Android for Work welcomes new friends

Posted by Rajen Sheth, Senior Director, Android and Chrome for Work Product Management

Editors note: To gain access to the latest Android for Work news and updates, join our mailing list. 

Android for Work launched earlier this year to help companies put the world’s most popular mobile OS to work for them. The response has been overwhelmingly positive: today, more than 10,000 businesses, including the World Bank, the U.S. Army and Guardian Life Insurance Company are testing, deploying or using Android for Work.

The Android for Work program took off with the help of our partners across the Android ecosystem, and today we’re expanding the family to 40 companies to continue the momentum, including new device manufacturers, application makers and management providers.

And for the first time, mobile carriers are joining the Android for Work program. AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, Sprint, Rogers, Bell Canada, Telus Mobility and KT are now offering broad support for Android for Work, so people can soon turn to their mobile operators to take advantage of Android for Work’s integrated security, management and productivity solutions.

The Android for Work program is also showcasing devices built for regulated industries, like government and healthcare, which have strict security and compliance requirements. Samsung, for example, offers some of the highest levels of government certification with its KNOX devices, while Blackphone by Silent Circle has built enhanced privacy and security features on top of the Android platform. You can check out our regulated devices page here to learn more about Samsung KNOX devices and Blackphone.

All of this investment is designed to help businesses extend the power of mobility in more ways across more teams. And companies are indeed turning to Android for Work to drive that change: SAP uses Android for Work to streamline app distribution and expand support to many more Android devices, Woolworths is looking to standardize on Android for corporate devices, and Guardian Life Insurance Company deployed Android for Work to enable its employees and field agents to work from anywhere on their personal devices. "Choice is important,” says Daniel Johnson, Chief Technology Officer at Guardian Life. “With Android for Work were able to offer Android as a BYOD option in a more secure and manageable way."

With its choice, flexibility and security, we believe Android is uniquely equipped to help businesses tap the full power of mobility. Together with our partners, we’re gearing up to make this a reality.

Learn more by visiting google.com/work/android.

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Android 2 3 is here and what does it bring

Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) has been released on the 6th of December 2010. While it is still a minor release, Android 3.0 (Honeycomb) would probably bring greater surprises. Atleast I am hoping that there would be the "Wow" factor with it.

Here are a few features of the Gingerbread version:

• Updated user interface design
• Support for extra-large screen sizes and resolutions (WXGA and higher)
• Native support for SIP VoIP telephony
• Support for WebM/VP8 video playback, and AAC audio encoding
• New audio effects such as reverb, equalization, headphone virtualization, and bass boost
• Support for Near Field Communication
• System-wide copy–paste functionalities
• Redesigned multi-touch software keyboard
• Enhanced support for native code development
• Audio, graphical, and input enhancements for game developers
• Concurrent garbage collection for increased performance
• Native support for more sensors (such as gyroscopes and barometers)
• A download manager for long running downloads
• Improved power management and application control
• Native support for multiple cameras
• Switched from YAFFS to the ext4 filesystem
• An Integrated task Manager

Alongside the new platform, Google is also releasing updates to the Software Development Kit (SDK) tools (r8), Native Development Kit (NDK) and Android Development Tools (ADT) plug-in for Eclipse (8.0.0).

The new features are simplified debug builds, integrated ProGaurd support, HierarchyViewer improvements and a preview of new UI Builder.  For a few of the reviews you can go here:

Gizmodos Review - Android 2.3 Gingerbread Review: Better Than Fruitcake

Techworlds review - Google Android 2.3 Gingerbread review

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Androids Growing Fragmentation An Insight

Last year in June, I posted this article talking about the huge levels of fragmentation in the Android world. However, that seems to have been just the beginning...

The number of devices were around 3997. Any guesses on how many this year? a whopping 11,868 as per the report by OpenSignal.

What was seen as a growing bane for developers has also turned out to be an advantage. OpenSignal summarizes the growing advantage aptly:

              "Despite the problems, fragmentation also has a great number of benefits – for both developers and users. The availability of cheap Android phones (rarely running the most recent version) means that they have a much greater global reach than iOS, so app developers have a wider audience to build for. It may be tricky to do, but the potential reward definitely makes it worthwhile. For consumers, extreme fragmentation means that they can get exactly the phone they want – big or small, cheap or expensive, with any number of different feature combinations."

Out of 682,000 devices that were surveyed, Samsung had a share of 47.5% making it clear as to who is in the lead. There are many unheard of devices probably in the local markets of the various countries. And not surprisingly, there are still 8 versions of android in active use. We know many of th
e lower end phones are available in older versions without any upgrade path to the latest versions. 

Why, lower end phones? Even Samsung Galaxy S does not allow for an upgrade to ICS or Jellybean!!  Interestingly, a mere 37.9% are on Jelly Bean. So, the "upgrade to the latest version" mania is not for the Android market, it looks like. :)

Some graphics form the report convey a lot about the level of fragmentation and the market share. The device fragmentation is shown here:

It is far more fragmented earlier and we should watch and see where this goes and surely lead to some consolidation !! 

The brand fragmentation is another insightful graphic:

All this makes the market an exciting place to be in - for all types of developers, testers and buyers of mobile phones as well. There is so much choice and smartphones are now in the reach of a larger customer base - it is no more exclusive stuff for a smaller percentage of a privileged few!! 

While, all this is happening in the Android world, the latest version of Android being named "Kitkat" makes me wonder if Android is going to "Take a Break" and pave the way for Microsoft and Nokia?!! 

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Android Simulating an Incoming call on Emulator

On windows XP, open a command console.

Type “telnet”. The telnet client starts.

Then, type, o localhost 5554

This connects the telnet client to the android emulator (assuming emulator is running locally listening on port 5554. Else this connection fails)

Now type

gsm call 123456

The last parameter could be any number.

This simulates a call to the emulator.

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WebOS on PCs will be an integrated experience

HP blocked its recent "Think Beyond" event with a extraordinary announcement that webOS would be coming to PCs. How, accurately, the company considered on doing that has been a mystery. The Seattle Times just interviewed HPs CTO, Phil McKinney, who helped put to rest some premature speculation that HP would be dumping Microsoft Windows in favor of webOS while adding some clarity to its webOS on the whole thing plan. According to Phil, people still want an OS appropriate to PCs, tablets, and smartphones with webOS pulling it all together by "taking the existing operating systems and bringing WebOS onto those platforms and making it universal across all of our footprint." That doesnt signify that webOS will run as a virtualized instance within Windows. Phil says, "its not virtualization. Its an integrated WebOS experience were looking to bring." He then adds, "Were working with Microsoft on the future of Windows and were very optimistic on what that future is, but what we think is we can bring an enhancement to that." The goal is to create a large device footprint that makes webOS a very good-looking platform to developers -- "you can build up your WebOS app thatll run on your phone, your slate and your PC," according to McKinney. Hmm, apparently HP didnt get the Elopcalypse memo about the "three-horse race" that considers HPs and RIMs ecosystems irrelevant. Source

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