All About Android 3

All About Android Episode 3

All About Android 3: Getting Things Done With To-Do Apps

Andy Rubin's defends Android openness, Xoom sales figures analysis, To-Do list app bonanza, and more.

Guests

• Kevin Purdy
  • completeandroidguide.com

News

• Google’s Andy Rubin Defends Android’s Openness, Claims Rivals Just Spreading FUD
• In light of all the reports last week that Google was clamping down on Android and tightening its grip to overt fragmentation. (newly promoted) Senior vice president of mobile at Google, Andy Rubin, responded with a lengthy letter disputing those claims.
  • "Our approach remains unchanged: there are no lock-downs or restrictions against customizing UIs. There are not, and never have been, any efforts to standardize the platform on any single chipset architecture. Finally, we continue to be an open source platform and will continue releasing source code when it is ready."

• CyanogenMod 7.0 Released!
  • After four months of work, the folks at Cyanogen(mod) have officially released their latest version of the popular ROM for rooted devices, based on Gingerbread. CM currently supports 30 devices, so if you have a rooted phone and wish to try it out, head over to cyanogenmod.com to find the appropriate install file for your device.

Hardware

• Samsung Galaxy S II available May 1st in the UK.
  • Those in the UK waiting for the Samsung Galaxy S II don't have to wait much longer. It now has an official availability date of May 1st across "all major networks and retailers."
• Nexus S and Motorola Xoom Now Available In Canada
  • Also, the Nexus S and Xoom wifi are now available to Canadians. The Nexus S has landed on Videotron, Mobilicity, Telus and Koodo, with Wind and Rogers expected to release it in the near future. Both can be found at Best Buy.

• Verizon, AT&T 'pleased' with Xoom, Atrix, despite analyst concerns
  • Amidst analyst reports last week that sales figures for the Motorola Xoom were disappointing, sitting at around 100,000 sold since the device's Feb. 24 release, AT&T and Verizon have since come out in defense of the Xoom and the Atrix, stating that they were actually pleased with the number of sales. No exact sales figures were given by AT&T or Verizon. What do we think? Is it still too early to tell? Is comparing the success of the iPad 2 to that of the Xoom literally comparing Apples to oranges?

• Kevin Purdy's giveaway

Apps

• Google's new cloud-based Android Music app leaks out
  • Last week, Tech From 10 gained access to a developer version of the Android Market and hidden inside was a newer version of the official Google Music app. Found inside is an improved interface that matches the look of the Honeycomb version, plus controls around streaming your music library from the cloud. An older leak actually allowed you to upload to this mysterious Google cloud, but this one seems to lack that ability. But the settings are there, and this appears to be further evidence that a Google Cloud service might be around the corner.

• Google boots Grooveshark from Android Market

• SPB Shell 3D
• A new take on home replacement apps has hit the market for a pricey $14.99. SPB Shell 3D is a visually stylized home screen with up to 16 panels, a bunch of included widgets, and integration of a 3-dimensional carousel for switching screens among other things. Though expensive, it's said to be extremely intuitive, super snappy, and a great way to completely change the look and feel of your device.

Android Arena!

• Last Week's Poll
• This week's face-off: To-Do List apps
  • Jason - Gtasks
  • Eileen - Wunderlist
  • Ron - Action Complete
  • Kevin - Todo.txt

• This Week's Poll

Voicemail (347-SHOW-AAA)

• Steven in Florida: Pair your Wii controller to your phone!

• Andy B: Backup without root?

E-mail (aaa@twit.tv)

• A few emails related to last week's Cloud Music Streaming apps:

"Hi all,

I've enjoyed the first two episodes of the show so far, and look forward to it going forward. However, during the cloud music discussion, I was surprised you didn't mention the solution I have been happily using for the last 6 months or so: Subsonic. It's definitely a geeky alternative to a full cloud player, but I don't think that will be a turn off for this audience.

Subsonic (www.subsonic.org) is a free (some features only available after a 1 time donation) runs a small server program on your home computer or media server (windows, mac and linux supported) which allows you to connect to it via a web interface (rerouting from yourname.subsonic.org is included for life with donation) or mobile app (for all major platforms, donation required after the first 30 days). It is very polished, very low resource usage (for your server), and is optimized for very large media collections. One of the most recent versions also allows you to stream video. It transcodes music and video on the fly to support pretty much any internet connection. It's extremely customizable, but also dead simple to install and use even if you don't know anything about the technology. The developer is very responsive to feature requests and bug fixes. It's not perfect, and it does require an always on computer and reasonable upload speed, but it's been very nice for me and my friends, and I think it's worthy of mentioning.

There are a few other programs which do similar things (Orb is probably the most used example), and I've used most of them. Subsonic is the best I've tried. I've never spoken with and am not affiliated with the developer in any way, but I think he's done very good work, (well worthy of my donation), and his program is worthy of a larger audience. If you agree, I hope to hear what you think of it on the show.

Thanks and keep up the good work, Nemo"

"Hey AAA gang,

Love the show, it is about time that TWiT finally got an Android show. I was wondering if there is an Android equivalent of Camera + on Android? I am using a Motorola Droid and the camera software is terrible. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Richard j Smith La Crosse, Wisconsin"

"Jason, Eileen and Ron,

I learned about your show when I saw a rerun of your show on live.twit.tv. I've watched the two shows you've produced and the first two beta shows. I've enjoyed Leo's productions since the Tech TV days.

I'm ready to buy my first smart phone and it will probably be an Android. I'm locked into Verizon, since my wife still has 18 mos. left on our family plan feature phone contract. The more Mac Weekly shows I see, the stronger my anti apple sentiment becomes. I don't change phones very often. My current phone is an LG ENV2. I'm leaning towards the HTC Thunderbolt, but Verizon has some pretty tempting offers on certified pre-owned units (Samsung Fascinate, HTX Droid Incredible and Motorola Droid X). Any opinions on any of these?

I'm a 75 year old retired ""software engineer"" with a physics background and the family's tech support. I've always been an early adopter, but have been slow to move to a smartphone. I'm not a gamer. I've been building my own desktops sine the late 70s. This is my first home build circa 1977 or 1978:

https://picasaweb.google.com/wjburl/SWTPC?authkey=Gv1sRgCLPzocazlNK57AE#

It came with blank PCBs and bags of chips that had to soldered onto the cards. The processor was only 1Mhz and the memory cards used 1K chips.

Bill Burlingame Huntsville, AL"

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Production Information

• Edited by: Jason
• Notes:

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