I'm sad that the Galaxy Nexus isn't supported. My phone has increasingly been running out of RAM lately for reasons I don't understand - hearing Google boast about how KitKat has been optimized for memory had me hoping that it would support more than just the latest-greatest.
Does that mean that there will no more be stock 'Browser' app? I refuse to use Chrome on Android because of brain-dead, non-disablable 'font-boosting' that makes (among many others) Hacker News absolutely unusable.
If that means that the same engine is the only one officially supported on 4.4 forwards, then that's really sad and unfortunate.
I clicked on that link and got a page that says "moma: inside google. Single Sign On" and asks for a Google login, password, and OTP. It also appears to display a random image; I wonder if that random image is used as part of the authentication process, perhaps as an authenticator that this is a valid Google login page (perhaps something you can verify with your OTP device).
"Host card emulation" -- Does this mean I can "upload" my NFC bank cards and transport card and have my phone emulate them? If so that is -freaking awesome-.
Wonder if this means alert dialogs will start showing up from ads in embedded webviews. Window.alert() didn't work in Android's webview and the WebChrome client was the workaround.
"Android 4.4 introduces platform support for hardware sensor batching, a new optimization that can dramatically reduce power consumed by ongoing sensor activities."
This sounds remarkably similar to the M7. This functionality of Android 4.4 requires hardware support, which initially is only provided by the Nexus 5. It allows for continuous sensor measurements, only waking the application processor when it delivers a batch of them.
Behind the polish on the screen is the power under the hood. Take the Phone app, which for most people hasn’t really changed since the days of flip phones. Now, we’re making calling easier than ever, by helping you search across your contacts, nearby places, or even Google Apps accounts (like your company’s directory), directly from within the app.
Is that marketing speak for, "We're moving the Phone app into Google Play Services"?
I'm more concerned about the integration of hangouts with sms and mms -- I read that as all other voip/video calls and messaging services (xmpp) will be further pushed into the cold.
The story behind the scene to my eyes is Google removing out of the box apps from Android to leave it PLAY dependent 100% if possible %200. This means that no other store like Amazon will be able to create a second store based on Android with a fresh environment out of the box. Google says is due to modularity I say due to market strategy. As a clear example (apart from the clear explanation of the article, great article BTW) a feature released today on KiKat 4.4 is that WebView is based on Chromium, this means the sole purpose of only Google using WebView. If I where Amazon I would be reconsidering having to develop all again for future releases or today make a fair deal with Google.
However this is not bad news at all for startups like myself because of two things.
1) Google will spend about a year or two on refactoring Android to fully cope with PLAY dependence allowing some spare "time" for third party ideas on features that can advance outside Google internal teams.
2) Third party developer a are now in equal position to compete with Google applications to win terrain into Android future tiny out of the box. Basically on future ex-activated apps like mail for example.
I suspect the webview was updated because of two related reasons, first they didn't want to maintain a separate webkit, and second because Chromium/Chrome have switched to Blink (a fork of webkit). Also, being Chromium this should be directly in the ASOP sources, so it's still separate from Chrome.
I had a terrible experience with the Nexus S. I bought it a couple years ago (which seems to be a vety long time in Google terms) and right now it's totally unusable. It's very slow, the battery is sucked up in less than an hour when on wifi, some apps can't work, the play store is a mess and I can go on and on.
I experienced the nexus 4 a little bit and though it's a great phone I'm afraid the next OS updates are going to ruin it just like it happened to the poor Nexus S.
My next phone is going to be an iPhone as I had a rather pleasant experience on the iPad.
I had (have) a Nexus S. The hardware at this point is coming up on it's third birthday... yes, it is ridiculously, unapologetically slow... but if you look at the iPhone 4, it's not fairing so well either.
Yes, old hardware will always fare poorly when running operating systems that are generations ahead. Try running Windows 7 on a 286... Nexus 4 and I'm loving it. I anticipate no issues moving between 4.3 and 4.4.
Oh, and I suspect your battery is torched. my wi-fi only nexus s reports on average a solid day of battery with moderate/heavy use.
Just to counter your anecdote, my HTC Desire D which is the same hardware as Nexus S was one of the best phones I had with great battery life, durability and it works well even after I dropped it on the concrete and in the water on several occasions.
Same on the Galaxy Nexus. Less than 2 hours of idle time if I'm going through an area with poor service - less than 2 hours of battery life when browsing on wifi.
>which seems to be a very long time in Google terms
To be fair, that was during the iPhone 4 period.
The iPhone has since gone to the iPhone 4s, iPhone 5, and then iPhone 5s. Many users report an absolutely miserable experience with iOS 7 (and even 6) on the iPhone 4.
The mobile industry has moved very, very quickly, and devices are a magnitude more powerful+ than just a couple of years ago. As a developer with an interest in mobile, I've gone through literally seven different smartphone devices in the past three years.
Okay I thought the camera on my Nexus 4 would kick ass but it sucks compared to an iPhone. The only way I'm going to purchase this 5 is if it has iPhone-esque camera quality.
In a moment of madness I managed to easily buy a Nexus 5 on the UK Play store. Last year it was months after N4 release until I was able to grab one. I don't normally splurge on consumer goods but in this case, the camera looks like a step up, and more battery life can't be bad.
I thought "ach why not", but bought it at least partly out of surprise that the online store was working :)
First major smartphone which included India as one of the first few countries to be released. Nexus 5 will have a huge impact on high end market in budget conscious indians.
Selling at 28k where HTC one, note3 and Lumia 1025 are being sold at around 50k!. If distribution channel is properly organized it will just blow away the likes of samsung,nokia and HTC
My GNex is still doing just fine! The recent 4.x dot releases have been a bit shabby, but fundamentally things work (bluetooth cough cough). I guess being stuck with a 4.3 device for testing will be ok. I do most of my Android dev and testing on the first gen Galaxy Tab 10.1 which is stuck on Android 4.0, and my consumption/games on a Nexus 10 which Google will no doubt abandon soon.
Doing dev and debug on a device I don't actually use has been effective. My most productive features have been having the device in a dock, and using wifi adb so I don't have to bother with cables.
Verizon's band 13 LTE (700 c-block) is not listed as supported, but band 4 is (AWS). Slim chance of connectivity if Verizon has deployed AWS in your region.
Hugely anticipated and closely watched release, and thirty minutes later you're complaining that they're sold out?
Come on.
I knew it was coming and got in early, finding it the most enjoyable Nexus purchase yet -- available in many markets the day it is announced, the Play store didn't crash and functioned speedily, and it will ship in days? I'd say it was a fantastic user experience.
I'm disappointed with the current lack of details around this. For example, it's unclear if the rumoured Dalvik improvements made it in. The omission of GN support is slightly galling too, although with the variants of that in the wild it may be too complicated to deploy.
That said, a couple of things in the API, especially the storage framework, could be really good. That may provide a way forward to get apps working with the cloud or self hosted servers with a common API, which would be a great development.
Cyanogenmod usage may get a big spike when they get on to Kitkat, and that might be just what the Android ecosystem needs.
As a GNex owner, I'm a bit upset with the fact that there won't be official support for 4.4 on my phone. Supposedly, this choice is due to TI not supporting the chip anymore.
The phone supports CDMA..? I'm on Verizon and really want this phone (eventually). Are you seeing that it doesn't work with Verizon somewhere specifically?
Its too bad the focus isn't on battery life. "7 hours" internet time on wifi, when you're on airplane mode. And they refresh the same page every 40 seconds.
How about a real battery test, where you simulate someone reading HN or reddit, opening gifs, images, web pages with crappy flash video. I'm tired of the same 3 hours of useful battery life I've had since the HTC evo. Maybe I'm just bitter because my galaxy nexus has around 8 hours of idle time if I have 4G on (this after doing a clean wipe not 1 month ago).
[+] [-] bsimpson|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] eigenvector|12 years ago|reply
http://developer.android.com/about/versions/kitkat.html
Highlights:
* WebView is now based on Chromium * KSM and zRAM integrated into stock kernel * Public SMS framework * Printing framework * Storage access framework
[+] [-] klausa|12 years ago|reply
Does that mean that there will no more be stock 'Browser' app? I refuse to use Chrome on Android because of brain-dead, non-disablable 'font-boosting' that makes (among many others) Hacker News absolutely unusable.
If that means that the same engine is the only one officially supported on 4.4 forwards, then that's really sad and unfortunate.
[+] [-] lambda|12 years ago|reply
https://devsite.googleplex.com/chrome-developer-tools/docs/r...
I clicked on that link and got a page that says "moma: inside google. Single Sign On" and asks for a Google login, password, and OTP. It also appears to display a random image; I wonder if that random image is used as part of the authentication process, perhaps as an authenticator that this is a valid Google login page (perhaps something you can verify with your OTP device).
[+] [-] maaarghk|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] devx|12 years ago|reply
https://plus.google.com/u/0/+RomanNurik/posts/EURexV9yF32
http://phandroid.com/2013/10/31/android-kit-kat-videos/
[+] [-] kuida0r3|12 years ago|reply
https://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=752
[+] [-] ausjke|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rsynnott|12 years ago|reply
2013 definitely seems to be the year of memory compression.
[+] [-] corresation|12 years ago|reply
This sounds remarkably similar to the M7. This functionality of Android 4.4 requires hardware support, which initially is only provided by the Nexus 5. It allows for continuous sensor measurements, only waking the application processor when it delivers a batch of them.
[+] [-] Spoom|12 years ago|reply
Is that marketing speak for, "We're moving the Phone app into Google Play Services"?
[+] [-] kcorbitt|12 years ago|reply
And the discussion, much of which involves explaining why this tendency is maybe not as sinister as the Ars article implies: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6582494
[+] [-] e12e|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] JoseVigil|12 years ago|reply
However this is not bad news at all for startups like myself because of two things.
1) Google will spend about a year or two on refactoring Android to fully cope with PLAY dependence allowing some spare "time" for third party ideas on features that can advance outside Google internal teams.
2) Third party developer a are now in equal position to compete with Google applications to win terrain into Android future tiny out of the box. Basically on future ex-activated apps like mail for example.
[+] [-] keeperofdakeys|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] csomar|12 years ago|reply
I experienced the nexus 4 a little bit and though it's a great phone I'm afraid the next OS updates are going to ruin it just like it happened to the poor Nexus S.
My next phone is going to be an iPhone as I had a rather pleasant experience on the iPad.
[+] [-] MAGZine|12 years ago|reply
Yes, old hardware will always fare poorly when running operating systems that are generations ahead. Try running Windows 7 on a 286... Nexus 4 and I'm loving it. I anticipate no issues moving between 4.3 and 4.4.
Oh, and I suspect your battery is torched. my wi-fi only nexus s reports on average a solid day of battery with moderate/heavy use.
[+] [-] bowmanb|12 years ago|reply
http://wiki.cyanogenmod.org/w/Crespo_Info
http://wiki.cyanogenmod.org/w/Crespo4g_Info (4G)
[+] [-] vdaniuk|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] taurath|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] corresation|12 years ago|reply
To be fair, that was during the iPhone 4 period.
The iPhone has since gone to the iPhone 4s, iPhone 5, and then iPhone 5s. Many users report an absolutely miserable experience with iOS 7 (and even 6) on the iPhone 4.
The mobile industry has moved very, very quickly, and devices are a magnitude more powerful+ than just a couple of years ago. As a developer with an interest in mobile, I've gone through literally seven different smartphone devices in the past three years.
[+] [-] kiallmacinnes|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] acconrad|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nodata|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nmeofthestate|12 years ago|reply
I thought "ach why not", but bought it at least partly out of surprise that the online store was working :)
[+] [-] neel8986|12 years ago|reply
Selling at 28k where HTC one, note3 and Lumia 1025 are being sold at around 50k!. If distribution channel is properly organized it will just blow away the likes of samsung,nokia and HTC
[+] [-] HorizonXP|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rogerbinns|12 years ago|reply
Doing dev and debug on a device I don't actually use has been effective. My most productive features have been having the device in a dock, and using wifi adb so I don't have to bother with cables.
[+] [-] wuliwong|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] beowulfey|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kdot|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] undoware|12 years ago|reply
Yep, definitely another high-grade Google Play user experience....
[+] [-] corresation|12 years ago|reply
Come on.
I knew it was coming and got in early, finding it the most enjoyable Nexus purchase yet -- available in many markets the day it is announced, the Play store didn't crash and functioned speedily, and it will ship in days? I'd say it was a fantastic user experience.
[+] [-] matwood|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fein|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fidotron|12 years ago|reply
That said, a couple of things in the API, especially the storage framework, could be really good. That may provide a way forward to get apps working with the cloud or self hosted servers with a common API, which would be a great development.
Cyanogenmod usage may get a big spike when they get on to Kitkat, and that might be just what the Android ecosystem needs.
[+] [-] saamm|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] makmanalp|12 years ago|reply
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hQ0XTJqFLIE#t=11
[+] [-] beauzero|12 years ago|reply
...but Android is slowly becoming less open. Scares me a little. Why shouldn't it?
[+] [-] unknown|12 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] Aardwolf|12 years ago|reply
I'm confused, PDFs, games and movies already are full screen on previous android versions.
[+] [-] ciferkey|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] drhayes9|12 years ago|reply
Edit: More comments here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6648976 and here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6648664 but not seeing links, feels like hearsay.
[+] [-] canistr|12 years ago|reply
Already appears to be down.
[+] [-] taurath|12 years ago|reply
How about a real battery test, where you simulate someone reading HN or reddit, opening gifs, images, web pages with crappy flash video. I'm tired of the same 3 hours of useful battery life I've had since the HTC evo. Maybe I'm just bitter because my galaxy nexus has around 8 hours of idle time if I have 4G on (this after doing a clean wipe not 1 month ago).