Google's gPhone is dead, long live Android

Filed under: OS Updates, Linux, Google, Open Source, Mobile Minute

Google's gPhone is dead, long live Android

by Brad Linder Nov 5th 2007

Google is finally lifting the veil of secrecy from one of the company's worst kept secrets: Google has been working on a cellphone platform. In the early days of gPhone speculation, rumors were flying that Google was going to launch its answer to the iPhone: a piece of hardware running custom software. Now we know that Google has instead developed a software platform for mobile phones that allows phone makers and software developers to do more with cellphones. And of course, to make sure those phones connect easily to Google services like search, Gmail, Google Maps, and so on.

Google today is announcing Android, the mobile OS and the Open Handset Alliance. Google will be releasing the first version of the software development kit for Android on November 12.

Android is built on Linux and features a virtual machine designed for memory and resource optimization. Since the OS is built on an open source foundation, we could eventually see thousands of independent developers creating or porting third party applications to the mobile operating system. Think there are plenty of applications for your Windows Mobile, Palm, or Symbian phone? If Android catches on, we'd love to see developers port every single one of those apps, plus a few Linux goodies like OpenOffice.org or at least AbiWord.

In other words, Android is sort of the anti-iPhone. While Apple released an amazing new OS for a single handset, Android will be able to run on any number of phone models. And while Apple has yet to make an SDK available for third party iPhone development (although one is coming), Google will launch an Android SDK before a single phone even runs the OS.

Tags: android, gPhone, mobile-phone, open-handset-alliance

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Shiva said 1:45PM on 11-05-2007

...so, would Android run on my laptop? And why not?

kingkool68 said 1:45PM on 11-05-2007

Why would you want to put it on your laptop? It's meant for phones!

James said 4:23PM on 11-05-2007

The thing I want to see is, will the source for the OS be released? At the very least, will we have the option of porting it to other devices? I'd love to see my Nokia 770 reflashed with Android underpinnings, or maybe my Pocket PC.

...

Is it wrong that I'm cheering Google towards world domination?

John McCall said 6:07PM on 11-05-2007

Hey,
What about iPhone and the Blackberry.
Seems like alot of competition.
http://www.net-ebooks.com
http://www.ebooks-downloads.com

Rawker said 8:27AM on 11-06-2007

windows mobile is already an open sandard in the mobile phone industry, while it might not be as open as this, it has pretty much any application that anyone would ever need available for it, Google has long road ahead if they wan to overthrow Microsoft.

michael said 8:28AM on 11-06-2007

@Rawker:

I so agree. My WinMo phone supports a lot of add-ons, and things I've downloaded from the internet. Unlike the iPhone, it really does work.

No company really needs to be threatened by this.

Thierry BRETHES said 8:30AM on 11-06-2007

This is Good news, but there is very few details about the platform itself.

I see 3 options for Android on the table:

Option 1) it comes with a native open source JVM. This is the Blackberry approach and the best scenario. It will enable running existing J2ME applications (thousands exist today) and Google will provide more powerfull APIs for their integrationg with their application suite, like GMail, Google Maps and YouTube. GPS APIs would be great too. They will also provide a custom Java based UI toolkit to make applications consistent with the phone UI. IDEs will be Netbeans and Eclipse. The low level access to the underlying Linux OS would be hidden from the developer.

Option 2) The JVM is not part of Android, but available as a addon. This is Palm approach (IBM provides the JVM for Treos). In this case, Esmertec will likely provide a non open source JVM to run J2ME apps to each phone vendor. This is OK but not very good, as the JVM may or may not be present and they will be no integration with existing app or UI toolkit. Developer will have to code all apps running on Android with C or C++ APIs using Eclipse. the SDK will be very similar to the now defund Palm Foleo or the Nokia Linux Maemo platform.

Option 3) No JVM, but a powerfull mobile Web Browser ala Safari, based on the Safari WebKit, which is open source, to runn local mobile AJAX apps written in Javascript and DHTML. Google would provide in the browser custom APIs as Javascript libraries to integrate with the platform and custon Javacript UI compomenents. This will be similar to the current iPhone development and also like the Google widget developement. This is ambitious and risky and will not work for mutimedia or game apps. This is not GREAT, but this is OK, specially if they can integrate some version of Google Gears, enabling mobile AJAX apps to run offline.
OR ... all 3 options ? Anyway we will know in 1 week time.

http://www.unyverse.com

Jonathan Cline said 3:24PM on 11-06-2007

An open platform like Android will allow application developers a standard functionality across all phones. This will allow everyone to have more choice of applications.

If the SDK supports Voice over IP then it will get even better. Then applications can merge data, video, and voice. Imagine having a phone call using VoIP and sharing photos with the other person in real time over the data network in a chat client. It's a simple application yet current platforms make this impossible to implement. An open platform would make it possible.

www.d2tech.com

j2eejava said 8:18AM on 11-07-2007

Hi out there,

waiting for the development kit. Is Nov. 12 still on schedule?

Joshua Brown said 10:20PM on 11-09-2007

http://www.ohadev.org Given the recent news of the "g-phone" and the Open Handset Alliance. A new website has been launched to facilitate coordination between developers who intend to use the "Android SDK" from google.

please visit: http://www.ohadev.org

Nick said 7:43PM on 12-29-2007

As this story continues to develop, it could turn more and more into a battle between the two tech giants: Google with its Android and Microsoft with Windows Mobile, as I saw raised recently at http://www.androidvswindowsmobile.com, among other spots. In the long run, those most likely to develop are we consumers, if we can wait long enough before plunking down our money!

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