Google Android mobiles face lengthy delays

Davey Winder
Monday, 23 June 2008 16:54

IT Industry - Strategy

Cellular News , meanwhile, is reporting that the Chinese interface issue is not the only problem facing Android developers. It claims that software development houses are having difficulty in developing applications. What's more, it also worryingly claims that handset OEMs are understood to be having difficulties with the application software as well.

"A sizeable number of developers - the very people that Google hopes will add the bells and whistles to its mobile phone software - are complaining that the tool kit is riddled with coding errors, some of them shockingly basic" it says, adding that those developers have also said that "Google has been largely unresponsive to their feedback and some observers suggested the very credibility of Google's mobile phone initiative is on the line."

Which is a shame, as there is very good reason for the excitement amongst developers and clued up tech savvy consumers alike: Android could be the beginning of something big.

Built from the ground up to be truly open, Android is based upon the Linux kernel. With a custom virtual machine designed to optimise memory and hardware resources, the concept has 'wow' written all over it.

Not least because it represents a mobile phone platform that should be totally open, totally customisable. The Open Handset Alliance promises "With devices built on the Android Platform, users will be able to fully tailor the phone to their interests. They can swap out the phone's homescreen, the style of the dialer, or any of the applications. They can even instruct their phones to use their favorite photo viewing application to handle the viewing of all photos."

Mind you, it also promises a "fast and easy application development" and handsets available real soon now. Both of those look like being well and truly broken...