Android: Past, Present and Future

Google I/O's first keynote was all about Android and there were many imposing announcements.

Android stats continue to be surprising: 100 million activated Android devices, 400,000 Android devices activated every day, 200,000 apps in the Android Market, 4.5 billion apps downloaded from the Android Market, 310 Android devices.

The next major Android release is called Ice Cream Sandwich and the goal is to create a united operating system that runs on phones, tablets and TVs. Ice Cream Sandwich will be released later this year, but there's a Honeycomb 3.1 update that adds support for USB accessories and for Google TV. This summer, people who bought Google TV devices will be able to put in Android 3.1 and run apps from the Android Market

Android users from the US can now rent movies from the Android Market. "You can decide to rent from thousands of movies starting at $1.99 and have them available across your Android devices — rent a movie on your home computer, and it'll be obtainable for viewing on your tablet or phone. You can rent from Android Market on the web today, and we'll be systematic out an update to Verizon XOOM customers beginning today. We'll start undulating out the update to Android 2.2 and above devices in the coming weeks," informs Google.

There's no music subscription service, but Google launched an invitation-only service that stores all your music on Google's servers and lets you stream it from roughly any computer and Android device.

iPhone/iPod/iPad users can install the latest software updates for at least two years, but that's not always the case when it comes to Android devices. Some Android phones run outmoded software at launch and not all of them are updated to the latest version because phone manufacturers and carriers don't think that's really important. Google and some of the other members of the Open Handset Alliance (Verizon, HTC, Samsung, Sprint, Sony Ericsson, LG, T-Mobile, Vodafone, Motorola and AT&T) started to expand some guidelines for updating firmware. "To start, we're equally announcing that new devices from participating partners will be given the latest Android platform upgrades for 18 months after the device is first released, as long as the hardware allows," informs Google.

Google also urbanized Android Open Accessory, "which allows external USB hardware (an Android USB accessory) to interrelate with an Android-powered device in a special accessory mode. (...) Many previously released Android-powered devices are only able of acting as a USB device and cannot initiate connections with external USB devices. Android Open Accessory support overcomes this limitation and allows you to build accessories that can interact with an collection of Android-powered devices by allowing the accessory commence the connection."

Probably the most interesting announcement is Android@Home, a framework that allows Android devices to converse with home appliances and other devices. It's an ambitious project that could make home automation part of everyday life. That's also one of the main reasons why Google bought Android: bringing Google's software to new devices, finding new ways to use Google's information in each day life, creating an ecosystem of smart devices with standard features and APIs that make "the world's information" more useful.

Patents look for in Google's Sidebar

Google added a new quality to the sidebar: patents search. You no longer have to visit Google Patents to search the full text of the U.S. patent corpus since you can just click "patents" in the upright navigation menu. Here's an example.

It may seem like a minor development, but this shows that Google's particular search engines will be available from the sidebar. At some point, you'll no longer have to visit Gmail to find a contact, Google Docs to find a file or Android Market to find an Android app.

Android Market for the Web

 Google has finally released the Web-based description of the Android Market, which is now available at market.android.com. You can link to applications, find apps from your computer and install them over the air.

Android Market for the Web includes all the applications, not just the ones that are obtainable for a certain device or a certain description of Android, so it's much more complete than the application that's installed on your Android device. You'll be able to find paid apps even if you live in a country where you can only put in free apps and you'll be able to find apps that require Froyo even if your phone still uses Android Donut. In fact, you don't even have to be an Android user to discover the Market.

I've tried to install an application from the web site, but Google shows an "invalid request" error after the verification process.

To make the Market even better, Google announced two additional features that will be available soon: in-app purchases and fixed pricing for various currencies. That means you'll see less apps that cost $1.73 or €2.26, pretentious that developers will adjust their prices.