Google’s upcoming major unifying platform release for Android, dubbed Ice Cream Sandwich, has been confirmed to launch during the October-November time frame. However, the news doesn’t come as an official announcement from Google. Instead, it’s Google Chairman and former CEO, Eric Schmidt, that spilled the beans during a Dreamforce conference in San Francisco.
Ice Cream Sandwich is expected to unite the separate smartphone and tablet versions of the platform into one, making it easier to develop for and streamline the Android ecosystem. Currently, Android Gingerbread runs on smartphones and some smaller tablets, while Android Honeycomb is the official tablet version. Hence, the goal with Ice Cream Sandwich, is that it would run on both while bringing some of the new Honeycomb features to smartphones.
The major update was first announced during Google I/O earlier this year and thus far, Google has only confirmed that the update would launch sometime in Q4. And although rumors have been swirling about theNexus Prime arriving in November along with Ice Cream Sandwich, this is the first time that a Google exec has publicly confirmed that time frame. The following are Schmidt’s exact words:
We have a new operating system, internally known as Ice Cream Sandwich for some reason, which is being released in October/November, which everyone’s really excited about.
Google is working on the next Android operating system, Android Ice Cream Sandwich, and once the new OS sees release no doubt many smartphones will get updated, and the latest word is Sony Ericsson has stated they will be updating all current Xperia devices to Ice Cream Sandwich.
ReplyDeleteAccording to an article over on Phone Arena, Sopny Ericsson has confirmed with SoMobile, that their current Xperia range of devices including the Sony Ericsson Xperia Ray and Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc will see Android Ice Cream Sandwich.
Google’s Eric Schmidt recently confirmed that the Android Ice Cream Sandwich release time frame is October or November, so no doubt the Sony Ericsson upgrade will follow sometime after then.
ReplyDeleteHowever the rep also stated that all smartphones in the 2011 Xperia line would firstly be updated to Android 2.3.4 Gingerbread and then updated to Android Ice Cream Sandwich.
Rumour has it that Ice Cream Sandwich will deliver such Android goodness as a “Virtual camera Operator,” which is apparently something akin to the functionality of Kinect along with a redesigned holographic user interface, NFC, and will of course be for both Android smartphones and Android tablets.
Well, it will bridge the gap between the current two Android operating systems – with Android 2.3 Gingerbread targeting smartphones, while Android 3.0 Honeycomb being good with tablets. Ice Cream Sandwich will demolish these boundaries, uniting both kinds of devices with a single operating system, making things more efficient from the developer’s point of view, while providing less headaches for those who want to upgrade their firmware.
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