In 2007 , people began to pass around rumors that the Google corporation would innovate asmartphoneto compete with Apple’siPhone . Speculation run rampant – would Google get into the hardware business ? Would the company swear on established cell phone manufacturers for computer hardware ? Would Google simply rivet on building smartphone applications for other gadget like the iPhone ?

Googleexecutives claim that the company was n’t concerned in construction hardware . But some connection journalists and bloggers remain unconvinced . By former 2008 , it became unclouded that the Google executives had been aboveboard all along – Google was n’t getting into the French telephone computer hardware plot . But they were getting into the French telephone software patronage with a mobileoperating organisation ( OS)calledAndroid .

Unlike the Apple iPhone , which has its own group O sole to the iPhone ’s hardware , Google ’s approach shot was to create an OS that could work on phone work up by different manufacturers . Additionally , no single help supplier would have single right hand to use the Android political platform . In that respect , Android joins other nomadic twist operating systems like Symbian and Windows Mobile .

A cropped image of a driver using a map on a phone.

The first Google telephone set was the G1 , a handset cook up by a company based in Taiwan call the High Tech Computer Corporation ( HTC ) . The first service supplier to support Android in the United States was T - Mobile . As the OS debut in the United States , other French telephone manufacturers announce plans to develop their own Android earphone .

In January 2010 , Google unveiled the Nexus One . This Android speech sound was the first French telephone you could buy directly from Google . Like the G1 , HTC cater the computer hardware for the Nexus One . Customers could prefer to bribe the sound for $ 179 if they signed up with T - Mobile for a two - year contract or $ 529 for an unsubsidized phone without a contract .

An important broker that sets Android apart from most other mobile operating arrangement is that it ’s base on anopen sourceplatform . That means Google allows anyone to reckon at and change most of Android ’s beginning code . Ideally , this would mean that if a developer felt Android needed a specific feature or capableness , he or she could build it and incorporate it into the OS . The software system would always evolve .

ab initio , the Android political program did n’t support many of the characteristic of other smartphone operating systems . For example , Android offer no Microsoft Exchange backing upon vent . Many companionship use Microsoft Exchange as a weapons platform for einsteinium - mail and scheduling program program . But because of theopen sourcenature of Android and Google ’s funding for third - party developer , it did n’t take long before a company put up an app that would sync Exchange functions with the phone . The Android platform may have to play arrest up with the other operating systems on the food market , but it may have the ability to go even farther .

On the next page we ’ll introduce you to the Nexus One Google phone .

Google Phone Features

Several French telephone use the Android operating system of rules . There ’s the HTC G1 , the firstsmartphoneto carry on Android in the United States . Verizon offer the Droid , an Androidphonebuilt by Motorola . Several other phone also bank on Android but the Nexus One is the first true Google phone – the first phone you’re able to purchase directly from Google .

When Google first issued Nexus One models to its employees , the handset had no maker markings on the compositor’s case [ reference : Abramson ] . Once Google offer the phone to the cosmopolitan populace , the hardware include an HTC logo .

The Nexus One is 4.7 inch ( 119 millimetre ) improbable , 2.4 inches ( 59.8 millimeters ) wide and less than half an inch ( 11.5 millimeters ) thick . It weigh just 4.6 ounces ( 130 Hans C. J. Gram ) with the battery installed . It has a 3.7 - inch ( about 9.4 - centimeter ) active matrix organic light give out diode ( AMOLED ) display . The display resolve is 800 by 400 pel and its contrast proportion is 100,000 to 1 .

The phone apply a 1 gigahertz Qualcommprocessorand has 512 megabytes of RAM . It also has 512 megabytes of Flash memory and come with a four - gigabyte micro SD storage visiting card . Nexus One owners who need more storage can upgrade up to a 32 - gigabyte Coyote State card .

The phone works on the 850 , 900 , 1800 and 1900 megacycle per second frequencies on GSM / EDGE cellular net . It also has a Wi - Fi receiver that is compatible with 802.11 b and g protocols . The headphone supports Bluetooth 2.1 and A2DP stereo Bluetooth . It also has an assisted global positioning system receiver .

The headphone ’s 5 - megapixel television camera come with an light-emitting diode flash . It also has a digital zoom feature of speech that provides a rapid climb power of 2X. The tv camera can take telecasting at 20 chassis per second with a resolution of 720 by 480 pixels .

The Nexus One set up with the Androidoperating systemversion 2.1 , codenamed Éclair . This version of the OS supports multiple contacts and synchronization applications , allowing developers to create apps that let users superintend several e - post accounts using one machine .

Anyone wanting to purchase an Android phone will have to produce a Google account first . Googleaccounts are liberal and you may sign up at any meter whether you own an Android phone or not . If you have a Google account , you could access services likeGmail , Google CalendarandGoogle Docs . Android ’s designers build the political platform so that it interfaces with these functions swimmingly .

As computer hardware becomes more advanced , Google is potential to tweak the Android O to support unexampled features and functions . And if Google does n’t do it , someone else will . That ’s the beauty of an open - rootage arrangement .

What makes Android check ? Read on to find out .

Google Android Architecture

Googleusually relate to the Android OS as asoftware push-down list . Each stratum of the stack groups together several program that affirm specificoperating systemfunctions .

The al-Qa’ida of the batch is thekernel . Google used theLinuxversion 2.6 oxygen to build Android ’s kernel , which includes Android ’s storage management programme , security setting , power management software and several hardware driver . Driversare political program that control hardware devices . For instance , the Nexus One has a television camera . The Android kernel let in a photographic camera driver , which allows the drug user to send commands to thecamerahardware .

The next grade of software let in Android’slibraries . you may think of library as a solidifying of didactics that tell the equipment how to handle unlike sort of data . For example , the media theoretical account program library underpin playback and transcription of various sound recording , picture and picture data formatting . Other libraries let in a three - dimensional acceleration library ( for devices with accelerometer ) and aWebbrowser library .

Located on the same level as the libraries stratum , the Android runtime layer includes a hardening of coreJavalibraries – Android diligence computer programmer work up their apps using theJava computer programing language . It also includes the Dalvik Virtual Machine .

Avirtual machineis a software diligence that behaves as if it were an independent equipment with its own operating organization . you’re able to range a practical machine on a computer that operates on a completely different atomic number 76 than the physical simple machine ’s osmium . The Android OS uses practical machines to run each lotion as its ownprocess . That ’s important for a few reasons . First , no software is qualified upon another . Second , if an software crashes , it should n’t touch any other applications tend on the gimmick . Third , it simplifiesmemorymanagement .

The next bed is theapplication model . This include the platform that manage the phone ’s basic functions like imagination parcelling , telephone applications , exchange between processes or programs and keeping rails of the phone ’s physical positioning . software developer have full access to Android ’s software framework . This allows them to take advantage of Android ’s processing capability and underpin features when ramp up an Android app . conceive of the app theoretical account as a stage set of canonic putz with which a developer can build much more complex tools .

At the top of the stack are theapplicationsthemselves . This is where you find the basic functions of the gimmick such as makingphonecalls , accessing the Web internet browser and accessing your physical contact lean . If you ’re an average exploiter , this is the stratum you ’ll use most . You do that with theuser interface . Only Google programmers , software developers and hardware manufacturers reach the other stratum further down the stack .

you could vary the way your Google Phone works by downloading applications to it . Read about a few of them on the next pageboy .

Google Phone Applications

These day , it ’s not enough for yoursmartphoneto be able-bodied to check e - post and surf the Web as well as make earpiece calls . You require to have at your electric pig a host of useful , fun , rich or just plain pointless applications . TheiPhone ’s success has proven that a strong app program library can excite customer . Google ’s Android platform seem to be play along suit .

Months before the HTC G1 hit the shelf , Google unveiled the Android platform to developer . The companionship created a limited software developer kit ( SDK ) and pass on it to developers . Googleeven laid down the Android Developer Challenge – a contest that had a collective prize pool of $ 10 million .

The top developers take in $ 275,000 for their software . Here ’s a modest sample distribution of what made the grade :

There are many more Android practical program in the $ 275,000 winner ' circuit and beyond . And several developers for some of the well - known iPhone applications have expressed stake in developing an Android interpretation of their apps . While the iPhone has a head commencement , Android has the potentiality to equal and perhaps even surpass it on the program front .

So how do these developer work up applications for the Android ? We ’ll get word more about the software development process in the next section .

Building Android Applications

To build an Android diligence , a developer has to be intimate with theJava programing spoken language . take on the developer is adept in Java , he or she can download the software developer kit ( SDK ) and get started . The SDK hand the developer access code to Android’sapplication programming interface(API ) .

The SDK includes several instrument , including sample distribution applications and aphoneemulator . Emulators are programme that duplicate the features and procedure of a specific system or machine . The Android copycat is a programme that duplicates the mathematical function of a sound running on the Android program . When the developer polish off build an software , he or she can essay it out on the emulator to see how the app will perform on actual hardware .

Googleprovides an extensive Android tutorial on its developerWeb site . The party even put up tips on canonic programming steps like testing and debug software . experience developers can skim over the tutorial and go direct to building an applications programme . Google even supply step - by - step instructions on how to build up an program named Hello World to give developers the chance to become conversant with Android ’s computer architecture .

This brings us to another feature of Android that sets it aside from the iPhone – developers can make complex applications that run in the background of other coating . Apple limitsiPhoneapplications to the foreground – if you switch to a unlike diligence , the first software you were in stops working until you return to it . This feature circumscribe the types of applications developers can work up for the iPhone . Android allow developers more all-inclusive memory access to background processes .

Google breaks down all applications into four basic building blocks ( not all diligence will have every building mental block ):

There are other consideration developers must keep in mind while building applications . They include Android ’s nontextual matter rendering engine , process direction software , user interface support and other technical details . Google render guide for all of these element on its Android developer Web site .

The journeying of the Google Phone has not always been a smooth one . Some vendors have been quick to live with the OS , while others have usher out it . Let ’s take a look at who is and who is n’t thrilled about Android .

Google Mobile Phone Vendors

There are two kinds of seller you have to consider when you talk about asmartphoneoperating scheme : the handset manufacturers and thecell phoneservice providers . Handset manufacturersproduce the actual hardware . Service providersare the phone company like T - Mobile or AT&T. Some handset manufacturing business work on exclusively with a specific cell phone provider . In a few cases , a cell headphone service provider will also produce its own ironware .

As we mentioned before , the first French telephone to feature the Android OS was the High Tech Computer Corporation ’s HTC G1 . Before the earphone even went on sale , bloggers and diary keeper began to speculate on who would be the next handset manufacturer to get into the Android game . Gradually , other troupe like Motorola , Samsung and Dell debuted their own Android handset .

The first cell phone supplier in the United States to indorse an Android headphone was T - Mobile . The caller first offered the HTC G1 on its 3 G mesh to customer in October 2008 for $ 179 with a declaration . A calendar month earlier , T - Mobile offer up current customers the chance to reserve an HTC G1 in advance . The pre - sales agreement was a vast winner – T - Mobile had to end the sale early when orders exceeded the company ’s caudex of 1.5 million phones [ source : Bylund ] .

But some cell phone service providers have gone so far as to criticize the Android atomic number 8 in public . Sprint CEO Dan Hesse said that Android was n’t " good enough to put the Sprint brand on it " [ source : Carew ] . Hesse did get out open up the possibility that Sprint would work with the Android weapons platform in the future . Meanwhile , Peter Michaels , the CEO of Hop - on , criticise Hesse ’s statement . Michaels allege that Sprint makes it operose for cheap handset vender to unite its internet . He also point out that Sprint was a founding member of theOpen Handset Alliance– a project that spawned Android . But Michaels said that while the company says it support open political platform , its actions seem to contradict those claim [ source : Hop - on ] .

Hesse must have vary his mind about the Android operating system . Sprint now support the HTC Hero and the Samsung Moment , both Android earphone .

Verizon debut two Android phones in 2009 : the Motorola Droid and the HTC Eris . AT&T announced at the offset of 2010 that it would presently carry Android phone made by HTC , Motorola and Dell .

With Android spread to all major mobile phone telephone set carriers across the ball , we may see Google dominate the mobile phone mart the same elbow room it has for online search . Maybe this is the droid you ’re looking for .

To learn more about the Google Phone and connect subject , dial up the links on the next varlet .

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