From the initial days of Android Cupcake to the present times, the progress of the planet’s favourite open source operating system has been nothing short of a marvel. The last iteration of the OS, Jellybean saw the introduction of ‘Project Butter’, which imparted an overall smoothness to the transitions and other functions of the OS. With 4.2.3 being the last version of Jellybean, the gates for a newer version have opened.
For long, the OS was expected to be called Android Key-lime pie and was called so even by Google’s own engineers. The name was withheld up to the last minute and Google and Nestlé seem to have done a fine job in being secretive regarding the same. The latest iteration of the Android OS according to Android and Chrome head Sundar Pichai of Google’s mobile operating system is officially named as Android 4.4 KitKat.
The immensely popular wafer coated chocolate candy bar is trademarked by Hershey’s in the US, and has sparked discussions worldwide: Was this one of the biggest marketing ploys by both companies or was it a genuinely spontaneous decision? Google claims that no money was exchanged in the process, however KitKat bars the world over will now have promotions for Google Play Store, including discounts via gift cards, Nexus 7 giveaways, etc.
The announcement proceeded with bold claims by the software giant such as “it’s our goal with Android KitKat to make an amazing Android experience available for everybody”. The statement more or less further acknowledged the facts predicted by several tech pundits that the mobile OS will support all kinds of devices, from the usual high or low cost smartphones, to tablets, gaming consoles and even laptops.
Assuming even that 30% of the existing devices running Android upgrade to the latest OS, this would still mean that a whopping 30 million devices would run on KitKat. And let us not forget that this would be the number excluding the devices that would be sold with KitKat inbuilt.
Another major possibility discussed by the community is KitKat’s ability to support devices that run on low memory. By memory, we mean RAM and if such is indeed the case, there lies high probability that the OS will run on even old devices that include the age old Galaxy Ace, Galaxy Mini etc, i.e. the devices that comprised barely 256MB RAM, as compared to today’s smartphones that have RAM ranging from 1, 2 and now even 3 GB.
New development for Android in general is always hotly anticipated. However, the stakes are even higher with the launch of KitKat. If the OS does indeed support low memory devices, the migration to Android will increase a lot more, increasing its share even further. More devices supporting the current OS would mean more devices downloading from the Play Store, indicating that there has never been a better time to get an app developed for the Android platform.
Author Bio: Prince Sinha, is associated with with www.appsdevelopers.com.au (SDI) as VP Mobile Apps Solutions, he Loves blogging and is a tech expert. You can write off an email him at team@sdi.la or give them a ring at 0422 710 780 and commence your app-building journey.
