Tag Archives: Android

Android Released The Third Beta of Android 13

Android

Google’s Android Developers Blog posted “Android 13 Beta 3 and Platform Stability” on June 8, 2022. It was written by VP of Engineering, Dave Burke. The blog post talks about the release of the third beta and platform stability.

Today, we’re releasing the third Beta of Android 13, taking us into the final phase of our cycle where we’re focusing on polish and performance. With Android 13, we’ve built on our core themes of privacy and security, developer productivity, and tablet and large screen support.

In the blog post, he mentions features in Android 13. This includes privacy features like the new notification permission and photo picker, to productivity features like themed app icons and per-app language support, as well as modern standards like HDR video, Bluetooth LE Audio, and MIDI 2.0 over USB.

They also extended the newer updates they made in 12L, giving you better tools to take advantage of the 270+ million tablet and large screen devices in active use.

Those who want to participate in Beta 3 on their Pixel device can enroll for over-the-air updates. Anyone who has previously enrolled will automatically get the June 8 update.

Regarding platform stability, they are asking all app and game developers to start their final compatibility testing now, and to prepare to publish their compatibility updates as soon as possible ahead of the final release. It is important for app and game developers to move quickly, because those who don’t may find their apps blocked until Android receives their updates. There are more details in the blog post for developers to consider.

Gizmodo explained that Android’s Beta 3 is now available as an over-the-air update to anyone already using Android 13 as their daily driver on a respective Pixel device.

Gizmodo also pointed out that this version of the Android beta has also reached Platform Stability, which means that the developer APIs and how apps perform on this next version of the operating system are final. According to Gizmodo, from here, until the software’s public release sometime in a few months, developer are to focus on app compatibility and overall quality.

The Android Developers Blog says that the Android Beta 3 can also be tested on tablets. According to the blog, Android 13 builds on the tablet optimizations introduced in 12L. As part of your testing, make sure your apps look their best on tablets and large-screen devices. You can test with the large screen features by setting up an Android emulator in Android Studio, or you can use a large screen device from their Android 13 Beta partners.

Nothing Announces a Smartphone at the Heart of an Ecosystem

smartphone, ,

Nothing is Carl Pei’s latest venture after leaving the OnePlus smartphone company in 2020. Now employing 300 people in six countries, the first product, wireless earphones called ear(1), were very well received for their design, audio quality and price. The ear(1) are transparent and have sold over 400,000 units at a reasonable GB£100.

The ear(1) was always intended to the be the first in a range products and in today’s Nothing presentation, Carl promised a revolutionary new smartphone, the phone(1) at the heart of an open ecosystem. The vision is interoperability in the style of Apple without the walled garden, attitude and price.

The new phone will be powered by a Qualcomm processor running Nothing OS. This Android-based OS will be fast and smooth, and stripped of bloatware. Hardware and software would be brought together as one, and design elements would be consistent across the phone. If it all sounds a bit familiar, it’s not terribly different from the vision for OnePlus before it snuggled up to Oppo.

That’s pretty much it. There was no unveiling of the device itself – all that was revealed is the pictogram on the right. The phone(1) is expected to go on sale in the summer.

And if you are thinking that this is all pie in the sky, it’s not. They’ve the financial backing to go with it to the tune of US$140 million and backing from the likes of Google, Samsung, Qualcomm, Sony, BYD and Visionox.

To get a taste of what’s on offer Nothing will be offering, the Nothing OS launcher will be available from April for installation on select existing devices.

I’m looking forward to it.

Google Introduces the Privacy Sandbox

google,

Google has introduced the Privacy Sandbox. This news was announced on Google’s The Keyword blog. The purpose of this new feature appears to be to “evolve how digital advertising works to improve user privacy.”

Today, we’re announcing a multi-year initiative to build the Privacy Sandbox on Android with the goal of introducing new, more private advertising solutions. Specifically, these solutions will limit sharing of user data with third parties and operate without cross-app identifiers, including advertising ID. We’re also exploring technologies that reduce the potential for covert data collection, including safer ways to integrate with advertising SDK’s.

Google claims that the goal with the Privacy Sandbox on Android is to develop effective privacy enhancing advertising solutions, where users know their information is protected, and developers and businesses have the tools to succeed on mobile.

Google acknowledges that “other platforms have taken a different approach to ads privacy, bluntly restricting existing technologies used by developers and advertisers” Google believes that those approaches are ineffective.

It is possible that Google is referring to Apple’s App Tracking Transparency feature, which allows Apple users to diminish the amount of data apps can collect, lets them know what is shared and how it is used, and gives users the ability to turn all of that off.

The Wall Street Journal reported that Apple’s changes “have already upended the digital-ad industry and contributed to a wipeout of more than $300 billion from Meta’s market value.”

The Wall Street Journal also reported that Google’s new restrictions to curtail tracking across apps on Android smartphones is “putting restraints on an advertising industry that has covertly collected data across billions of mobile devices.” Google plans to keep supporting current smartphone identifiers for at least the next two years to give the ad industry notice before any changes.

According to The Wall Street Journal, one proposal would have users’ Android devices track their app usage and analyze it on their devices, rather than sending raw usage information to outside companies. The phones will then tell third parties the user’s interests so they can be targeted with relevant ads without the advertisers knowing that user’s smartphone identifier.

Personally, I think that Google should do better. Allowing third-parties to send Android users targeted ads based on the user’s interests certainly doesn’t sound like something a Privacy Sandbox should be doing.

Apple Launches AirTags and Find My Trackers for Android

Android, , ,

Those who choose to travel during this holiday season should make an effort to keep a close watch on their baggage or carry-on items. Previously, Apple gave iOS users the ability to use AirTags to keep track of their stuff, and to identify when an AirTag has been placed on their stuff by a stranger. Now, Android users will have the same ability to protect themselves.

CNET reported: The new app, which Apple released on the Google Play store Monday, is intended to help people look for item trackers compatible with Apple’s Find My network. “If you think someone is using an AirTag or another device to track your location,” the app says, “you can scan to try to find it.”

The Verge posted a screenshot of what Apple’s Tracker Detect does. The screenshot shows a blue circle, with a smaller blue dot in the center. Three smaller circles show a key, a backpack, and an AirTag.

The screenshot includes the following text: “Tracker Detect looks for item trackers that are separated from their owner and that are compatible with Apple’s Find My network. These item trackers include AirTag and compatible devices from the companies. If you think someone is using AirTag or another device to track your location, you can scan to try to find it.”

As The Verge pointed out, the Tracker Detect will alert Android users if it finds a tracker that shouldn’t be there. However, it is “purely a manual search.” The Verge makes it clear: “Tracker Detect doesn’t help you keep track of the AirTags attached to an Apple account, so it’s not helping Android users actually use AirTags.”

In my opinion, it appears that Apple’s Tracker Detect could provide Apple users who have added AirTags to their belongings to quickly learn that a tracker that they did not put there has been detected. Tracker Detecter can provide Android users with the same information, but the user will have to do a manual search for the unknown tracker while scanning for it. That said, everyone traveling should always keep a close eye on their luggage and carry-on items.

Xiaomi 11T Pro Charges to 100% in 17 minutes

Android,

After yesterday’s event by the #3 smartphone brand, it’s the turn of Xiaomi, #2 worldwide smartphone brand, to show off their latest gear, and it’s a tasty selection of tech. Amazingly, it’s taken Xiaomi only 11 years to get to #2 (#1 in Europe), and while it would be easy to say that they’ve benefitted from Huawei’s woes, they do make very competitive products.

Xiaomi 11T series
First out of the gate are Xiaomi’s new flagship phones, the 11T and 11T Pro. Available in three colours: Meteorite Gray, Moonlight White and Celestial Blue, Xiaomi has focussed on cinematography, from the recording all the way through to the viewing. Cinemagic, as they say. The company has created some pretty cool tricks, such as the video focussing on the loudest sound and has partnered with the Sundance Institute to provide classes on filming. There are three rear cameras, a 108 MP main shooter, a 120° landscape and a telemacro lens. The Pro offers end-to-end 8K HDR10+ video capabilities and Dolby Vision.

Under the hood, the 11T Pro is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 processor whereas the 11T runs on the MediaTek Dimensity 1200-Ultra. On the front, it’s a 120 Hz ActiveSync AMOLED TrueColour screen showing 1 billion colours protected by Gorilla Glass Victus. It’s a WQHD+ screen, which is 2960×1440. The screen received A+ from DisplayMate, setting or matching records in 14 display categories. Sound-wise, the phones come with dual speakers tuned by Harman Kardon, supporting Dolby Atmos.

Powering all this in the 11T Pro is a 5000 mAh battery which can be charged from 0 to 100% in 17 minutes using Xiaomi’s 120W HyperCharge. The 11T uses 67W TurboCharge which still charges to 100% in 36 mins. Charger comes in the box.

Pricewise, there are five models across the two phones.

Xiaomi 11T

  • 8 GB + 128 GB 499€
  • 8 GB + 256 GB 549€

Xiaomi 11T Pro

  • 8 GB + 128 GB 649€
  • 8 GB + 256 GB 699€
  • 12 GB + 256 GB 749€

There are some special offers on the pricing, so keep eyes open for those.

Mi 11 Lite 5G NE
Following on the from Mi 11 Lite and Lite 5G, Xiaomi also announced the 11 Lite 5G NE. A fun, light and slim phone at 158g and 6.9mm thick, it comes in four colours: Bubblegum Blue, Peach Pink, Charcoal Black and Snowflake White. The new phone has at 90Hz 10 bit AMOLED screen on the front and round the back, there’s a 64MP main lens, ultrawide and telemacro, plus a 20MP selfie. Powering all this is a Qualcomm Snapdragon 778G.

Pricewise,

  • 6 GB + 128 GB 369€
  • 8 GB + 128 GB 399€

Xiaomi Pad 5
Next, Xiaomi announced the Pad 5, an 11″ tablet with a 1600 x 2560 display in an aluminium frame and smart pen support. Driven by the Snapdragon 860, the OS has been beefed up with extra features and productivity tools. The battery is 8720 mAh giving 16 hours of video or 10 hours of gaming. I’m delighted to see this as I’m a fan of Android tablets with hi-res screens. Available in Pearl White and Cosmic Gray

  • 6 GB + 128 GB 349€ (299€ special offer)
  • 6 GB +256 GB 399€

You can watch the whole launch event here.

Hands-On with the OnePlus Nord CE 5G

Android, review, smartphone, , , ,

OnePlus LogoThe OnePlus Nord CE 5G drops into the crowded mid-range market where there’s no shortage of competitors wanting to take your money. OnePlus pitches the CE as “Core Edition” focussing on key features requested by its user community: “Heavy on features, light on price” says OnePlus. Obviously, there’s 5G in the CE, but what else does this new Nord offer? Let’s take a look…

Back view of OnePlus CE 5G smartphone showing sea green colourThe Nord CE 5G arrives in a black cardboard box with Nord branding picked out in reflective navy blue. There’s a clear contrast between the Nord’s black box and the red boxes reserved for the higher-end models. Opening the box reveals the CE 5G phone itself, along with a semi-transparent bumper case, a SIM tray tool, a few small manuals, a Warp charger and a USB charging cable.

Unwrapping the Nord CE 5G, it’s clear that it continues OnePlus’ current design cues which stretch back at least as far as the 7 series. There’s nothing unexpected here – flat glass front, pinhole camera top left, power button on right, USB C on the bottom, smooth curved back with attractive colouring, vertical triple camera array. It’s largely by the numbers. What’s different? There’s no alert slider but the 3.5 mm headphone jack makes a return to the smartphone. I think the restoration of the jack is a good move at this price point: my daughter prefers wired headphones as she’s less inclined to lose them and if she does, they’re cheaper to replace.

Sizewise, the CE 5G is within a millimetre or two of most recent OnePlus handsets at 159 mm x 74 mm, but it’s only 7.9 mm deep, making it the thinnest OnePlus since the 6T. Weighing in at 170 g, it’s lighter than the Nord by 14 g, though you’re unlikely to notice the difference day-to-day. The back of the CE 5G is polycarbonate rather than glass and it doesn’t quite feel as premium as I’d like but the Blue Void colour is lovely. It’s very similar to the Glacial Green of the OnePlus 8 but as you rotate the phone from the back to the front, the curved edge of the back takes on this lovely purple tone. There are other colours, Charcoal Ink and Silver Ray, but I’ve not seen them in the flesh. The Silver Ray version is only available with the large memory capacity (12 GB + 256 GB)

Front view of OnePlus CE 5G showing home screenTurning on the CE 5G begins to show off the lovely 90 Hz Fluid AMOLED 6.43″ display (2400 x 1080 pixels, 410 ppi). It looks good, it’s fast and it has the controls of its more expensive siblings – screen calibration, refresh rate, vision comfort, reading mode. I do like the dynamic wallpapers that OnePlus offers and the Nord CE 5G comes with a couple of new ones that show off the display when the phone is unlocked.

In terms of sound, I’ve mentioned the return of the headphone jack, which is a good thing for a large chunk of the possible purchasers of the CE 5G. For speakers, there’s only the one at the bottom next to the USB C port. “It’ll do” is about as best as I can muster. It’s quite loud but playing music above two-thirds volume will start to distort the speaker and don’t expect much bass.

Powering the Nord handset is the Qualcomm Snapdragon 750G 5G Mobile Platform to give it the full title. Simplistically, this is a perfectly acceptable workhorse platform that offers some improvements over the 765G in the Nord. In day to day use, it’s a fine processor and keeps up with most activities. Will it run Fortnite? Yes, it does run Fortnite reasonably well, but there are definitely times when it stutters and all you can do is pray that it’s not at an inconvenient time. However, I have won a solo Battle Royale on the Nord CE 5G so it’s not a big deal. For something a bit more gentle, Pokemon Go runs beautifully. For the nerds, the phone scored 639 single-core and 1798 multi-core on Geekbench 5, putting it in amongst the Pixel 4, the Xiaomi Mi 9 and the Samsung Galaxy A51.

Powering the phone is a 4,500 mAh battery which easily gave me a day of use as long as I wasn’t burning through it with non-stop gaming. Even the battery does get a bit low, the supplied Warp 30T Plus charger is supposed to get the battery from 0% to 70% in 30 minutes. In my test run, it didn’t quite hit the 70% mark in the half-hour, but it was literally only a few minutes behind. The charger itself has a USB A socket, so the charging cable is USB A to USB C.

Cameras….The Nord CE 5G officially has three cameras on the back and one selfie camera around the front. The smartphone uses the same camera app as all the other OnePlus phones as far as I’m aware and offers time-lapse, panoramic, slow-motion, video, photo, portrait and nightscape and pro modes. Starting with the selfie cam, it’s a 16 MP Sony IMX471 that OnePlus has used many times. I feel it takes good enough selfie photos with reasonably accurate skin tones. For the rear, there’s a 64 MP main camera, an 8 MP ultra-wide with 119° field of view and a mono 2 MP unit that’s mainly used for depth sensing (as far as I know). The brand of the camera sensor is not revealed in the specs.

To review the rear cameras, I took a few photos to see how they turned out. Overall I was happy enough with the snaps but there are a couple of issues. First, colour saturation could be stronger: here’s my cat on a red blanket. The red of the blanket is way stronger than it appears to be in the picture.

Next, on ultrawide shots, even with ultra-wide lens correction turned on, you get this kind of motion blur effect on the edges of the shots. You can see it in the picture below. Again the colours of the flowers could do with just being that bit brighter too.

These would be my main two concerns, but I did take some other pictures that I’m really quite pleased with. I thought it handled close up shots better than panoramic ones. That bee has some load of pollen…

 

 

I think it would be fair to say that the Nord CE 5G takes photos that are acceptable without being outstanding.

Lastly, the CE’s OxygenOS 11 is based on Android 11 with OnePlus keeping tinkering to the minimum but adding value where it can. That’s the OnePlus way and to extend that value, the company is committing to 2 years of software updates and 3 years of security updates.

Clearly, the Nord CE 5G has loads of other features that you’d expect as standard: Wi-Fi bgnac, Bluetooth 5.1, NFC, GPS, in-display fingerprint reader, dual SIM slot and so on. Rather than review each in turn, I’ll simply confirm that everything is as you’d expect.

Let’s talk about covers…OnePlus sent four bumper covers with the Nord – black, blue, purple and creme. They’re flat colours with flecks of straw through them. Again, using my daughter for her opinion as a prospective purchaser, she liked the purple one but thought that golden glitter mixed in would’ve been much better. I’m with her on this one. These will be priced at GB£17.99 when they’re available.

For most territories outside of the Americas, the CE 5G is the fourth Nord device alongside the Nord, N10 5G and N100. If you are looking to understand where the Nord CE 5G fits in the OnePlus line-up, it’s below the Nord but above the Nord N10. In terms of base pricing, the Nord is GB£379, the CE 5G is £299 and the N10 is £249, though the N10 has slightly less memory at 6 GB rather than 8G.

The Nord CE 5G comes in two variants for the UK:

  • 8 GB + 128 GB: GB£299 / 329€
  • 12 GB + 256 GB: GB£369 / 399€

So does the Nord CE 5G meet expectations as a “Core Edition” focussing on what’s really needed without all the frippery? On the whole yes: 5G, great screen, powerful enough processor, day-long battery life, fast charging, 2 years of software updates, lovely colour. There’s plenty to like but there are some negatives: the rear cover could be better though once the phone is in a case, it’s not noticeable, and the camera does have some failings. Overall, the Nord CE 5G is a good all-rounder without being exceptional. The snag is that there’s plenty of competition to consider as well. If you like it, the phone is on sale from the OnePlus store.

Thanks to OnePlus for supplying the Nord CE 5G smartphone for review.

Google’s Android 12 Includes Some Privacy Features

google,

Google announced the release of the first beta of Android 12. It includes options for people to personalize their phone with a custom color palette and redesigned widgets. It also includes some privacy features, but not the one that I suspect Android users really want – Apple’s App Tracking Transparency.

Starting with Android 12 on Pixel devices, you’ll be able to completely personalize your phone with a custom color palette and redesigned widgets. Using what we call color extraction, you choose your wallpaper, and the system automatically determines which colors are dominant, which ones are complementary and which ones look great. It then applies those colors across the entire OS: the notification shade, the lock screen, the volume controls, new widgets, and much more.

There are also some new animations. For example, when you dismiss your notifications on the lock screen, your clock will appear larger so you know when you’re all caught up. Google also stated that Android devices are now faster and more responsive with better power efficiency so you can use your device for longer without a charge.

What about privacy settings? Macworld reported that you won’t find anything like Apple’s App Tracking Transparency feature. “To be fair, Google does include an option to turn off ad tracking. In Settings, there is a toggle to opt out of ads personalization, which tells apps not to use your advertiser ID to create interest-based ads.” This, Macworld reported, is similar to Apple’s “Prevent cross-site tracking” toggle “and is a good thing to turn off.”

MacWorld also points out: “To get a similar level of granularity you need to go to the Google tab in Settings, then Manage Your Google Account, Data & personalization, and finally Ad settings. Inside, you’ll find a dizzying array of options and preferences for Google and its partners as well as an ability to turn off access for individual apps and categories. MacWorld notes that Android users may not know those features exist, or that Google routinely changes the access.

In my opinion, if the most important thing about a smartphone is the ability to customize the interface – then maybe you will feel comfortable with Android 12. However, if you consider the ability to prevent companies and advertisers from tracking you through apps and across the internet – I would recommend you get an iPhone.