This is smart, and long overdue. Google said today that it will begin releasing an Android Platform Development Kit (PDK).
This will give Android device makers access to coming versions of Android 2-3 months before its official release.
As is well-documented, most Android devices are way behind. 65% today run Android 2.3 Gingerbread which, with the release of 4.1 JellyBean today, now lags 3 versions behind.
The PDK isn’t a cure-all, but it will hopefully allow OEMs to release new smartphones and tablets running up-to-date versions of Android.
This will also help them update their older smartphones and tablets sooner, too (though there the mobile carriers remain bottlenecks).
How is this like Microsoft? With its open Windows hardware ecosystem, Microsoft also faces problems of fragmentation and also failure-to-upgrade. Indeed, Windows XP remains more popular than Windows 7, despite being more than a decade old (it was released in fall 2001).
That’s not because PC makers are bad at releasing new hardware on the latest OS. They are actually quite good at that, due to all beta versions that Microsoft provides early, all of the testing support it offers, and all of the ecosystem marketing that Microsoft in general does.
No, the reason XP is still so popular is because enterprises still go out of their way to erase Windows 7 from a new PC and re-install XP, in order to make it easier to manage and to support old, XP-only software.
Releasing an Android PDK several months in advance is a small step towards replicating the Microsoft ecosystem model, something Google would probably only grudgingly admit to be doing.
Apple, by contrast, has no hardware partners. It hires contractors to help make hardware that it alone designs and sells. Thus, it doesn’t need to give early access to iOS to third-party hardware makers. It does allow developers to get new versions of iOS 2-3 months before it is released to users of its iPhone or iPad, though. Fortunately, that’s all the time that some developers need.
This will give Android device makers access to coming versions of Android 2-3 months before its official release.
As is well-documented, most Android devices are way behind. 65% today run Android 2.3 Gingerbread which, with the release of 4.1 JellyBean today, now lags 3 versions behind.
The PDK isn’t a cure-all, but it will hopefully allow OEMs to release new smartphones and tablets running up-to-date versions of Android.
This will also help them update their older smartphones and tablets sooner, too (though there the mobile carriers remain bottlenecks).
How is this like Microsoft? With its open Windows hardware ecosystem, Microsoft also faces problems of fragmentation and also failure-to-upgrade. Indeed, Windows XP remains more popular than Windows 7, despite being more than a decade old (it was released in fall 2001).
That’s not because PC makers are bad at releasing new hardware on the latest OS. They are actually quite good at that, due to all beta versions that Microsoft provides early, all of the testing support it offers, and all of the ecosystem marketing that Microsoft in general does.
No, the reason XP is still so popular is because enterprises still go out of their way to erase Windows 7 from a new PC and re-install XP, in order to make it easier to manage and to support old, XP-only software.
Releasing an Android PDK several months in advance is a small step towards replicating the Microsoft ecosystem model, something Google would probably only grudgingly admit to be doing.
Apple, by contrast, has no hardware partners. It hires contractors to help make hardware that it alone designs and sells. Thus, it doesn’t need to give early access to iOS to third-party hardware makers. It does allow developers to get new versions of iOS 2-3 months before it is released to users of its iPhone or iPad, though. Fortunately, that’s all the time that some developers need.