Feb 12, 2010

My 45 minutes of romance with Android on HTC Elf/Elfin. (HTC Touch)


Context: I have a useless HTC phone; which thanks to it's hardware lacking doesn't respond well to the network signal of Vodafone and leaves me begging for some usability all the time. So I use a regular nokia stud for my daily conversations. However I haven't left my HTC completely craving for attention as it is my usual fav. subject to experiment. Sometime back I had tried installing Windows 6.5 release candidate and it worked out so well that I kept it as my OS for about an year or so. Finally with the kick off, of I-phone dev, I decided to give android a shot; in case I decide to learn a little bit of Android app-dev. So here are my 10 cents of my 45 mins of flirting with Android.

Yays :)
  • Setup was super easy; probably not because Android people made it so; instead because some guys on XDA Developer forum really worked hard and left me a bunch of sooper easy cab files to just click and install with precise instructions. (As mentioned in their post, sound, Wifi, BlueTooth and some other stuff didn't work.. but whatever worked; worked well)
  • Android made Stylus totally useless, as it is totally for finger operation and I loved that aspect of it.
  • UI was not Apple-ish but it has nicely contrasting colors and animations were not overdone. I loved simple transitions effects.
  • Desktop real estate was not cluttered instead was left clean for users. Didn't see an outright usage of google search bar there; but what the heck.. if I have internet I am sure I am going to use it.
  • From what it seems like; Android has built in developer tools and instrumenting and profiling of code is possible too. This is really exciting as a developer if you have to work on it. Goes a long way in plucking out issues.
  • Some of the neat tricks of pulling down the notification screen from nowhere was cool; I think it was a clean way of putting that together.
Nays :(
  • UI Could be much much better still. I am sure, there is a theme support but as if now I didn't find it and that was a bit of disappointment. Especially that same look and feel tends to get boring soon; especially with cellphones as you use them so frequently.
  • I didn't find anything outright new and never-seen-before type. I think maybe because I was just looking at core android and not the apps. I saw Nexus-One though and some of the stuff there looks promising and exciting both.
  • Performance from my ELF standpoint was a let down. (Jittery screen transitions sometimes) This is understandable too as I realize it was officially release for the models with qualcomm processors in HTC; I am just running a tweaked version inside a Wing Linux Bootloader.
Apart from that I just felt it was a great OS and I'd replace my Windows Mobile anyday with Android, if it came with full/equal feature-set. I have also heard that testing and development framework for android is excellent and much much better than that of I-phone. Especially from unit testing point of view; which is something I'll be checking out soon.

Thanks for Guys on XDA Developer community for showing me the way to get android on HTC Elf. As if now; you don't have to flash it in your ROM; instead you just install the CABS and Wings Linux bootloader loads up your phone in Android; which means it's safe, non-disruptive and easy. You won't brick your phone and you won't loose your data. (Never hurts to make a backup though!)

Finally, will I choose to work on Android app-dev over I-phone?
My answer is "yes". For simple reason.
1. I am pro-google.
2. I feel Android has a brighter future considering that Apple is focused on making dead closed systems; from chips to OS coming in-house starting I-Pad. On the other hand; Android has not only created waves but also has mass adoptors ranging from cellphone to net-book manufacturers.
3. Better development framework and testing support.
4. I am guessing bigger community? (that shouldn't matter though!)

Hope to see you on the other side!!