Posts Tagged ‘Android’Android now most used mobile platformMonday, May 23rd, 2011The Q1 smartphone sales figures that were released yesterday by Gartner show that Android has surged and now leading all other smartphone operating systems. These numbers are Q1 sales figures and not reflective of overall market share but the show the direction the overall market is going.
Now offering Android application development servicesWednesday, January 12th, 2011
Blue Star are happy to announce that we are now developing Android applications. As mobile platforms become more popular as a means to access content and applications online it is important to cater for these users. This has of course been popularized by the iPhone and the App Store, however Android devices now outnumber iPhone’s in the U.S. and will soon surpass here in Europe also. Mobile is ‘the next big thing’, it is redefining how we access our data and increasingly more people are using mobile search now. A lot of modern smartphones have a ton of interesting hardware features that allow for unique applications not possible before with technology at this cost. Fully loaded phones have GPS, Wifi, Camera(s), audio/video recording/playback, G Sensor. These all open up a new field of possibility. Location based services will play a major role in this new landscape of mobile data. Android development services we offer can complement an existing online presence or provide a new mobile app for an activity that is more convenient to have on the go than requiring a PC. More information on Android Application development
Review - HTC Desire Android PhoneSunday, August 29th, 2010
I have had faith in the Android platform from day one, it is solid, it has a linux kernel, it does what you want, when you want making everything ever so reliable. Admittedly my first encounter with Android was unfortunately with the Samsung Galaxy, it served its purpose yet was a unrefined and a little slow. The HTC Desire on the otherhand, one knows they are dealing with serious hardware here from paper, and the handset actually proves true. It is essentially a rebranded Nexus One, the original Google-developed phone which was manufactured by HTC, Sony turned down the contract. Bound by the unignorable marketing force of Apple I am obluged to compare to the iPhone. Bye, Bye iPhone, this blows it out of the water. The phones construction is superior in every way, it fits well in one hand and is light and responsive enough to use single handed. The hardware is quite impressive, 1Ghz Snapdragon, 5MP camera with LED flash, incredible clear 480×800 Sony SLED amongst the usual trimmings one has come to expect in a smartphone, GPS, Bluetooth. The software is HTC Sense on top of Android, this works quite nicely, the widget structure is excellent, 7 home screens to work with for essentials such as Clock, Contacts, Calendar, Mail/Social network updates, Weather, etc. This can be customised anyway you wish. General operation of the phone is very responsive and lightning fast. Everything Instant. Everything connected. Everything integrated. And this is the real beauty of this device, all information on the device is linked, okay you may need to manually link some entries in facebook to contact list, but all contact data from Google/Facebook/Twitter/Flickr are viewable on the contact card. GPS is incredible fast, and accurate, I have yet to put Bluetooth support through its paces. Camera is well decent at 5MP with flash, video is also very clear. Battery seems to be above average for a smartphone, and there are a number of options to conserve power, disabling wireless transmitters, dimming screen, amongst other fine tuning. Inclusion of Google Navigation is a nice bonus, and Google Earth is amazing in detail, 3D buildings would be nice however. The G-Sensor and GPS are both incredible accurate, and can be recorded in My Tracks (Google mapping service) and uploaded to Google Maps. There is a Kindle app from Amazon to easily read and purchase books, this is one of the killer features for me, no more lost books! And indeed the convenience of being able to carry a volume of books in your pocket, and yes the books are perfectly readable, its nice to have a copy of Huxley’s Brave New World on me at all times, my Catcher In The Rye. It is obvious after a couple of hours using the phone that it is a serious iPhone competitor, probably the first handset to give it a run for its money. After a little time with this device you know you are dealing with serious high tech gadgetry, just what every aspiring Jack Bauer or James Bond needs to have in his pocket. Indeed, the only corners cut on the Desire are the round edges on the handset frame.
Review: O2 Samsung i5700, Google Android phoneSaturday, February 6th, 2010Firstly, before I even bought the phone I was dubious of my new Android being a Samsung manufactured model, generally not a mobile I would ordinarily go for preferring a HTC a Sony Ericsson handset if available. That aside, I was buying it for the OS and on those terms first imprressions of Android is impressive. It is highly expandable with a good choice in the Market with a lot of free apps, which compensate for some of the limitations of the phone’s natively installed applications. The phone system settings are a bit all over the place with some illogical menu choices to get to what you want, could be laid out better and more obvious. Saying that setup with a Google Account is stragiht forward, and it accepts Google Apps account with no hassle by simply entering full email of Apps domain as Google Account username. For me this is a big thumbs up. The Gmail client and Google Talk offer push notifications on email and IM’s while the apps are running, calendar events are also synced to phone quite conveniently, a usable task list/mobile calendar with the familair Google usability offered by Android under the hood. I notice that several apps make use of Gears, I had an inclination Gears would run on Android, makes sense to have offline capabilities, particularly on a mobile device. The basic support for Google Docs is somewhat dissappointing but I’m sure this will improve with time. Of course, with Android, its all about the apps. But decent hardware is needed to back it all up, with HSDPA, WiFi, Bluetooth, GPS connectivity and also 3.2 MP camera with video. The device is powered by a Qualcomm 6246 800 MHz CPU with 256Mb RAM, when you think about it makes it about as powerful as a PC of the late 90’s. Sound quality for music is only so-so, one thing that could be improved on, but voice is crystal. The software stack and Android itself appear to based on a linux kernel gathering from a debug app I installed. Good choice. The native support for DivX is most welcome, simply a matter of copying a movie direct to phone’s SD card. It is worth reducing resolution of video to 320 x 240 to save space on the memory card, many free apps can do this, I use mencoder myself. Getting to the Apps, essentials to get immediately on this device are jkAppSwitch, as the phone lacks a basic task manager, and also the Astro file manager is definite must. The usual crop of apps one would expect are available and for the most part implemented quite well. Facebook, Twitter, WordPress are all very well supported and really do make Android a killer social networking platform when coupled with Google notifications. The first app I looked for after sorting out the basics was an SSH client, connectBot works quite nicely for this. This was the most impressive feature for me as it is so useful to have. I had yet to come across a phone that would read a QR code successfully with built-in camera, including the iPhone, an was mighty impressed when the Barcode Scanner app picked it up straight away and decoded it- these are appearing everywhere now more and more. I think this was mostly to do with the camera, which has a very intelligent auto-focus and image stabilizer, probably the best I’ve seen on a phone. Of course with live mail, twitter, facebook, gtalk, etc all running one gets inundated with information overflow so I suggest just running the apps you need updates from at any given time, and watch out for data charges if operating on phone network and not a wifi zone. There are the usual batch of cool-for-the-sake of cool apps, GPS tracking, send a file with gesture movement, disco lights and all sorts of other weird, wonderful and wacky apps. It looks like an Android 2.0 firmware update will be available soon, which is nice to know, 1.5 (Cupcake) is on the model I purchased. In the end I have gotten past the fact it is a Samsung and Android can fill any gaps missing natively on the phone until something better comes along on O2. Battery life is an issue however, but time will tell this more as I have being using it a lot since I got it.
|
