, and imperils them further. (It's not as big as the jump from Android to iPhone, though, which some do make; even so, it's not trivial.) Samsung is also making moves to offer music and video through its own iTunes-like store; it knows that just making hardware isn't enough.

Where next?

If the smartphone wars are really over, what comes after? As above - the obvious next step is the phone that you don't need to look at, but which alerts you by voice or visual message when you need to know something. Wearable, pocketable - it's likely to be an evolution from what we're seeing now (as the smartphone was from the featurephone; think of the Asha as the missing link, maybe) and which - let's hope - will change our lives for the better too.

source : guardian.co.uk

Samsung reports 19% rise in sales to £32bn but warns of slowdown

Samsung's move to freeze spending amid uncertain prospects for the consumer electronics market spooks investors

Sales of Samsung smartphones are outstripping those of its rival Apple's iPhone. Photograph Marcio Jose Sanchez/AP

Samsung Electronics has cemented its position at the top of the mobile phone business, ahead of archrival Apple, after the technology group posted a 19% increase in sales but warned of a looming slowdown in the market.
The South Korean firm, whose products range from memory chips to mobile phones, said fourth-quarter sales climbed to 56tn won (£32.2bn) while profits increased by 78% to 7tn won.
However, it spooked investors by warning of general uncertainty in the outlook for the consumer electronics market and announced a freeze in capital expenditure. Samsung's executives noted during a conference call that smartphone sales would probably slow down during the first quarter, with the company expected to replace its flagship Galaxy S3 smartphone before April. Samsung Electronics shares fell 2.5%.
Even so, analysts said it would tighten its grip on the mobile business, where it has taken over from Apple and Nokia. "Even though they said demand for smartphones will slow down in the first quarter, Samsung will likely buck the industry trend and its own smartphone sales will go up," said Byun Han-joon, an analyst at KB Investment & Securities.
Samsung offers dozens of smartphone and feature phone devices at a range of prices, unlike Apple which has stuck with its high-end iPhone. This has led analysts to mark down Apple's future profitability as the market for expensive phones becomes saturated.
Key to Samsung's record profits were smartphone shipments. Unlike Apple, which announced this week that it had shipped 47.8m phones during the fourth quarter, Samsung does not provide specific numbers, but gives analysts guidance on the figures. Research company IDC put the figure at 63.7m, while Strategy Analytics put it at 63m. That would give Samsung roughly 30% of the smartphone market overall, and Apple about 20%.
The next largest smartphone maker was China's Huawei, according to IDC, with a market share of just under 5%. IDC reckoned Samsung shipped a total of 111.2m mobile phones in the fourth quarter, ahead of Nokia's 86.3m.
Apple is ahead of Samsung in the courtroom, however, having won $1bn in damages from the South Korean firm in a patent case in the US last year. Samsung has dropped a legal attempt to ban sales of some Apple products, which it claims have infringed its intellectual property, in five European countries including the UK.
Elsewhere in the results, the components division, which makes semiconductors such as memory chips and processors for Apple's iPhone and Samsung's own phones, helped boost profits.
Samsung is also working on flexible displays that could be used in tablets and phones, but despite showing off the technology at an industry show in Las Vegas this month it is not yet ready to move into mass production.

source:guardian.co.uk

     10 best free Android apps for kids

Android Market is packed with apps, hundreds and thousands of them, and finding a good quality app can be a tedious and frustrating process.
In the Education segment alone there are over 3,000 free educational apps available for you to download.
Here we dig deep and uncover ten of the best free Android apps for kids.

1. AniWorld Lite
AniWorld Lite is an excellent app for kids aged one to five. It teaches kids the names of different animals and gives them a chance to feed and pet them. While the app itself is very basic, it's the "Hey, pet me" feature that will have you and your kids rolling on the floor.

2. HomeWork
HomeWork is not a fun app, it's a helpful one and aimed at the older kids. Using this free app they can schedule homework and lessons, set reminders, plan for exam revision, and manage their time more effectively. It works well on a tablet, supporting both screen angles, and is extremely intuitive to use.

3. Famigo Sandbox
Famigo Sandbox is a brilliant, and free, way of making your Android device safe for your kids. It includes a free app of its own for kids to play as well as listing certified safe apps for parents to browse and choose from. There are no ads or in-app purchases and you get shown games and activities that are platform and child specific.

4. iStory Books
Free books complete with voice-over, pictures and alternative languages. Fancy teaching your tot Spanish? There's a Cinderella for that... iStory Books is a simple but sweet app that's good for entertaining the kids. Eleven free books are included from the get go with new ones added every two weeks.

5. Ant Smasher
Ant Smasher is a free app kids and adults can enjoy with vicarious murderous intent. Smash the ants with your finger, don't smash the bees, try not to die. Sound easy? It isn't. Addictive fun for kids aged four and up, and ideal for building their reflexes.

6. 0-10 Numbers
0-10 Numbers is all about overachiever baby having fun with numbers and it is excellent for what it does. Bright colours, anthropomorphised characters, careful enunciation, it's a learning resource that works well for kids aged two to four.

7. Kids Numbers and Math
A clever and sweet title, Kids Numbers and Math offers your kids the basic stepping stones into the world of numbers. The app is hugely entertaining and kids will enjoy learning the numbers 1-20 with the variety of exercises on offer. The paid version allows for more customisation but the free version is just fine for number learning fun.

8. Steamy Window
Steamy Window is plain daft and completely brilliant. Kids love making pictures on steamy windows so just hand them the tablet or phone and hit Steamy Window and, voila, they have steam galore to play with. By blowing into the mike you create more steam. Genius.

9. Classic Simon
Remember that game that had you hooked as a kid? Nab Classic Simon for free on Android Market and play it for hours. Entertaining, challenging and excellent for building memory skills in kids and reminding you that yours isn't quite what it used to be.

10. How To Make Paper Airplanes
How To Make Paper Airplanes has to be one of the best free apps for kids and parents around. Think about it, how many times have you built a paper airplane and failed, watched it crash into the wall or fall into the sea? Well, now you and the kids can create some impressive paper creations that should, theoretically, fly like a dream.

source:techradar.com

Android News : Apple's fourth-quarter earnings are the first sign of strategic weakness

Apple's fourth-quarter earnings are the first sign of strategic weakness

For any other tech company, Apple's Q4 results would be stellar. Instead, I see symptoms of the onset of possibly fatal sclerosis

Tim Cook: the Apple CEO's problem is less the products than the company's closed culture. Photograph: Eric Risberg/AP

First, a big disclosure: I own a lot of Apple stock, whereas I do not own stock in any of its major competitors. And, even worse, I own a Macintosh, an iPhone, and an iPad. I was a Wintel user for 20 years, but eventually, I gave up in disgust, and have never looked back. So, please feel free to regard what follows as either deluded or financially biased. But I think you'll see that I'm neither an Apple bigot nor an Apple booster.
Apple's quarterly earnings, just announced, have been the subject of speculation reaching into hysteria and chicanery. For any other company, the results would have been excellent, even stellar: revenues of $54.5bn, an 18% increase over the same quarter last year, and profits of $13.1bn. While profits were flat relative to the prior year, the same quarter in 2011 had 14 weeks, as opposed to 13 weeks in 2012, so results were actually better.
Still, investors were very disappointed – including myself. My own disappointment, however, is not principally financial, in the narrow sense. Rather, what bothers me is that Apple's financial shortfall comes from a clear refusal to recognize some very important realities.
What does this mean for Apple's prospects?
The company's future depends upon three very large, very separate questions: the size of its market opportunity; its implementation competence; and its large-scale strategic position.
The first question is often posed very skeptically: can a company this large continue to grow rapidly? Many observers assert that this simply isn't possible, and that Apple's markets must soon reach saturation. They're wrong. I realize that it is hard to believe, but in fact, Apple has enormous room to grow: it could reach $500bn (or more) in revenues quite easily, and rather soon.
Even Apple's existing markets – primarily, phones and tablets – are still only in the earliest stages of evolution. Only perhaps one third of the world's mobile phone users have ever owned a smartphone, and most of the installed base of smartphones is, or will soon be, entirely obsolete.
Twenty years from now, a smartphone with a fast broadband connection will be a necessity of life, replacing your keys, credit cards, identification, remote controls, cameras, GPS, and much else. These phones will also be far less expensive than today, and everyone will have one. Much the same will be true of tablets: if, as I and many others believe, tablets become as ubiquitous as the objects we still quaintly call "personal computers", then we're going to buy another billion of them, and then replace them a few times after that.
And then, there's also a billion televisions – if Apple enters that market – not to mention cloud services, watches and glasses and heads-up car displays and games and household control systems and personal robots … and five more things I can't think of right now. Twenty years from now, there will be consumer-usable, internet-connected stuff everywhere. I'm not sure I'll like that world, but I'm certain that it will be there.
But just because Apple could become by far the largest and most profitable company in the history of the world, dwarfing even Exxon, does not mean that it will become that company. Apple faces two major challenges: its ability to execute, and its large-scale, high level, strategic position.
As to the first – implementation capacity – I am rather sanguine. It is increasingly clear that, for better and/or worse, modern information technology makes it possible to manage organizations of extraordinary size and scope. Hon Tai Precision Industries (aka Foxconn), the Taiwan-headquartered company that is Apple's largest contract manufacturer, already has well over 1 million employees. Apple still has less than 100,000 employees, and half of those are in its stores, which are, by far, the most profitable retail operations in the world.
Most of Apple's operational metrics are outstanding: revenue per employee, etc. And whatever problems Apple has – I'll give you my list in a moment – I don't think that managerial competence is among them (at least, in the narrow sense). I listen to Apple's quarterly conference calls, and Tim Cook is one smart cookie.
But now we come, literally, to the $1tn question, about which I'm becoming highly skeptical. Apple is enmeshed in the highest-stakes strategic contest in economic history – one that makes the battle for control of the personal computer market, won by Microsoft and Intel three decades ago, seem nearly trivial. The new contest presently has three core participants – Apple, Google, and Samsung – and many secondary players. A few others, such as Amazon, aspire to first-tier status, whereas firms such as ARM, EBay, Netflix, and Square could dominate major specialized domains.
It is an extraordinarily complex, nuanced strategic game, though one in which most of the large incumbents – Intel, Microsoft, PC manufacturers, RIM, Nokia, Japanese electronics companies – can be ignored. Indeed, I will argue (in a later column) that Microsoft is terminal: it has cancer, heart disease, strokes, and Alzheimer's, while also being shot, knifed, and poisoned by skilled assassins. It is so over.
Google and Samsung, though, are a different story, and Apple is not doing everything right. To be sure, its products are gorgeous and cool and easy to use; it leaves manufacturing to others but is intimately knowledgeable about it; and Apple is highly disciplined about its architectures, so that it avoids the technical monstrosities that now cripple Microsoft.
But Apple is making huge mistakes – which could destroy it over time unless it corrects itself. The first is its failure, or refusal, to address low-price markets. While Apple's products are cool, there are billions of human beings who can't afford to, or simply don't, care about cool. Apple is dismissing those human beings, their needs, and the market they represent because they have the bad taste to be poor. That is arrogant, and in this case, it's also stupid.
Relatedly, Apple still refuses to distribute important elements of its technology on rival platforms, which prevents it from ever being able to offer ubiquitous, standardized inter-operability. Apple is in a war for platform control, and low-cost Android devices are dangerously close to setting standards, even on Apple's own devices (for exampe, Google maps, Google docs).
And finally, Apple's obsessive secrecy, and the insularity that inevitably comes with such secrecy, is also a huge mistake.
Long ago, I worked for IBM when it behaved similarly, and IBM's cult of secrecy contributed mightily to concealment and avoidance of unpleasant facts. If you don't talk to people, they don't talk to you; and then you don't learn.
Apple's underperformance this quarter is a symptom of these problems, rather than simply a matter of component prices or gross margins. Let's hope that they figure that out, because they still do some very cool stuff.
I'd like to hold on to my stock, too. But unless Apple changes, I don't think I should.

source : guardian.co.uk

Android 5.0 Key Lime Pie release date, news and rumours

Updated Here are the touches that will make Key Lime Pie even sweeter 

Google's showing no signs of slowing its pace of Android development, with Android 4.0 appearing on the Galaxy Nexus late in 2011, followed in July of 2012 by the Android 4.1 Jelly Bean release that arrived powering the super Nexus 7.
But, forward-looking, update-obsessed people that we are, we can't help but imagine how Google's going to maintain the pace of innovation in its next version of its mobile OS, Android 5.0.
All we know so far is that Google's working away on the K release of Android, which it's developing under the dessert-related codename of Key Lime Pie. Regarding the version number, it's likely that the Key Lime Pie moniker will be given to Android 5.0. We thought we might find out on 29 October but as yet there is no official word from Google.
Rumours of a new Nexus handset started trickling in during the third quarter of 2012, as we reported on 1 October 2012. There was speculation that this phone would be sporting Key Lime Pie, but sources who spoke to AndroidAndMe correctly claimed that the handset, which turned out to be the Google Nexus 4 would be running Android Jelly Bean.
So now as we wait on official news of the Android 5.0 release date and features, we can start to pull together the Key Lime Pie rumours from around the web, with the first sighting of Android 5.0 on a benchmarking website, apparently running on a Sony smartphone. There has previously been speculation that Sony is in line to produce the next Nexus phone, which may lend some credence to this rumour.

Android 5.0 release date

Google has announced that its next developer conference - Google IO - will take place from May 15 to May 17 2013, a month earlier than 2012's June dates. Given that Google announced Android 4.1 Jelly Bean at 2012's IO conference, it's not unreasonable to expect to see Android 5.0 at this year's event.

Android 5.0 phones

While the Nexus 4 didn't appear with a helping of Key Lime Pie, speculation that we reported on 21 January 2013 suggests that the Motorola X Phone is the Android 5.0-toting handset that will break cover at Google IO. According to a post on the DroidForums website, the phone will also feature a virtually bezel-free, edge-to-edge, 5-inch display.

Android 5.0 features

Key Lime Pie features are yet to revealed, but as we scour the web for more Android 5.0 news, we've been thinking about what we want to see in Android 5.0 Key Lime Pie. Hopefully the new mobile OS will feature some of these things...

1. Performance Profiles

It's bit of a fuss managing your mobile before bed time. Switching off the sound, turning off data, activating airplane mode and so on, so what Android 5.0 really needs is a simple way of managing performance, and therefore power use, automatically.
We've been given a taste of this with Blocking Mode in Samsung's Jelly Bean update on the Samsung Galaxy S3 and the Note 2 but we'd like to see the functionality expanded.
Something like a Gaming mode for max power delivery, an Overnight low-power state for slumbering on minimal power and maybe a Reading mode for no bothersome data connections and a super-low backlight.
Some hardware makers put their own little automated tools in, such as the excellent Smart Actions found within Motorola's RAZR interface, but it'd be great to see Google give us a simple way to manage states.
Another little power strip style widget for phone performance profiles would be an easy way to do it.

Set telephone to BEDTIME SLEEPY MODE

2. Better multiple device support

Google already does quite a good job of supporting serious Android nerds who own several phones and tablets, but there are some holes in its coverage that are rather frustrating.
Take the Videos app which manages your film downloads through the Play Store. Start watching a film on one Android device and you're limited to resuming your film session on that same unit, making it impossible to switch from phone to tablet mid-film.
You can switch between phone and web site players to resume watching, but surely Google ought to understand its fans often have a couple of phones and tabs on the go and fix this for Android Key Lime Pie?

3. Enhanced social network support

Android doesn't really do much for social network users out of the box, with most of the fancy social widgets and features coming from the hardware makers through their own custom skins.
Sony integrates Facebook brilliantly in its phones, and even LG makes a great social network aggregator widget that incorporates Facebook and Twitter - so why are there no cool aggregator apps as part of the standard Android setup?
Yes, Google does a great job of pushing Google+, but, no offence, there are many other more widely used networks that ought to be a little better "baked in" to Android.

4. Line-drawing keyboard options

Another area where the manufacturers have taken a big leap ahead of Google is in integrating clever alternate text entry options in their keyboards. HTC and Sony both offer their own takes on the Swype style of line-drawing text input, which is a nice option to have for getting your words onto a telephone. Get it into Android 5.0 and give us the choice.
UPDATE: Google heard us and this feature appeared in Android 4.2.

P-U-T T-H-I-S I-N A-N-D-R-O-I-D 5-.-0

5. A video chat app

How odd is it that Google's put a front-facing camera on the Nexus 7 and most hardware manufacturers do the same on their phones and tablets, yet most ship without any form of common video chat app?
You have to download Skype and hope it works, or find some other downloadable app solution. Why isn't there a Google Live See My Face Chat app of some sort as part of Android? Is it because we're too ugly? Is that what you're saying, Google?

6. Multi-select in the contacts

The Android contacts section is pretty useful, but it could be managed a little better. What if you have the idea of emailing or texting a handful of your friends? The way that's currently done is by emailing one, then adding the rest individually. Some sort of checkbox system that let users scroll through names and create a mailing list on the fly through the contacts listing in Android Key Lime Pie would make this much easier.

Make this a destination, rather than a never-used list

7. Cross-device SMS sync

If you're a constant SIM swapper with more than one phone on the go, chances are you've lost track of your text messages at some point. Google stores these on the phone rather than the SIM card, so it'd be nice if our texts could be either backed up to the SIM, the SD card, or beamed up to the magical invisible cloud of data, for easy and consistent access across multiple devices.

8. A "Never Update" option

This would annoy developers so is unlikely to happen, but it'd be nice if we could refuse app updates permanently in Android 5.0, just in case we'd rather stick with a current version of a tool than be forced to upgrade.
Sure, you can set apps to manual update and then just ignore the update prompt forever, but it'd be nice to know we can keep a favoured version of an app without accidentally updating it. Some of us are still using the beta Times app, for example, which has given free access for a year.

Let us keep older versions. Many people fear change

9. App preview/freebie codes

Something Apple's been doing for ages and ages is using a promo code system to distribute free or review versions of apps. It even makes doing little competitions to drum up publicity for apps much easier, so why's there no similar scheme for Android?
It might encourage developers to stop going down the ad-covered/freemium route if they could charge for an app but still give it away to friends and fans through a promo code system.

10. Final whinges and requests...

It's be nice to be able to sort the Settings screen by alphabetical order, too, or by most commonly used or personal preference, as Android's so packed with a huge list of options these days it's a big old list to scroll through and pick out what you need.
Plus could we have a percentage count for the battery in the Notifications bar for Android 5.0? Just so we know a bit more info than the vague emptying battery icon.

source  : techradar.com