Android is an operating system developed by Google. Android OS is mainly focused on the mobile devices which now expanded to tablets and even laptops. The latest Android technology can deliver superior user-friendliness with the easy controls and functions. The devices like Android Gears, Android TV, and Android Cars, expanded the usefulness of a mobile operating system beyond expectations. Being one of the well-crafter and feature rich OS, Android is being expanded to more areas rapidly.
Before 2007, Android was just a robot with human appearance or a humanoid robot. But, back in 2007 when the first version of Android called Android Alpha made its appearance, it was more than a humanoid robot. It was brand new operating system. It is working on the Linux kernel, and being used on smartphones, smart TVs, and tablets today. Aside of that, Android operates in many other devices like watches and even some systems in the automobile industry, making it one of the most versatile operating systems of today. This operating system operates by direct manipulation, which means that touchscreen is used. On a touchscreen, there is a virtual keyboard available for input and users can swipe, pinch or tap to manipulate on-screen objects. The first version of Android was 1.0 and the newest 7.1.2 with its codename Nougat. Android 8.0 is yet to be released.
Android History
As we said, first Android OS came back in 2007, but it was only the alpha version. The full version of Android 1.0 was released on September 23, 2008, and it was pretty advanced for that time. It featured Google Maps with Street View, Android Market where you could buy or download applications and games, Media player, Bluetooth, YouTube video player and support for WiFi. It was something new at that time, but it didn’t quite function as well as today’s Android operating systems. On April 27, 2009, came to the first big and important update called Android 1.5 Cupcake. It added some cool features that are available on Android devices even today. There was auto-rotation option, support for Widgets, ability to upload videos to YouTube and to upload photos to Picasa. Videos could now be played in MP4 format and support for Bluetooth stereo was introduced.
After that version, version 1.6 called Donut made it’s way to smartphones. It brought features like faster interface, faster access to the camera and support for WVGA resolutions and it isn’t that big improvement in terms of overall performance. On May 20, 2010, came the next big improvement- Android 2.2 Froyo and a few months later there was Android 2.3 Gingerbread. They were massive improvements over the past versions providing more memory, speed and performance optimizations. Some minor updates were also here, like enabling USB tethering and WiFi hotspot, Adobe Flash support, changing between various languages on a keyboard, updated Android market, and automatic update features. Gingerbread version introduced support for NFC, and more video/audio formats could be reproduced.
On February 22, 2011, Android 3.0 Honeycomb was released, and it’s even bigger update over the past versions because it included support for multi-core processors. Apps were further optimized, and performance was a lot better. From this version of Android, smartphones started to improve at a high rate, making them a preferable device for every mobile phone buyer. Android 4.0 series of operating systems is one of the most successful series in the history of Android. You could find Android 4.4 KitKat on almost every high-end smartphone, for example in Google Nexus 5, which is still a pretty good device. Next in series is Android 5.0 Lollipop, Android 6.0 Marshmallow, and the newest Android 7.0 Nougat. Lollipop introduced smart lock system, while Marshmallow introduced 4K display mode for apps. Android 7.0 Nougat is the latest OS, and it’s most advanced, with most features. You can now zoom start screen, use VR, connect your device to smart TVs and much more. On top of that, it has support for Vulkan 3D rendering API, which is used both on PC and consoles. HTC Dream was the first smartphone released that used 2008 version of Android.
Android features
- Messaging: In an Android operating system, there are two types of messaging available; SMS and MMS. There is also a feature called Android Google Cloud Messaging used for the same purpose.
- Multi-Touch: In the beginning, Android smartphones didn’t have a support for multi-touch, or if it was there, it was only for 2 fingers. Now, Android supports multitouch for more than 2 fingers, and the first device that had multitouch available is HTC Hero.
- Multitasking: Multitasking with Android smartphones is possible thanks to great app optimization and memory handling.
- Language support: Android operating systems support almost every language for typing, making it accessible for all the customers.
- Connectivity: There are many ways in which an Android device can connect to other devices. Bluetooth first. Bluetooth is used mainly for transferring files or documents, but as the technology progressed, this feature was updated. Now, Bluetooth can be used to connect to headphones, mouse, keyboard, joystick and it started from the Android 3.1 version. Tethering is another type of connection, meaning that your device can become a WiFi hotspot for other devices supporting this feature. Hotspot can be customized and given a name and a password.
- Media support: Smartphones with Android OS now support many different formats of media. Supported sound/video formats are MP3, 3GP, H.264, AAC, HE-AAC, MIDI, FLAC, WAV, MP4, etc. Some of the supported photo formats are GIF, BMP, JPEG and PNG.
- Storage: Many Android devices include MicroSD slots for additional memory. This allows for using external HDD or USB flash drive on a smartphone, with or without USB OTG cable. Supported formats of USB drives are FAT32 or Ext3.
- Hardware: Hardware is where Android devices shine. Typical mid-range smartphone can include a camera, GPS, accelerometer, barometer, gyroscope, proximity sensors, thermometer and dedicated 3D graphics.
Android hardware support
Hardware plays an important role in how will Android work on a particular device. Android is focused on ARM platform, which is the main platform for this operating system. ARM platform also underwent some big updates, and now we have ARMv7 and ARMv8-A, the newest architectures for smartphones. While ARMv7 is 32bit architecture, ARMv8 adds an option for the 64bit, but it isn’t quite necessary as a 32bit platform is still doing great on any smart device. As for RAM, well it really depends on the device specs. A Minimal amount of RAM should be 512MB for older Android versions, beginning with Android 5.0. 512MB is a minimum for the devices with low-density screens, while high-end devices with high-density screens should have almost 2GB of RAM to run it properly. Everything below 512MB isn’t optimal, and usually, these devices are based on older Android 4.0 version.
Google Play in Android
Google Play plays a very important role in the functioning of one Android device. Before we start with its features, it’s good to mention that Google Play was formerly called Android Market, which we mentioned earlier. So Google Play is basically a digital distribution service which is created and operated by Google. This feature allows the users to browse through numerous applications and download or buy apps, games, tools, etc. Google Play is one of the biggest apps stores of today, closely followed by iStore and loosely followed by Microsoft Store. Newer versions of Google Play offer users features like music, magazines, books, music and TV programs, of course at the certain price which is usually affordable.
The cost of the applications depends on many factors. Some are free, and some aren’t, which doesn’t always speak about app’s quality. Some games that are free on Google Play are pretty good, and when some other application isn’t free, it usually means that it boasts bonus features in comparison with for example free app. As we mentioned earlier, Google Play is capable of delivering various types of apps and media, so we have expansions for Google Play like:
Google Play Games
This is an online gaming service made only for Android, and it allows the users to download or buy any game, experience real-time multiplayer gaming, save the game or look at their achievements and check public and social leaderboards.
Google Play Music
As its name says, Google Play Music is focused on bringing the large collection of music to the users. On Google Play Music you can find almost any artist and song, and there are a rating system and some free samples for listening. Currently, there are over 40 million songs ready for downloading or streaming, and if you decide for downloading, Google gives you free cloud storage for almost 50 000 songs.
Google Play Movies & TV
This Google Play feature is a brand new feature from Google with the first stable version released in April this year. There were some versions before this, but currently, it’s the most stable and reliable version. It’s sort of video on demand service where you can find movies and TV shows. These can be purchased or rented, depending on your choice and availability.
Google Store
Back in 2015, Google Store has introduced a new Google Play feature. Before 2015, Google Play has a “Devices” section where you could buy Google products like Chromecasts or Google Nexus devices. Now, Google Store is exactly the same feature but made apart from Google Play, and with new updates, you can inform yourself on best buy places and much more.
Google Play Books
Another cool feature of Google Play is Google Play Books which is an ebook digital distribution service. This part of Google Play is purely for buying ebooks and allowing the users to upload up to 1000 of their own ebooks in formats like PDF or EPUB.
Google Play Newsstand
Google Play Newsstand is a news aggregator service where you can subscribe to online digital magazines and news feeds.
All these apps are functioning by detecting which Android device you have and recommend the apps for your device. Also, when you download the particular app, Google Play remembers it and recommends apps based on your interests. It can automatically update your apps and itself, keeping your device always up to date.
The Journey
When Android first came out as an alpha version, back in 2007, it really was something new and mobile manufacturers weren’t sure if they wanted to replace their old operating systems with the new one. Regardless of that, Android received very good reactions upon its release. At that time, Nokia and Microsoft were strong competitors when it comes to smartphone manufacturing, and Android just came out. Nobody thought that Android would become this big and important operating system. Nokia even stated that they don’t believe that Android would represent any kind of competition for them. Today, Android counts millions of users, even more than iOS and much more than Microsoft. What’s good about Android OS is its open-source nature which means that every smartphone manufacturer can interfere with it and create custom interface thus being default operating system for a majority of devices.
Flexibility continues as Android users are available to download and install apps from third-party websites, so possibilities for customization are expanded. This, however, isn’t possible on iOS and Microsoft Windows operating systems. Despite all of this, Google still claims that they didn’t manage to transform Android into something that would make that much money. This is mainly because of the open-source nature of that OS, and that causes Google to lose money because of many customized version of Android and third-party, Non-Google apps. This didn’t make much of an impact on overall Android experience as this OS is now compatible with almost every single device. Adaptation to smartphones didn’t represent a problem, but adaptation and optimization for tablets did. When tablets with Android operating system emerged, customers often hesitated to buy one because apps were not that much optimized for that kind of device.
Today, main Android’s rival is iOS, and while a majority of people chooses Android over iOS when we talk about smartphones, tablets tell another, a little different story. Android is far more dominant in South America and Africa, but in other continents, they are up to par with iOS. These are just some of the facts and denying that Android is a great operating system would be non-sense. Android has some of the best apps optimization, it’s simple yet effective, and devices that use this OS are generally cheaper and very accessible, so if you are new to the smartphones, it’s best to start from an Android device.
