How can Google prevent Android from becoming obsolete without alienating existing users?



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Google I / O will be available soon and, even if it 's not just Android, most of the information and things you read are about the smartphone. It goes without saying now that computers are things that we mainly keep in our hands rather than putting them on a desk and I / O is a software conference. I am going to make another very sure prediction and say that the reactions to the ads will not all be positive. There will be people who do not like the things you like about Android features and changes, and vice versa.

In the short term, we must wait for it and it is not very serious. We are all wired differently in our heads and not everyone wants the same thing or the same type of change on our small handhelds. The world would be a very boring place if everyone thought like you or me. But in the long run, this raises one thing that gets a little more serious: where is Google going from now?

Some of us would like to see Google continue to add more and more until Android becomes Windows ME and constitutes a huge conglomerate of products running as long as you do whatever you want, in the good order and in the right order, and that you are shrewd enough to dig parameters page. A bit of what happened to Hangouts. This type of Android would be "powerful" for enthusiasts and seasoned users, and the hardware that falls in flagship smartphones could handle it. The problem is that enthusiasts and seasoned users do not pay bills alone and Android must be accessible and attractive to less sophisticated users and devices with less stellar features.

Plus, Google can not go ahead without adding new features that will inevitably complicate things. If Android Q launches without any new features for users, there will be a minor uproar on the part of the internet in general about Google 's mojo loss and Android' s obsolescence.

Google has gone from the "One Big Change" model in the Android updates to several smaller but nevertheless significant changes.

Google has been trying to balance this with smaller features and mostly UI changes, possibly with a dreaded feature that "will come soon". We saw it last year at Google I / O, and Google used this year to clarify how your phone and Google Duplex can place a call on your behalf in order to get a reservation from D & I. A hairdresser. This allows Google to make the essential changes to Android – to adopt new ways to use our phones to make money for society while simplifying our lives – while allowing the public to take Awareness of the greatest things, such as recalling virtual assistants.

Can Google do this forever? May be. But that means the company will still have to find that great thing every year and then fulfill the promise we received from a demo. This is not easy especially if you consider the limitations associated with a handheld device.

Since we all use a phone as the primary, or at least secondary, means of communicating with the world, elements from Mountain View must first be designed for the small screen. One of the biggest limits is precisely this: small screen where all the information can not be displayed at the same time and a user must know how and where to find all the details. It may be as simple as scrolling the list or it may mean a deep excursion into the settings. Once this is fixed, you need to think about how we introduce orders and ideas into our device, how our device can stay economically connected, what kind of feedback we need so we know that our device is " includes ", and more. Developing for a phone is difficult.

There are many hands involved in achieving an Android feature.

Fortunately, Android does not exist in a vacuum. Not only are there years of great ideas on how to "do" the computer, but Android is built on ideas and design more than just Google. You do not need to look for anything other than multiple window applications, for example. Xerox, Apple and Microsoft have all understood that it may be necessary to see several things at once if you were using an operating system more than 30 years ago. Google and its partners know it too. Samsung has been able to accept the relatively small changes made by Google for its integration on mobile and integrate them into its version. After sharing everything with the Android team, Google has been able to make more changes to become universal. The next time you move an app so you can see another app on half of your screen, be aware that Xerox, Apple, Microsoft, Samsung, Google and many other developers are responsible.

The real thing that Google will have to master is how to achieve it without alienating fans and experienced users. Over time, it is inevitable that changes are made that simplify things in favor of removing certain "features" of Android. This word is in quotation marks for a reason: some features are actually a byproduct. Android was not designed so that compressed files could be deflated and read on the fly, for example. This occurs because of the semi-open permission system for accessing files. If this disappears, as will be the case when Scoped Storage is (still) implemented, the zip file decompression without special utility also disappears.

You can not please everyone. Or can you? Whatever it is, Google must try.

Most of us are not interested in working on .rar files in real time via a third party file manager on our phone. But those who care about it will have to face the reality: it goes away. Other tricks and electricity services will die by the wayside, as Android will become simpler and more secure. Some will like it and others will hate it. Some will even change platforms for one of the least known but best performing smartphone operating systems. It's up to Google to find a semblance of balance in all of this, and it can.

I'm sure Google thinks it can do that. I'm not sure how that works or if the company is right. But watching everything unfold is a hell of a fun ride.

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