Android tablets gain market share versus iPad, which dropped to 57.6% of the tablets sold during the most recent fourth quarter, from 68.2% a year earlier; Android rose to 39.1% from 29.0%.
The iPad doesn’t have one tablet in particular that it can consider direct competition — but Apple should take Android a little more seriously after a new report released this week.
Android came on strong during the fourth quarter, and it retained 39.1 percent of the global tablet market share as of the end of the fourth quarter of 2011, according to the latest report from Strategy Analytics. Motorola, maker of the Android powered XOOM, reports that they shipped 1 Million Tablets in 2011.
Apple is still in the lead as iPad shipments are doing pretty well at 57.6 percent, but that global gap appears to be closing more so these days.
Nevertheless, Strategy Analytics director Peter King explained in the report that “Apple shrugged off the much-hyped threat from entry-level Android models this quarter” as 15.4 million iPads worldwide shipped worldwide during Q4.
While the report does not cite which Android devices are doing the best, Laptop Magazine uncovered the two leading the pack, and you won’t be terribly surprised.
Amazon’s Kindle Fire and Barnes & Noble’s Nook Tablet (both released last fall, so they haven’t even been on the market a full year — barely a full quarter each) make up nearly the majority of Android tablet shipments together make up 40 percent of the Android share, according to King as told to Laptop.
The Android surge was led primarily by tablets from Amazon and Samsung Electronics, according to Strategy Analytics' Neil Mawston. "Android is so far proving relatively popular with tablet manufacturers despite nagging concerns about fragmentation of Android's operating system, user interface and app store ecosystem," Mawston wrote in a note on the report.
Google's controversial new privacy policy could have an especially big impact on people carrying around Google in their pockets. Google will in March begin sharing info it collects across its platforms when users are signed in—and Android users essentially always are. "I guess it's theoretically possible to use an Android device without being logged on," one privacy advocate tells the Washington Post, "but that wouldn't be much of a smartphone."
Google disputes the notion that the change will be especially important for Android users, noting that the phone won't collect any more data than it already does. And that's true, analysts say, but Google will now be able to use the data in more ways—and that alone should make Android, which has never been a terribly profitable product, into a very valuable one.
So, as you can see, the initiative could be of particular significance for consumers of Android devices, who are almost always signed on to their phones and tablets, experts said. Without signing up for an account, an Android smartphone owner would be limited in what he or she could do on the device, they said.
The company said users who activate Android phones without signing into a Google account can make phone calls, browse the Web and use pre-installed applications. But they couldn’t use their Gmail, chat functions or download Angry Birds, Pandora or other applications from the Android Marketplace.
Kurt Opsahl, a senior staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a group that advocates for free speech and privacy online said that because Google account holders cannot opt out of the new policy, he fears that the company’s efforts to compile information about users won’t accommodate those who want to separate their personal and professional digital lives. The policy change also alarmed some lawmakers and consumer advocates.
The search giant offers a couple of options on what information is associated with any given Google account. You can get an overview of all the data Google associates with your account by looking at the “Dashboard” option on your main Google account page. There’s a lot of information on this page, such as Android devices associated with the account, calendar information, contact information, Gmail history and records of activity on Google Music, Google Talk, Google Reader, Google Voice and social connections through Google contacts and chat.
You can edit some account preferences through this page, though other information, such as what Android devicesare associated with your account, can’t be edited.
Apart from the Dashboard, users can turn off the setting that allows Google to record their search history . This record logs all your search history and the results that you’ve clicked on from those queries. To get to this menu, head to the “privacy” menu from the top navigation bar you see when signed in to your Google account. Scroll down to the bottom of the page and click on the button that says “Go to Privacy Center.”
From there, you can see Google’s current policy — the company has also put a notice at the top of the page with a link to its new policy — and you can head to the “Privacy tools” menu by clicking on that link and scrolling down to “Web History Controls.” From here, you can pause, edit or remove all Web History.
Android is getting bigger and bigger each day, and is quickly becoming the OS of choice for many devices. It's not just for your smartphone anymore.
Chances are that even if you aren't an Android user, you more than likely have heard of Android, or have seen "Andy", the little green Android mascot. For those who are unware, Android has quickly grown into the posistion of leader in the Smaertphone market, Android powered tablets are starting to become more popular, and it seems that manufactures for devices other than mobile phones want to take advantage of Android's powerful OS, and cash in on it's popularity.
Being a Gadget Guy, people are always asking me my opinion on smartphones and their respective platforms. I guess this is because I have had them all : Blackberry, Windows, Apple iOS and Android. The Blackberry and the iPhone have been around for a while and Microsoft has been playing with Windows phones for years but they never hit the mark. So who is this newcomer that’s making all the noise and where did it come from?
First of all, Android is a Linux-based operating system (as is Apple) for mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets. It’s what makes them work. Google purchased the initial developer of the software, Android Inc., in 2005 and announced in 2007 that they were making the software available to everyone for free as open source. Apple and RIM don’t make their operating systems available to any other phone makers, while Microsoft has heavy licensing fees for theirs . All of a sudden, all the other mobile device makers had an amazing platform to load on their gadgets without having to pay Google (or their own developers) a penny. Overnight this levelled the smartphone playing field and virtually every manufacturer other than RIM and Apple now use Android as their platform of choice. What a huge savings for the device makers, allowing them to concentrate on making great hardware that would run the Android software. Like the other smartphones, you can download Android “Apps” from third party sites or through online stores like the Android Market which is quite different than Apple and RIM who force you to download apps only from them.
The Gartner Group predicts that 468 million smartphones were sold in 2011, which is a 57.7 percent increase from 2010. Of those phones, 38.5 percent were powered by the Android operating system. By 2015, they estimate that 631 million smartphones will be sold, with almost 50% being Android devices. What’s equally important is that Android is showing up in more and more smart devices, like Samsung’s line of Smart TV’s and appliances. All of these devices will be able to download Android apps which is great for software developers developing on the Android platform and great for consumers.
With the release of Android 4.0 last November, Google has combined its phone and tablet platforms together into one very powerful operating system. There have been improvements to almost every facet of the software that will keep the platform growing at an amazing rate. The new Samsung Galaxy SIII smartphone, expected to be announced next month, will have a screamingly fast dual or quad-core microprocessor inside and a huge 4.6” SuperAMOLED Plus screen and will be the thinnest smartphone Samsung has ever made and will run Android 4.0. I personally believe that Android is the platform to beat, but still question whether or not we really need an Android-powered vacuum cleaner.
Scott Main took to the Android Developers blog yesterday to say goodbye to the old menu bar (above). The menu bar has been with us since the beginning and it really is time for it to go now that Google has come up with nicer ways to get things done and it is called the Action Bar.
The main purpose of the action bar is to:
Make important actions (such as New or Search, etc) prominent and accessible in a predictable way.
Support consistent navigation and view switching within apps.
Reduce clutter by providing an action overflow for rarely used actions.
Provide a dedicated space for giving your app an identity.
Google is pushing hard for developers to get on board and are offering a lot of help and advice. If you are developer and not on Google+ i recommend you get on over there and start circling the Android team, they are very engaged and do hangouts on a regular basis.
You can read the whole Blog post here . It has been really great to see the Android developer team get serious about working with the people that make Android tick, the third party App developers. Now everyone just needs to take the advice to heart and keep those Apps up to date.
Andromo- “the free online application maker for everyone”, created 15,135 Android applications in the first weeks of its release. Andromo’s popularity is with Ease-of-Use, reliable application production, custom pages, JavaScript pages, music players, YouTube videos, soundboards and advanced functions. It is possible to create Android applications without having programming knowledge by using Andromo’s Web 2.0 cloud service.
It is possible that everyone can make their own Android application with Andromo. This provides a list of popular activities like interactive maps, websites, Flicker photo galleries and RSS feeds. Andromo provides a way to build professional android applications and those can be uploaded to the Android Market.
Indigo Rose Software Corporation’s trademark is Andromo. Anyone can make money by turning their original ideas into applications and posting them in the Android Market. People love the fact Andromo makes pro-quality Android applications and it easy to use applications.
Andromo made applications with real Android look and features. Small business owners recognize that applications are essential to continue to remain competitive, and put forward enormous advantages such as free promotion and an approach to converse with customers.
Amazon is now selling the Verizon Galaxy Nexus to New Customers for $99!
If you are in the market for new mobile service from Verizon, and would like to get the best Android phone yet, you are in luck! Online retailer Amazon is now selling the Flagship Android Phone from Samsung for only $99. As you can see in the photo above, if you were to buy the phone flat out, that is without a two year agreement, you would have to fork out just shy of $800.Current Verizon customers can still catch a price break by shopping at Amazon rather than Verizon. The Samsung Galaxy Nexus goes for $259.99 when upgrading a device, and $179.99 when adding a line to your family plan. Amazon is also offering free two day shipping with the purchase of the GNEX.
If you've been on the fence trying to decide whether or not to switch to Verizon and have been itching for the Galaxy Nexus, this deal should certainly help you make a decision. If you are an Android fan and keep up with development forums or folllow Android Developers on Twitter, then you probably know that the Samasung Galaxy Nexus is a very popular device right now, and is currently being supported by a large part of the development crowd. If you've been waiting on a price break to make the move to Verizon, then go ahead and take advantage of this great deal, because I doubt a better price will be found for some time to come.
Ekahau Mobile Survey 2.0 for Android Brings Walk-Through WLAN Site Surveys and Network Heat-mapping to SmartPhones and Tablets
Ekahau, the market leader in Wi-Fi site-survey tools and real-time location systems (RTLS), today announced a new version of its Ekahau Mobile Survey for the Android operating system.Ekahau Mobile Survey 2.0 introduces fully-featured site survey and heat-mapping capabilities for enterprise Wi-Fi networks, previously available only for laptop-based tools.
Ekahau Mobile Survey 2.0 is the industry's first touch-operatedenterprise-grade site survey tool designed for use on tablets and phones, making it easier and faster to use as compared to traditional competitive solutions in the market. For IT administrators and wireless engineers, this translates into faster, more efficient deployments anda simplified approach to troubleshootingandoptimization of Wi-Fi networks. It also brings professional Wi-Fi verification and analysis into a price range suitable for administrators of small and medium-scale Wi-Finetworks.
Data gathered utilizing Mobile Survey 2.0 can be integrated with Ekahau Site Survey (ESS), which is the leading laptop-based site survey and planning tool for Wi-Fi networks. The user can perform walk-through site surveys with a light-weight Android tablet or smart phone, and export the information to a laptop for more in-depth data and network analysis and reporting. Although recommended, Ekahau Site Survey is not required as all the features in Ekahau Mobile Survey 2.0 can be operated without ESS.
"Performing site surveys by carrying a laptop computer around for extended periods may not be ideal for some people. The touch-operated Ekahau Mobile Survey for Smartphones and tablets changes the way Wi-Fi networks are deployed." said Jussi Kiviniemi, director of product marketing at Ekahau. "The operation could not be much simpler: import a floor plan image, or take a photo of the fire escape plan. Then walk around the area, tapping your location on the touch screen. You will immediately see the network infrastructure layout as well as coverage heatmapson your tablet or phone."
The key features of the previous Ekahau Mobile Survey are also present in version 2.0. These include: - Active and passive on-the-spot network testing for data, voice and location tracking systems (RTLS) - Touch-operated map view with wireless access point locations, configurations, and current status - Continuous network monitoring, from the client device perspective, including error logging.
Ekahau Mobile Survey 2.0 is now available from Ekahau and its distribution partners for $399. For more information, please contact sales@ekahau.com.
