Did Google solve the fragmentation problem with this IO?

[Phokus]

Interesting...

http://ishouldhaveknownthisbefore.w...d-fragmentation-and-forgot-to-tell-everybody/

http://www.androidcentral.com/new-google-play-services

http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2013/05/how-google-updated-android-without-releasing-version-4-3/

 

[dguy6789]

Fragmentation in Android(the fact that different phones run different versions of the OS) has never been a problem in the last 3 years.

 

[zerogear]

No, but it makes it less evident, since everyone is running "Jelly Bean", most people won't care about the revision numbers. Hell, I don't think majority of the people care about 2.6.x -> 4.x, as long as they can still run the apps they need from the Play Store.

 

[Bateluer]

Fragmentation in Android(the fact that different phones run different versions of the OS) has never been a problem in the last 3 years.

This. The 'issue' comes up every couple of months though.

 

[Zaap]

Yeah, in actual practice I have no idea how this so-called fragmentation actually affects anything.

I bought a $40 el-cheapo Android e-reader tablet for my nephew last year, and it was running Android 2.1. And yet every app I needed to install on it for him -the same apps I used in the latest version of Android- worked just fine. (E-book readers, music players, web and email apps, calendar, tools, social networking, launchers, widgets, etc.)

I used the same apps on my Droid X since it had Android 2.2 when I got it- all the way to Android 4.2 on my Galaxy Note 2.

If I didn't hear people bitch and moan about fragmentation with Android, I wouldn't even know what it was.

 

[Crono]

They didn't have a fragmentation problem, what they had was slight disharmony between services.

Tighter integration between seemingly disparate products and services from social networks to photography tools, and from email to chat clients, with a helping of navigation/mapping thrown in, makes for a much more fluid user experience.

Ultimately, that means more data and ad revenue for Google if they can get users to stay in the Google environment or ecosystem or whatever you want to call it. They are closer this I/O with all the updates they've announced and released, but they didn't "solve" the problem, but they have improved the experience in many ways. They are making it harder and harder to not use any of their services as dominant or at least competitive they are in many areas.

 

[postmortemIA]

There are very few apps (Chrome being one) that require ICS or newer.

 

[Mopetar]

Yeah, in actual practice I have no idea how this so-called fragmentation actually affects anything.

It's more of an annoyance than an actual problem and doesn't apply to everyone. If you buy the latest flagship phone or a really popular one, more than likely apps have been tested an confirmed to work on it. If you have some random device that almost no one owns, some apps might not work on it or behave strangely.

For developers it means having to support multiple devices and dealing with odd hardware quirks that cause the occasional bug. Once again this is a less of a problem as you can target only a handful of devices and cover most users. Also the handset manufacturers have moved away from constantly producing new devices with minor variations and have focused on releasing a few major flagship devices each year.

There are still issues where carriers don't offer updates, but I doubt that most people here have that problem since they'll run unlocked devices or custom ROMs. The people who don't understand what that is or why they might want it probably don't care about getting updates anyway.

It's fairly safe to say that most people don't need to worry or care about fragmentation. There are likely more pressing issues to be solved.

 

[A5]

They've been working down this path of decoupling the Google apps from the core OS for a few years now (I think it started with ICS).

We're not far from the point where the actual "Android OS" updates only cover the kernel, the lowest ring of system apps above that, and the stock launcher. Google is never going to be able to force manufacturers and carriers to ship new full revs on old hardware, but they can keep doing more to make that not mean as much. They're also going to get an assist from the slowing rate of hardware platform revisions over the next several years.

 

[QueBert]

There are very few apps (Chrome being one) that require ICS or newer.

What about apps that require a specific GPU? I guess that's not fragmentation though, I mean Android owners would be stupid to expect a game to run on the latest handset right? And then you have the mysterious apps that have no special requirements but still won't work on certain handsets. About 10 games I've bought that didn't work on my Note 1 or my Nexus 4, but worked on my One X would like to have a talk with you.

Now I'm not stupid enough to say it's this huge problem, but I think it's equally silly for people to act like it's 100% fabricated when anyone brings it up.

 

[dagamer34]

The only actual fragmentation that I see as a developer is dealing creating UIs for a 2.x system and a 4.x and onward system because of Holo. While I try to put in a decent effort in my 4.x UI, I don't give two shits about people running 2.x. I sorely wish I could dump that platform and strip out all of that code, but Gingerbread is still 30+% of the market. Arg.

 

[Zaap]

10 games I've bought that didn't work on my Note 1 or my Nexus 4, but worked on my One X would like to have a talk with you.

What 10 games don't work on a Nexus 4?

 

[Bryf50]

What 10 games don't work on a Nexus 4?

Just go to the play store through the browser. Gameloft is particularly bad with this. There are dozens of just Gameloft games that are not compatible with my S3 despite being probably the single most popular android handset. The worst part is if I go out and find the apk they usually work perfectly fine. It's the same thing with EA, Rockstar, etc.

I think if there is an app that's "incompatible" with your device it should just pop up a disclaimer saying that you can't leave a review/receive support but still allow you to download it.

That's not even including Nvidia and all their bullshit. The latest GPUs are like 5x faster than tegra 3 yet plenty of games are either exclusive to it or look better on it.

 

[ultimatebob]

The only actual fragmentation that I see as a developer is dealing creating UIs for a 2.x system and a 4.x and onward system because of Holo. While I try to put in a decent effort in my 4.x UI, I don't give two shits about people running 2.x. I sorely wish I could dump that platform and strip out all of that code, but Gingerbread is still 30+% of the market. Arg.

What's sad is that there are still some prepaid phone providers that are selling "new" Android phones with 2.3 on them. Supporting those customers two years from now is going to be a pain in the ass.

 

[zerogear]

What 10 games don't work on a Nexus 4?

Usually these are Tegra games, and the developers get paid money by nVidia to be Tegra-only, sometimes for a little bit, sometimes forever. Though I don't really see how that "fragmentation" is Google's fault.

 

[Zaap]

Just go to the play store through the browser. Gameloft is particularly bad with this. There are dozens of just Gameloft games that are not compatible with my S3 despite being probably the single most popular android handset.

Not that I'm doubting you, but:
I had an S3 for months and had all the Asphalt games, Modern Combat, N.O.V.A. one or two others on it.

Viewing the play store, user reviews report the phones people are using:
https://play.google.com/store/search?q=gameloft&c=apps

Just looking through their major titles, I see S3 users reviewing all of them.

Could this have been a custom ROM-specific thing?

 

[Zaap]

Usually these are Tegra games, and the developers get paid money by nVidia to be Tegra-only, sometimes for a little bit, sometimes forever. Though I don't really see how that "fragmentation" is Google's fault.

Exactly. Sounds more like developer-specific politics in this case.

 

[Raduque]

Usually these are Tegra games, and the developers get paid money by nVidia to be Tegra-only, sometimes for a little bit, sometimes forever. Though I don't really see how that "fragmentation" is Google's fault.

It's not Google's fault, it's nVidia's fault... artificial fragmentation. Android phones are roughly where the PC gaming industry was during the 3dfx era.

 

[Mopetar]

Usually these are Tegra games, and the developers get paid money by nVidia to be Tegra-only, sometimes for a little bit, sometimes forever. Though I don't really see how that "fragmentation" is Google's fault.

Almost none of the fragmentation issues are Google's fault. They can't stop hardware manufacturers from making dozens of different devices. They can't stop the carriers from not releasing updates. They can't stop developers from only targeting Tegra. They can't stop people from installing custom ROMs that may break some functionality.

That's why the idea that Google can somehow fix these issues doesn't make much sense to me. They only way to do it would be to exert Apple-like levels of control over Android and that's not something they want to do.

 

[Deeko]

There are very few apps (Chrome being one) that require ICS or newer.

...which actually isn't good for users. There are a ton of good features in the Android SDK that aren't in Gingerbread - so developers either aren't using those features in order to maintain clean backwards compatibility, or they're spending time managing multiple versions of their apps, which isn't good for progress either.

 

[Bateluer]

What's sad is that there are still some prepaid phone providers that are selling "new" Android phones with 2.3 on them. Supporting those customers two years from now is going to be a pain in the ass.

The kind of people buying ultra cheap phones on fly-by-night prepaid carriers do not care about the Android version though. Its a phone, it makes calls, it can run apps. Thats good enough for that clientele.

Usually these are Tegra games, and the developers get paid money by nVidia to be Tegra-only, sometimes for a little bit, sometimes forever. Though I don't really see how that "fragmentation" is Google's fault.

Its worth noting that most of them can be side loaded and stripped of the Tegra requirement through methods like Chainfire. Irritating yes, but 99% of phone and tablet games aren't worth playing anyway.

 

[QueBert]

What 10 games don't work on a Nexus 4?

Off the top of my head NBA Jams, AVP Evolution claims to work, but I couldn't get it to load. i tried it on stock and about 100 different 3rd party roms. There's probably 50 THD or whatever Nvidia games that won't work too. I'm just talking about non Tegra specific games here to be fair. But really it isn't unfair to bring up Tegra games as the average joe doesn't know or understand their new phone top of the line phone might not have the needed GPU to play certain games. Hell they won't even know what a GPU is. When I get home I can pull up the full list. The sad thing is a game like NBA Jam's has no special hardware requirements even, it just doesn't work.

I'm a tech person since the age of 4, and I really don't understand how/why Nba Jam's plays great on my EVO 4G but isn't compatible with my new Nexus 4. Of course I could sideload the nVidia games and run Chainfire, this is something I'm sure the average joe who would scratch his head at the term GPU would be able to figure out.

 

[Zaap]

Off the top of my head NBA Jams, AVP Evolution claims to work, but I couldn't get it to load. i tried it on stock and about 100 different 3rd party roms.

Still sounds like a developer issue more than any so-called 'fragmentation' issue.

I see the same sorts of issues all the time on iOS as well. Perfect example, for AVP Evolution, the big note for the latest update:

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/avp-evolution/id583066190?mt=8

What's New in Version 1.3.1
Please note: iPod touch (4th Generation) is NOT supported.

So those with a 4G iPod touch are SOL. Does that mean iOS is fragmented, or is it just that developers try to make these things work on the widest possible range of devices, but some are going to get left out, and with Android, there's a hell of a lot more devices to support.

 

[poofyhairguy]

The worst offenders for incompatible games are the bigger developers cranking out so many titles that many are almost instantly abandoned. The majority of my already purchased Gameloft games won't work, and which sucks because many were their last real games before everything went Freemium which means they will never update them to work. Half of my EA games won't install or work, and many are older versions (like last years Madden) that won't get updated probably. My wife's favorite game, Chuzzle, flies to pieces on a high Res screen. I probably lost about a third of my Play Store library's value when I upgraded.

With that said, I have been playing games nonstop since I got the phone. There are so many cheap Android games, with almost no extra expensive HD versions, that you can still be plenty entertained. In the Android market you get many Freemium games that cost a few bucks on iOS so even if you didn't want to pay you can still play.

So I guess I am saying even though its a pain on Android that app backwards compatibility with games is an issue, the more consumer friendly Android market makes up for it.

Now for developers its lose-lose- you can't milk customers for as much money and you have to redo old games when a new phone gets released or watch the rating drop through the floor. But I think that is almost like every other free market- don't develop for Android if its not worth it to you. I will just play someone else's game, and pay them for the gold coins/mithril/smurf berries when I am hooked.

 

[s44]

My wife's favorite game, Chuzzle, flies to pieces on a high Res screen.

I'm still outraged by this.