Most of the author's complaints are completely valid. That said, a jailbroken iPhone can install software to mitigate a number of these issues. Not a sure-fire solution, of course - it's such a pain chasing after jailbreaks, and you never know if-and-when the magic update happens that'll stop jailbreaking forever.
Still, for those curious...
1: Android can Run Multiple Apps at the Same Time
"Backgrounder" will give you basic multitasking. And "ProSwitcher" builds on it to give you wonderful, Pre-like task switching. Caveat - there just isn't enough memory in anything less then the 3GS to comfortably multitask.
2: Android Keeps Information Visible on Your Home Screen
It'll cost a few dollars, but I've been very happy using "LockInfo" to provide a useful lock screen. It's a must-have application for me - it goes a long way to making my iPhone feel like an actual PDA rather then just a toy.
4: Android Gives You Better Notifications
Not nearly as nice as the Android's, but "LockInfo" does a pretty good job of managing my notifications once I told it to suppress pop-ups when my phone's locked. Paired with "Notifier" to continue pestering me if I miss an important update, I'm pretty content.
8: Android Lets You Change Your Settings Faster
"SBSettings" makes changing settings a snap - just slide my finger across the status bar at the top of the screen to access it. Though I'm not a fan of the default appearance - do yourself a favor and install the "Deep HUD" theme for a cleaner interface.
--
And while I'm advocated bits and bobs to match up with the Android user experience:
"Simple Background" is a nice bit of eye candy, if you want your iPhone to have the same sort of parallax scrolling wallpaper that Android enjoys.
"Inspell" gives you red squiggly misspelling highlighting and intuitive spelling correction. It's a fantastic addition. Honest question - does the Android have something like this?
Most of the author's complaints are completely valid. That said, a jailbroken iPhone can install software to mitigate a number of these issues. Not a sure-fire solution, of course - it's such a pain chasing after jailbreaks, and you never know if-and-when the magic update happens that'll stop jailbreaking forever.
You've just pointed out that the general purpose CPU in the iPhone can run other software. This isn't what is at issue, what's at issue is the default/sanctioned install that comes with the iPhone. Of course you can get other android-like features on your iPhone if you replace or supplement the core iPhone software with something else. But then, your jailbroken iPhone isn't really an iPhone anymore, is it?
"Inspell" gives you red squiggly misspelling highlighting and intuitive spelling correction. It's a fantastic addition. Honest question - does the Android have something like this?
The default Android keyboard, and other keyboards, corrects as you type and/or gives you spelling suggestions and word completions. This has been a much better experience than having to go back and try to correct misspellings after the fact.
You've just pointed out that the general purpose CPU in the iPhone can run other software.
Actually, the gist of my message was to point out specific bits of software to help folks who feel hindered by some of the limitations the article's author mentioned. I know they help me feel more comfortable using the iPhone.
I didn't think I was being particularly subtle, but I guess I was mistaken. <shrug>
But then, your jailbroken iPhone isn't really an iPhone anymore, is it?
That's a... strange claim to make. And the only way it seems even related to my message is if you ignore my explicit caveat about how annoying and fretful jailbreaking is. Which I'm fairly certain you read - why, it's right there, in the bit you quoted.
The default Android keyboard, and other keyboards, corrects as you type and/or gives you spelling suggestions and word completions. This has been a much better experience than having to go back and try to correct misspellings after the fact.
Given the tone of your response, I seem to have really irked you. I'm asking an honest question here - this is a feature I find really useful (enough that I gladly paid for this bit of jailbreak-only software that could vaporize at Apple's whim). I'm not asking for your opinion on how text input should be done (because frankly, I don't agree), nor for platform advocacy. Really, I thought my question was rather straight forward.
The point was about how things come out of the box - for the consumer, not the prosumer :). Of course it's annoying to jailbreak. That's why, for all intents and purposes, it doesn't matter. It's like Δx^2 while you take the first derivative: in the end, jailbreaking doesn't really affect the sales of a product.
Anyway, red squiggly lines are good for checking a mass of text after the fact. But only if your input method does not allow for checking and correcting at time of input. When this type of thing happens at input-type instead of scan-before-hitting-reply-time, you're probably less likely to miss something.
Also, given that you can manually add words to the phone's dictionary is something my iPhone never did have (another win for Android).
The point was about how things come out of the box - for the consumer, not the prosumer :)
And that's a completely valid concern... if I were engaged in platform advocacy or arguing these iPhone shortcomings are inconsequential or non-existent.
But I'm not.
For the record: I don't like jailbreaking my phone. I don't like installing jailbreak software. I'm annoyed that Apple will neither provide this functionality that I enjoy nor expose a legitimate mechanism for 3rd parties to create it.
But such is the state of things. And given I have an iPhone, I darn well am going to make the most of it. And that matters. I'm not trying to affect software sales - I'm trying to help people like me. People who (for better or worse) have an iPhone, are hamstrung by some of the more valid critiques the article lists, and are looking for solutions.
As for the red squiggly text editing - let's consider that a red herring. I don't agree with your text editing philosophy, but that's neither here-nor-there. This wasn't meant as a dig on Android. I just assumed Android could do this, and was hoping to find out more.
Warfangle - I don't mean this to sound harsh. While I read your reply as assuming platform advocacy on my part, beyond that it was even handed. But golly, I shouldn't have to defend information. Opinions, yes. Information, no. :(
>"Inspell" gives you red squiggly misspelling highlighting and intuitive spelling correction. It's a fantastic addition. Honest question - does the Android have something like this?
Android supports what are called IMEs -- the OSK is essentially just another application type, which can be replaced by the user. Which is basically to say that if you can dream up a method of inputting text, Android can do it. You can find everything from what are essentially much improved versions of a "standard" OSK[1] to gesture based typing[2] to alternate IMEs for non-latin characters to almost anything else you could come up with.
So the short answer is "probably."
[1] http://www.smartkeyboardpro.com/ (this is what I use on my phone at the suggest of another HN commenter a couple of weeks ago).
Maybe the Android Marketplace is "better" than the App Store because anybody can put an app up there, but the apps certainly aren't better, not by a long shot.
I think it's really hard to call one store "better" than the other. I'm an App Store developer, but I can see advantages to both:
App Store: Far more apps (and thus a stronger platform, attracts more users, attracts more developers). The review process generally controls quality (ignoring taste, for example fart apps), in the sense of no virus or battery drainers or network abusers or completely unusable apps. This is a plus and I think it's severely under-appreciated.
Android: No review process means you can potentially get any kind of app. Alternative app stores (or you can download right from the web). Ever-improving number of apps in the store (it's lagging behind App Store but quickly catching up).
So it really depends on what you're after and what you value. I don't think it's really fair to for the article to call one store "better" than the other.
I can participate as a seller in the Apple App store. I cannot in the Android Marketplace.
Unless and until Canada is a first-class country on the Android marketplace, I won't even look at developing for Android.
(Granted, I probably won't do much with it even after that, because I hate Java with a passion and don't want the nasty performance hit that alternative languages currently have on Dalvik, but that's a different argument.)
Many of the points are valid (I really, really, _really_ would like widgets or something on the lockscreen), but the author's tone makes it seem like he's short AAPL posting on Yahoo finance. (Or more likely, inciting fanboys on each side to generate site traffic)
Those points are valid, and many of them pulled me back from buying an iPhone since before there were Android widgets on the market.
I am pretty sure though that one can find 10 things the iPhone does better than Android ... like fixed screen resolution, better dev tools (although that's debatable, as I just want to work on my OS of choice), more polished design for the hardware, etc...
Competition is such a wonderful thing ... those guys at Google that decided to throw Android in the marketplace to increase competition (such that their search engine remains in business) are pure geniuses.
The date says June 3rd, but then the text says "the Android Marketplace has only just broken the 50,000 mark". That number is, like, so last month. http://www.androlib.com/appstats.aspx
Ordinarily a month-old fact would probably be fine, but things are moving a bit fast in the smartphone world these days. So in this case it leads to an error of 26%.
> I was under the impression that the mechanics of each were nearly identical.
They're actually very different: with Android you create what's basically a daemon server, no UI but does everything it want, while with OS4 you register against service (there are 7 service types to choose from) and the OS itself runs and manages it, calling your registered service hooks.
Android gives far more control, at the cost of more (programmatic) complexity and more battery life risks (a badly implemented daemon/service will kill your battery life quick, whereas on the OS4 since the OS keeps full control of the execution it has a much better shot at managing battery/power issues, and it can more efficiently handle multiple applications registering for the same service).
The part that is similar is the handling of non-multitasking-aware applications (regular applications in OS4, applications with no daemon in Android): they're simply frozen in RAM, and killed if memory pressure becomes an issue.
Yes but that puts the onus of battery-care on the user of the phone. It's fine for geeks (nb: not a put down, I'm in that category myself) which are going to spend half their time between that and the task killer anyway, but that's not the demographic Apple targets, and that's not the kind of tradeoffs they'd find acceptable. Hence their selection of a different solution, which (they believe) gets you 90% of the way with 10% of the costs.
Not necessarily. It could also be the developer of the application that is taking advantage of the battery monitor functionality to see if their application needs improvement.
I agree that no end user should have to be keeping a watch for applications that use too much battery, but it sure is nice to have that information easily accessible for developers.
It doesn't work very well. There have been occasions where I've accidentally left the PandoraService running on my Droid overnight (not playing music mind you, but that doesn't stop it from sapping battery) and woke up in the morning to find my battery nearly dead and the battery tool claiming that it was "Android System."
Though I suppose it's possible that was a bug in the service management stuff...
Your quote is incomplete, the phrase before it is important:
> If an app needs to continue functioning indefinitely while in the background
Operative word here being indefinitely, in the paragraph above he describes task completion as well (an application can request up to 10mn [or something, might have changed] to finish handling a task)
"your manhood is not automatically diminished if someone else makes a different consumer choice."
In a sense this is true, but my lifestyle is definitely affected by others making a different consumer choice, at least in regards to platforms.
For instance, I use Linux primarily as my desktop OS. If an order of magnitude more consumers were using Linux, my experience would be better as there would be more software and support for the OS I am using.
I disagree with this. Software is mostly a product of API flexibility rather than the number of potential users.
One thing that annoys me most about Windows is that I have to use a mouse to manage windows. There are tiling window managers, but none of them can hold a candle to Xmonad. Even though Linux has fewer users, it has better software.
Same goes for Android -- fewer users and less monitization opportunities. But more possibilities, so there are more interesting applications. (Locale, for example.)
>I disagree with this. Software is mostly a product of API flexibility rather than the number of potential users.
I'm filling out a job application that is a Word Document that absolutely vomits when read in OpenOffice. If there were fewer people using Word, they wouldn't be able to get away with that. There's a part of me that doesn't want to work in that sort of shop, but I'm only a year out of college, and if I have to do C# to get a developer position, I'll take that, C# isn't a bad language.
That said, I can't get away with using Linux because of the potential users problem. Now I guess you could call the .doc format an API flexibility problem, but no API is sufficiently flexible that it runs anywhere without testing. There has to be enough of a userbase to justify testing.
You should try looking at many more linux and embedded shops. Many weren't hit that hard by the downturn. (But good luck finding a job wherever you seek).
As a programmer, you shouldn't be filling out Word documents. Get your recruiter to do it, or send an email to the company saying, "I wanted to apply for your job, but your Word document is unreadable on my machine."
There is a major shortage of competent programmers and industry is dying to get anyone with a clue. Use this to your advantage.
> One thing that annoys me most about Windows is that I have to use a mouse to manage windows. There are tiling window managers, but none of them can hold a candle to Xmonad. Even though Linux has fewer users, it has better software.
It's not XMonad by a long shot, but Windows 7 has much improved shortcuts for moving windows around and doing some basic tiling (left half/right half of a screen, as well as fullscreen and "normal" with the Win-arrows combinations)
I wrote a medium sized post about why I like iPhone OS4's approach to multithreading, but once again when I submit it I get "this link is expired" and go back to find my text gone.
Seaside used to use continuations for everything but realized that the only place you really need it is wizard-like work flows, so they've removed it everywhere else. This allows them to not need a session unless you're in a workflow and things like "expired link" for pretty static looking pages doesn't happen.
A lot of the points are certainly valid, though somewhat debatable. The #1 one-up (Multitasking) is set to become an iPhone feature in about a month. As for no notifications on the lock screen, have the authors never received a push notification? Again though, local notifications are coming in iPhone OS 4.
I was under the impression that both the Android and Apple multi-tasking implemntations were limited in various ways, but that the Apple one was more limited, so you could probably still count that if you wanted to.
The Android way has less (if any) limitations (you register a service/daemon which behaves as an application server, it's headless but other than that does whatever it wants). Apple's solution is much more limited (you register tasks against the OS and the OS runs it, which limits what you can do to what the OS itself provides) but the tradeoff is that "debatable" programming has lower chances of eating your battery alive (and the OS can more efficiently handle some services e.g. if 5 different applications asked for GPS/movement notification, the OS can poll the chip once and it will then dispatch that one message to everybody, whereas with the Android solution you'd have 5 different services polling the location API)
Unfortunately the talks on such subjects are filled with opinions of bystanders ... insightful articles/comments comparing X vs Y from people that used both in production are few and far between.
Still, for those curious...
1: Android can Run Multiple Apps at the Same Time
"Backgrounder" will give you basic multitasking. And "ProSwitcher" builds on it to give you wonderful, Pre-like task switching. Caveat - there just isn't enough memory in anything less then the 3GS to comfortably multitask.
2: Android Keeps Information Visible on Your Home Screen
It'll cost a few dollars, but I've been very happy using "LockInfo" to provide a useful lock screen. It's a must-have application for me - it goes a long way to making my iPhone feel like an actual PDA rather then just a toy.
4: Android Gives You Better Notifications
Not nearly as nice as the Android's, but "LockInfo" does a pretty good job of managing my notifications once I told it to suppress pop-ups when my phone's locked. Paired with "Notifier" to continue pestering me if I miss an important update, I'm pretty content.
8: Android Lets You Change Your Settings Faster
"SBSettings" makes changing settings a snap - just slide my finger across the status bar at the top of the screen to access it. Though I'm not a fan of the default appearance - do yourself a favor and install the "Deep HUD" theme for a cleaner interface.
--
And while I'm advocated bits and bobs to match up with the Android user experience:
"Simple Background" is a nice bit of eye candy, if you want your iPhone to have the same sort of parallax scrolling wallpaper that Android enjoys.
"Inspell" gives you red squiggly misspelling highlighting and intuitive spelling correction. It's a fantastic addition. Honest question - does the Android have something like this?