The HTC G1 was the first Android phone to hit the market, way back in 2008. It’s also sometimes known as the HTC Dream of the T-Mobile G1. While HTC hasn’t offered a major software update for the G1 in a few years, independent developers have been hacking the G1 constantly over the past few years, bringing pretty much every major new version of Android to the ancient (in smartphone years) G1.

Xda-developers forum members jcarrz1 and stritfajt are keeping that tradition alive by porting Google Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich to run on the G1.
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Google is fleshing out its digital media strategy with the launch of music and movie services. First up, Google has added video rentals to the Android Market. Now when you visit the Android Market on the web, you can view apps, books, or movies.

The videos run $1.99 and up and you can either stream them from the web, on a mobile device. Google will launch a new video app for Android 2.2 and up in a few weeks, and a new video app will be baked into the Android 3.1 operating system update which begins rolling out to tablets today.

As expected, Google has also launched a new service called Music Beta by Google which allows users to upload up to 20,000 songs to the web and stream them to computers or Android devices. The service will only be available in the US at launch, and Google promises it’s free while in beta, but makes no guarantees after that.
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Google has announced that the next major version of Android called Ice Cream Sandwich will be available in the 4th quarter of the year. It will be the first version of Android designed to run on all sorts of devices including phones, tablets, and even devices with keyboards such as the Asus Eee Pad Transformer.

The update will bring many Honeycomb features to smartphones, including the “holographic” user interface, the program launcher, widgets, and the application framework.

Google also went out of the way to confirm that Ice Cream Sandwich will be open source… which may be an indication that the source code for Android 3.x Honeycomb will never be released to the public, but I may be reading too much between the lines right now.

Google is introducing the first major update for its tablet version of Android. Google Android 3.1 Honeycomb will be available first for the Verizon Motorola XOOM 3G tablet, but Android 3.1 will also be available soon for Google TV set-top boxes.

Android 3.1 will include USB host capabilities allowing you to use USB storage devices, connect a camera to transfer photos, or even plug in a mouse, keyboard, touchpad, or video game controller.

The operating system will also come with an improved app switcher that allows you to scroll up and down to view more recent tasks. Developers will also be able to make scrollable widgets in Android 3.1 resizeable.

Google also announced that over 100 million Android devices have been activated to date, and over 200,000 apps are now available in the Android Market.

Update: You can read more about the new features in Google Android 3.1.

Google has begun pushing out an over the air update for Nexus One smartphone users bringing Android 2.3.4 to the company’s older flagship phone. The latest version of Android started showing up for Google Nexus S users last week.

If you don’t feel like waiting until a notification pops up on your phone letting you know your download is ready, you can go ahead and install Android 2.3.4 manually. Here’s how:

1. Download the update file directly from Google’s servers and save the file to your desktop.
2. Change the file name to “update.zip.”
3. Copy the file to the root directory of your microSD card.
4. Turn off your Nexus One.
5. Hold the trackball and press the power button to turn on the phone.

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Sure, there’s already a Dropbox app for Android devices, but it only tends to files located in its own local directory. Wouldn’t it be nice if there was a way to upload any file or folder from your phone and have that happen automatically?

Of course it would, and the developer of ScheduledSync agrees — which is why exactly why he’s created the app.

Punch in your Dropbox credentials and choose which files and folders you want to upload, and ScheduledSync takes care of the rest. You can choose a start time and sync interval, and you’re also able to limit its activity to Wi-Fi connections only so you don’t accidentally chew up your mobile data allowance. It’s a great way to silently back up new photos you take or videos you capture on your Android device, especially since they’ll automatically be copied both to the Dropbox cloud and any connected computers which you have tied to the same account.

via XDA-Developers

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If the thought of blasting TIE fighters as they flew around your backyard had you in a tizzy, then this news should really excite you. Qualcomm has announced that its augmented reality platform is dropping the beta label and is now ready for prime time development. Apart from its own AR SDK, Qualcomm is also making a plug-in for the popular Unity 3D gaming engine — so expect to see all kinds of spinoffs of existing Unity-based games coming in the near future. Sorry, iOS users, but the platform is all about Android for the time being (specifically version 2.1 or better). All we have to do is wait for the Kids in the Hall to sanction an official “I’m crushing your head” game, and we’ll be good to go.

And while games built using the Qualcomm SDK and Unity should work on just about any Android device, the company is quick to mention that they’ll “work best” on those running its Snapdragon processors.

via Android Community

With so many Android apps now able to install themselves to your microSD card — or at least store application data on it — it’s not hard to fritter away a few megabytes or even gigabytes in a hurry. That’s why it’s a good idea to have a few apps installed to help you keep an eye on your storage media and let you know where excess bits can be trimmed.

Grid Size is one option worth taking for a test drive. It works a bit like desktop drive space analyzers like  Space Sniffer or WinDirStat. Fire up Grid Size and give it a few moments to analyze the contents of your device, and it’ll show you which files and folders are eating up your valuable storage. Both a graphical view and text listing are available, and since Grid Size is a file manager app as well you can move or delete files as you hunt for space hogs.

It’s a free download and is compatible with devices running Android 2.0 or better.

via Gotta Be Mobile and xda-developers

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