There Seems To Be A Little Bit Of Interest In This Froyo Thing

From Android phone users there seems to be a great deal of excitment about the impending upgrade to Android 2.2. This was announced in May this year at Google I/O. In an industry where a week seems like a lifetime in terms of new innovation announcements, having to wait almost 3 months to actually receive the upgrade has left a lot of people salivating for a long time. OK to most consumers of mobile phones this probably doesn't mean a thing, but to Android geekdom this is Chritmas in late July! Or if you have a Network Carrier Locked HTC Desire, probably Christmas at the end of August if you are lucky! :-( Still a late Christmas present is better than none at all I guess. ;-). In fact even at the end of August it will still be 4 months early! Rock and Roll!

So here is a brief look at the coverage from the twitter-spere about impending Froyo updates to various devices! (Interestingly complete silence from Sony Ericcson for the SE X10 which was released with Android 1.6, while other handsets around it were being launched with 2.1. A great mistake in my view. I thought the SE X10 was a great looking phone but launching with 1.6 when others around it were heading out the door with 2.1 on board would have put me off if I was in the market at the time. So no news for either a 2.1 or 2.2 upgrade for SE X10 users. Sorry folks :-()

• @IntoMobile International Samsung Galaxy S to receive Android 2.2 (Froyo) in September http://bit.ly/9CFhnJ
  
• @HTC Please be aware any update.zip floating around for EVO are not final and may cause problems. Official updates are coming OTA next week!
  
• @IntoMobile Motorola Droid Gets Some Android 2.2 (Froyo) Lovin' Next Week http://bit.ly/bQl3KQ
  
• @MobileCrunch Don't Want To Wait For Next Week? Download Android 2.2 Now - http://is.gd/dTPeN
  
• @androidcentral Android 2.2 on the Evo 4G http://bit.ly/9ooUzI
  
• @IntoMobile Android 2.2 Froyo for Sprint EVO 4G Now Available from HTC http://bit.ly/aoAmWm
  
• @androidcentral Android 2.2 build for Evo leaked, rooted -- and released http://bit.ly/aYhLXO
  
• @AndroidGuys #Android: Verizon to Push Froyo to the Droid Next Week! http://www.androidguys.com/2010/07/30/verizon-push-froyo-droid-week/
  
• @androidcentral Original Droid getting Android 2.2 next week - it's official, folks! http://bit.ly/ba5idj
  
• @MobileCrunch Android 2.2 to hit the Motorola Droid next week? - http://is.gd/dTEhl
  

And so on and on!

Interestingly another Android release always seems to drive out the fragmentation issue again! An example can be seen here. At this stage with Android I don't believe think fragmentation is the biggest issue. I tend to agree with the comment posted at the end of the article

• The average user won’t even notice the differences between Android 2.0,2.1 or 2.2. The same Apps run on it, and most users only know one thing: “it runs Android”. I have rarely seen complaints about fragmentation from users, only websites that apparently are writing articles with the only reason of writing articles are mentioning things like this Fragmentation is overhyped and not something that is really that big a problem for either end-user or developer.

Lets see though. With so many different form factored devices there could still be issues, but the fact is that not all apps will run on all devices. Simple as that. Developers will always create where there is a need that creates a market where they can distribute their wares. So if a manufacturer deviates too far from the norm, either they make applications for their device themselves or the Customers have little to play with!

Cheers

m