Almost Two-Thirds of Android Devices Still Use Gingerbread
While there has been a significant increase in Ice Cream Sandwich adoption since last month, a large majority of Android devices are still based on Android 2.3, or Gingerbread, according to Android Developers’ recently released monthly overview of the number of active devices running different versions of Android.
As of July 2, 64% of Android devices use 2.3.x or Gingerbread, and 10.9% of devices use 4.0 or Ice Cream Sandwich. For comparison, 7.1% of active Android devices used ICS and 65% used Gingerbread one month ago.
Android 2.2 or Froyo is still running strong with a 17.3% share, while (now truly ancient) Android 2.1 or Eclair is present on 4.7% of devices. Other versions have a negligible market share and, unsurprisingly, the upcoming Android 4.1 or Jelly Bean is not even a blip on the radar.
Android fragmentation has been a persistent issue ever since the platform was introduced, and it seems it’s bound to get worse than ever, with Gingerbread (and even Froyo) refusing to go, Ice Cream Sandwich being adopted slowly and Jelly Bean lurking around the corner. Developing software for Android or even simply owning an Android device is and will continue to be affected by this situation.
We’ll see if Google’s recent launch of its Platform Development Kit (PDK), which will be delivered to hardware manufacturers in advance for each version of Android, will alleviate this problem in the future.
BONUS: A Walk-Through of Android 4.1 Jelly Bean
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From the outside, Jelly Bean looks a lot like its predecessor Ice Cream Sandwich.
Jelly Bean's keyboard learns how you type over time.
When navigating to a location, you can choose to download a portion of your journey and make that map available for offline viewing when you don't have a cell signal.
The functionality became available at the same time as Google's Jelly Bean announcement, however, can be used on any Android phone running 2.2 or higher.
To download a map, you have to select the specific area on the screen you would like to download.
Once you've selected a portion of the map to be downloaded, you will get a status message showing you how the download is going.
Google Voice Search works similar to Siri, offering in many cases better answers that Apple's digital assistant.
Google Now can give you all the details on your favorite team and how they're performing.
Looking for something specific? Google Now can perform searches for things like where to find Pad Thai and offer a suggestion near you.
Google Now can learn where you work, and let you know how long it's likely to take you to get there.
Google Now will display cards for different businesses around where you are.
Android Beam in Jelly Bean now supports transferring both photos and videos.
Notifications are improved with Jelly Bean, including the ability to preview emails and return calls and text from within the notifications tray.
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