Google Opens Up Android Codebase 204
rsk writes "It's official: Google has Open Sourced Android. The source code can be downloaded from Android's Git repository. Bugs are handled at the Google Code Android project page with documentation being handled by a collection of Google Site pages. One of the more interesting aspects of Android seems to be the seemingly Eclipse Foundation-like organization of the project, welcoming both Individual and Commercial developers into the Android development pot. One of the benefits of this arrangement is securing the existence of the project by involving commercial interests and their money in the process ... this is also one of the downsides; having commercial entities charter and lead features of a platform that their own commercial offerings provide 'enhanced' versions of, sometimes leaving the free offering always lacking in one obvious way or another. It's hard to say at this point how involved Google will be in this process, or the Open Handset Alliance in general, with managing the health of sub-projects under the Android umbrella as time goes on."
Re:Allowing "Banned" Features (Score:5, Informative)
Weird.... Google said the bluetooth decision was theirs due to stability.
There is a Skype voice App in the G1 Marketplace.
File transfer? You have Mass Storage, You can attach files to emails. There is no limitation I am aware of in android which would forbid a p2p application which uses the memory card.
But I'm sure you're right. It's a conspiracy by TMobile to not offer... what is it you want again that you aren't getting? It's not like exchange missing is a conspiracy. The G1 is missing quite a bit of stuff but I would wager it's a result of development resources being insufficient not intentional desires to offer less.
How open is Android? (Score:5, Informative)
One important aspect of being 'open' is whether you favor your customers or the carriers.
I see evidence of this distinction in support for bluetooth API's: the stronger and more customer oriented phone manufacturers support bluetooth API's (which makes many interesting applications possible). On the other hand, when carriers have a stronger role in designing a phone - this comes up particularly for CDMA phones - then the bluetooth API's are dropped or postponed.
So I was quite shocked to see that Android v1.0 does not support bluetooth API's!
I know that Google has claimed that they didn't have time to get the bluetooth API's into v1.0, but that is just the sort of thing that companies will tell us when they change plans due to carrier pressure. The BREW environment (for CDMA phones) has been playing this game for years: continually telling developers that bluetooth support was just around the corner.
I sure hope that Google doesn't play the same game with us. I really want this to be an open and powerful platform.
Re:Allowing "Banned" Features (Score:4, Informative)
But I'm sure you're right. It's a conspiracy by TMobile to not offer... what is it you want again that you aren't getting?
(1) A2DP and AVRCP
(2) Bluetooth tethering (can be implemented as a DUN)
These are two things that work fairly well on my WinMo 6.1 (HTC6800) and should be a piece of cake. I would switch to the G1 for those things (and if TMobile had a 3G network comparable to the EVDO revA that I'm on now -- they don't).
Re:Allowing "Banned" Features (Score:3, Informative)
So in short, i don't think it's readily portable to other machines (i'm not positive though, it'll depend on the differences in chip architecture and the like, dunno how similar the G1 is to other phones).
Re:How open is Android? (Score:3, Informative)
On the other hand, when carriers have a stronger role in designing a phone - this comes up particularly for CDMA phones - then the bluetooth API's are dropped or postponed.
My HTC PPC6800 (Titan, Mogul) was designed for Sprint and VZ (CDMA/EVDO) and it has a perfectly functional BT implementation. External applications (e.g. pdanet) can even provide bluetooth services (DUN).
Re:Allowing "Banned" Features (Score:3, Informative)
Google didn't have a production-ready BT stack, they have already said this was their fault, not T-Mo.
Doesn't mean much... (Score:3, Informative)
This does not mean that you'll be able to run whatever version of Android you want on your phone. I would imagine there's very likely situations with code signing involved that ensures that if you're using XYZ's phone, that you'll only be allowed to run the XYZ versions of Android.
This open sourcing does not mean that you simply get to buy an Android phone and then download a version that you want and run that. Not only due to "artificial" reasons such as code signing, but due to hardware features (or lackthereof).
All this really means is that the companies get to have someone else do heavy legwork for them. Beyond that, it means more familiarity with the Android platform which means there's potentially more market for the platform on the bottom line.
More developers means more applications, more applications means more market for Android. Google and the phone carriers are happy. As an end user, you still get a locked down piece of junk--but hey, at least you'll have 50 variants of a card game to buy instead of 40.
Re:2.1 GB?? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Allowing "Banned" Features (Score:5, Informative)
Uh, if you read Google's releases, it wasn't T-Mobile castrating those features, it was limitations of releasing a bug free 1.0, and they've promised more bluetooth functionality in later API and OS releases. T-Mobile has not neutered the bluetooth functionality on their other smartphones, why would they do it on the one device they're touting so well as 'open'?
Re:OH SNAP (Score:1, Informative)
Same for the iPhone SDK... why is it a burn? PPC is antiquated at this point.
Re:Hackability (Score:5, Informative)
I wouldn't say the Freerunner is "light years" behind the G1. The CPU is an earlier revision of the ARM architecture, there's plenty of memory, the phone has WiFi, GPS, Bluetooth, accelerometers, a nice VGA resolution screen, it supports uSD cards for storage... And the hardware is as open and documented as any GSM phone is ever likely to be - more than the G1, most likely.
The reason earlier attempts to port the Android stack to the Freerunner failed was that the source wasn't available, and the binaries Google provided were compiled for ARMv5, not ARMv4. With the source now being available, there's a good chance Android will run on the Freerunner.
Not sure you are right there (Score:3, Informative)
Re:What other devices will we see? (Score:3, Informative)
Android on a Netbook would be superb
Re:Allowing "Banned" Features (Score:2, Informative)
You're wrong, people have already been running it on other devices (such as the HTC vogue, I think) for quite some time now.
Re:Finally... (Score:2, Informative)
They only have a kill switch for apps installed through the App Market. It's trivial to install an unkillable app otherwise.
Re:Allowing "Banned" Features (Score:5, Informative)
One of the reasons we chose git was to make sure that we can't do that sort of blocking. While obviously the Core Technical Team can control what winds up in the master repositories, part of the reason we chose a distributed revision control system was to make sure that ultimately we can't block new ideas and new features.
If you'd like to chat more, come by #android on FreeNode.
(obDisclosure: I work in the Open Source Programs Office at Google)
Re:Let the porting begin! (Score:5, Informative)
We need to port this thing to all kinds of devices
An open source platform for mobile phones isn't any good at all if there isn't a open hardware platform to run it on.
I seem to recall some chatter on the OpenMoko [openmoko.com] Community [openmoko.org] mailing lists [openmoko.org]. They'd love to have already ported Android to their open hardware [openmoko.org] but there was no ARM4 binaries available to play with. I'm sure that with this source release I'll be able to boot Android on my Freerunner [openmoko.org] sometime this year.
Buy an Openmoko Freerunner (Score:2, Informative)
I recently bought one, and so far I find the hardware quire acceptable.
Re:Let the porting begin! (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Finally... (Score:0, Informative)
Damn it! ..
You seem like my colleague
The Kill Switch (TM) you are talking about is *part* of the ..
Wait for it
Android Market Terms of Service.
This is for application *distributed* over the android market.
And we already know that you can install applications by other means (memory card is one of them, maybe web/email/other market too) as well as the Official Market.
Big deal, I agree with them and I think this can only be positive. .. apt like but easy as a click or a tap with the pen.
I guess it could allow google to stop a competitor via the main official channel, while still allowing them to install them.
Like a normal mac/windows/linux box.
But I guess it could help make the main market, where Joe Sixpack buys, a safer place in terms of malware and viruses.
After all, you can still install anything you want.
I like the way Maemo does it
Re:Hackability (Score:4, Informative)
there's a good chance Android will run on the Freerunner.
So much of a good chance in fact that Koolu [koolu.com] is committing to shipping their FreeRunners with Android installed starting in November.
Re:Let the porting begin! (Score:3, Informative)
I ran Linux on my xbox for several years but never did anything graphical...it was pointless. I just ran a game server (bf1942).
The most useful thing you can do with the Xbox is run XBMC which is built using illegally acquired XDKs. The hardware can't handle high def sources, but the hardware on the 360 could, and now XBMC is ported to Linux....so where is the Linux on the 360?
And before you talk about Linux on the PS3 let me just say that it is broken too and the only reason you can run it on there is because Sony let you.
Re:Allowing "Banned" Features (Score:5, Informative)
the HTC Vogue might be running similar hardware to the HTC Dream (T-Mobile G1). either way, HTC is a member of the Open Handset Alliance, and they make a lot of popular carrier re-branded handsets. so you might be able to run Android on many of those devices [wikipedia.org].
the HTC Vogue/Touch uses the TI OMAP 850 processor while the HTC Dream/T-Mobile G1 is running on a Qualcomm MSM7201A ARM11. so other HTC phones running on, either Texas Instrument's OMAP or Qualcomm's MSM line processors, should support Android as well. in fact, all HTC phones run on either TI, Qualcomm, Intel, or Samsung processors. and it just so happens that TI, Qualcomm, Intel, and Samsung are all members of the Open Handset Alliance. so i wouldn't be surprised if all HTC handsets eventually supported the Android platform.
that's the power of having a strong cross-industry alliance supporting open standards. i think Android has a very good chance of dominating the cellphone market and potentially revolutionizing the industry.
Re:Hackability (Score:2, Informative)
Their next phone, the GTA03, which is currently in development will have EDGE, a camera, a 3.5mm jack, no compromised glamo chip, and a completely new case design.
All of this info was pulled from here, and probably subject to change. http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/GTA03 [openmoko.org]
Re:Allowing "Banned" Features (Score:3, Informative)
T-Mobile is one of the most customer friendly carriers out there.
For example, if you have your phone for more than 3 months they will unlock it for you so that you can use other SIM cards while travelling. I learned this after paying to unlock my T-Mobile dash.
Additionally, they fully "tolerate" tethering. Again with the Dash, it was a matter of firing up the PAN app and connecting my laptop, no call required.
I don't know if this was just becuase I had a special rate plan but I also found that I was never charged a cent for international data. I can't imagine this was simply because they were that nice, since they are pretty clear about int'l roaming fees.
I'm actually disappointed with ATT, travelling was a hassel with the iPhone and the fact that you get charged just for your phone ringing abroad is absurd. Though i did find that if you forward your calls to another line before you leave the country you will escape those nasty fees.
Certainly not all carriers have T-Mobiles customer centric nature Verizon is pretty adament about controlling how you get things on and off your phone, and ATT isn't much better.
Personally, I think T-Mobile was the best possible choice for Google simply because they are so flexible.
Re:Let the porting begin! (Score:1, Informative)
Doesn't putting a different OS on an apple product completely violate the point of an apple product? The advantage of apple's computers is that OSX works about as perfectly as you can expect an operating system to work because they know ahead of time what kinds of hardware they need to develop support for. Having said that, Android on the iPhone would be pretty cool (although, I don't like touch screens very much at all).
Re:Allowing "Banned" Features (Score:3, Informative)
This is a far more likely reason than any of the others that have been given, because:
1) Apple very likely pull in a fair bit of revenue from 3rd. party accessory manufacturers who license their proprietary iPod connection protocols and logos.
2) iPods are ubiquitous, so those connectors crop up in all sorts of unexpected places, and the fact that Apple won't license the protocols to other MP3 player (and phone) manufacturers means that people who want to use anything that has such a connector have to buy from Apple.
This sort of practice is very common in the consumer electronics world, where interoperability is often defined as being able to use a device by one manufacturer with other devices from the same manufacturer. It even happens with standard protocols and connectors such as HDMI, MIDI, etc., which are frequently used to carry manufacturer-specific data that's only understood by other devices from them, and isn't published or licensed to third parties.