[HN Gopher] Android 12 Released
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       Android 12 Released
        
       Author : skiman10
       Score  : 110 points
       Date   : 2021-10-19 17:04 UTC (5 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.android.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.android.com)
        
       | vzaliva wrote:
       | My Pixel 5 picked up the update just now. So it is actually
       | available not yet another future announcement.
        
       | joemazerino wrote:
       | Not bad. Monet, the Android theming engine, is closed-source. We
       | will see how much more Google covers up away from the community
       | with the Pixel 6.
        
       | nly wrote:
       | Anyone else just stopped keeping track of what version of Android
       | their phone is on?
       | 
       | I used to know this stuff, but these days couldn't care less.
        
         | hulitu wrote:
         | Since 6.0 there were no real changes in android. It will be
         | better if they just concentrate on fixing bugs instead of
         | claiming something was done.
        
         | bko wrote:
         | I've been underwhelmed by recent mobile updates. Maybe I'm
         | missing something but the stuff that sticks out is oh, this
         | rectangle is rounded now. New clock face, okay.
         | 
         | I guess floating notifications, but even that is meh. Facebook
         | had those annoying floating faces 5 years ago
         | 
         | I do remember when they were trying to push touchless gestures
         | (e.g. changing the spotify song by waving your hand) which is a
         | perfect example of a feature that pretty much no one wanted. I
         | imagine google had to pay spotify to include that feature.
         | Needless to say
        
         | johannes1234321 wrote:
         | This happens a lot with established systems. I also don't know
         | which Linux kernel versions I'm using. Was relevant once, now
         | most changes don't impact me anymore. They are quite
         | specialized. ...
        
         | foobarbecue wrote:
         | Yep, when updates stopped being available for my Xperia mini a
         | few years ago. Just checked and it's android 9. Still works
         | great. Still nice and small.
        
         | 45ure wrote:
         | It becomes even more irrelevant, where UI enhancements have
         | already been implemented by manufacturers to improve their OS.
         | For example, Samsung OneUI with Good Lock (Multistar,
         | Navstar,Notistar, Quickstar, Home Up, Clockface) One Hand
         | Operation+, Sound Assistant etc. I am looking forward to how
         | some of the features will be incorporated/improved in the new
         | version(OneUI 4), rather than the stock features of Android 12.
        
         | TOMDM wrote:
         | For real.
         | 
         | For me smartphones are just good enough.
         | 
         | They all take nice pictures, they're all fast enough, they all
         | have a nice screen, nice touch controls and nice UI.
         | 
         | It just doesn't matter as much anymore.
         | 
         | The only thing on here that made me go "oh cool" is the extra
         | dim mode, my 4a really likes scorching my retinas at night.
        
           | inglor_cz wrote:
           | I am almost with you, but there are some things I appreciate:
           | 
           | a. A better quality of pictures even in less-than-perfectly
           | lit scenes. This matters indoors or in the gloomier months of
           | the year.
           | 
           | b. As you mentioned, an extra dim, or on the other hand extra
           | bright, mode of the screen. Trying to orient yourself in
           | blazing midday sun is a horror with some screens.
           | 
           | c. Fast charging is something I thoroughly enjoy.
        
           | danellis wrote:
           | The dictation looks really good. The main reason I don't use
           | it currently, even though it would be the most natural way to
           | enter text, is that I want my text to have punctuation
           | without me having to be explicit about it. Looking forward to
           | trying this eventually.
           | 
           | Also, given that they have translation and live transcription
           | of videos, live translation of videos was the next logical
           | step. I hope it's available for all audio sources.
        
             | asmos7 wrote:
             | that's a good point - shouldn't it include that out of the
             | box? must be hard to accomplish
        
         | vb6sp6 wrote:
         | The updates are pretty boring these days. The top feature
         | showing in the system update screen is "Personalized design
         | that adapts to the color of your wallpaper". yawn
        
         | moogly wrote:
         | I've been using Android since Eclair (2.1) and Ice Cream
         | Sandwich (4.0) was the last version I was excited about. It's
         | kind of like Word and Excel that were "finished" with v6.0 and
         | v5.0 respectively.
        
         | ChuckNorris89 wrote:
         | I would like to. But the usability and quality of life
         | improvements on each new version of Android are pretty
         | tangible.
         | 
         | I went back to my trusty old OP3 running Android 9 I think, for
         | a bit, and the overall experience took a hit. Everything felt
         | kinda clunky now coming from Android 11, even though I always
         | loved the clean Android implementation of the OP3.
        
       | Aaargh20318 wrote:
       | So if it's released, why does my phone say there are no updates
       | available...
       | 
       | /s
        
         | mirekrusin wrote:
         | You need to give them your money first.
        
         | Zigurd wrote:
         | This is a serious problem that Google has not worked nearly
         | hard enough. Sure, you can buy a Pixel if you want no bloatware
         | and updates on the release day. But not having that for most
         | OEMs is, among other things, a security problem.
        
           | naikrovek wrote:
           | but how will those poor carriers and handset vendors "add
           | value" or "differentiate" if they are forced to use stock
           | Android? won't someone think of the children of the employees
           | of those companies?
           | 
           | seriously, "adding value" has never once "added" any "value"
           | for the end user. not once.
        
           | saiya-jin wrote:
           | Its not google's fault that manufacturers are greedy for user
           | data and basically nobody releases Android One phones, the
           | option is there. They could if they wanted, but even ie
           | Xiaomi stopped releasing their phones with it. And their
           | normal products are crapfest of highest calibre from OS level
           | (at least my Mi 9 is).
        
           | gog wrote:
           | > Sure, you can buy a Pixel if you want no bloatware and
           | updates on the release day.
           | 
           | Not really, I live in Croatia (EU member) and the product is
           | not available in my country.
        
             | vetinari wrote:
             | You are not alone; Google store is available only in 12 of
             | 27 EU countries (it is not in a single Eastern-European
             | country and neither in Cyprus, Greece, Luxembourg and
             | Malta).
        
               | xorcist wrote:
               | While true, the whole point of the EU is the open market.
               | It should be convenient to order from any member country.
               | 
               | Not all shops will ship abroad, but buying a smartphone
               | shouldn't pose a problem.
        
       | BuckRogers wrote:
       | I love Android, at least on my TV set top box. I haven't used it
       | on my phone since the Samsung GS3, almost a decade now. I like it
       | and as a Windows user would love the additional integration but I
       | need a "mini" phone and I want someone to match Apple's longterm
       | support. People (don't know they) want Microsoft's foldable
       | device and a phone like my 12 mini, but on Android. If Microsoft
       | or Amazon ever decides to fit the void, I'd be back in. I enjoy
       | the heck out of my FireTV devices, and have ever since I moved
       | off of my AppleTV gen2 box, which was the last one I know of that
       | could be easily jailbroken.
        
       | lucasverra wrote:
       | It is remarkable the difference in awareness that android vs iOS
       | releases produce. As a iOS user, i'm glad that iOS releases and
       | features are pushed to me aggressively.
        
         | handrous wrote:
         | Having been a developer for both platforms, Apple
         | events/announcements are exciting for people working on iOS
         | apps, while Google events are kinda just depressing.
         | 
         | "Oh, yeah, that's cool I guess. Be fun to get to use it in five
         | more years when enough people have this, or a newer, version,
         | for it to matter."
        
           | gman83 wrote:
           | This isn't true imo. With AndroidX and before that the
           | support library, most of the new features have been backwards
           | compatible with older versions of Android.
        
             | notreallyserio wrote:
             | Most of interesting features aren't (can't) be in the
             | support libraries. I haven't developed android apps in
             | years -- thankfully -- but the features I can recall off
             | the top of my head are runtime permissions and granular
             | notification settings. Both sweet things that weren't worth
             | implementing for years after the OS official release.
        
           | slownews45 wrote:
           | In fairness it is getting (very slightly) better.
           | 
           | A few years ago the phone co's would sell a phone today to
           | your parents that was already 1-2 version behind especially
           | if the phone was released a year or so ago. And then NEVER
           | update it over 3 years outside of (maybe) some security
           | updates.
           | 
           | For some reason, a month after iOS is released, phones from
           | Apple, including older phones still being sold, are either
           | sold updated or can be updated.
        
             | y4mi wrote:
             | > _For some reason, a month after iOS is released, phones
             | from Apple, including older phones still being sold, are
             | either sold updated or can be updated._
             | 
             | That reason should be pretty obvious. Apple has a massive
             | profit margin on their phones, so they're economically able
             | to do this.
             | 
             | The margins are super small with Android devices, so if any
             | OEM tries to offer support they'll be quickly undercut by
             | the competition
        
               | est31 wrote:
               | There are more reasons than that. Apple has tight control
               | over its operating system, and even designs many chip
               | components themselves (not all). Android phone
               | manufacturers on the other hand integrate finished
               | components from various manufacturers, together with
               | their driver packages. If Qualcomm doesn't create a new
               | set of drivers for a new android version, they don't have
               | much of a choice.
        
             | notreallyserio wrote:
             | Google themselves abandon their phones after only a couple
             | of years. It's awful for the environment, users, and app
             | developers.
             | 
             | Meanwhile my iPhone 8 got iOS 15 over 5 years after it
             | launched.
        
               | slownews45 wrote:
               | And they are still updating older versions of iOS for
               | some reason.
               | 
               | iOS 14.8 was 9/13/21 14.7 was 7/26/21
               | 
               | iOS 12.5 was 6/14/21
               | 
               | So that's 7+ years?
        
           | ajsnigrutin wrote:
           | Well yeah... because you have to wait until 2020 to get
           | widgets on your home screen. :)
        
             | handrous wrote:
             | Sure, but I don't want them and that's on the (lengthening
             | every year) list of stuff I wish Apple'd take out, to
             | simplify the UI. Peaked in iOS 6, IMO, been a rollercoaster
             | that's never again reached the height of that first hill
             | ever since.
        
               | reayn wrote:
               | Really? I've found Apple's slow and steady approach to
               | additions in the iOS UI to be more pleasant than not. I
               | will admit I've only been using iPhones since iOS 10 but
               | have mostly only noticed improvements since then (e.g.
               | the new control panel, amazing animations, app library).
               | 
               | Widgets, as well, have been a deal breaker for me, what
               | makes you dislike them?
               | 
               | The only real problem I have with iOS as a whole right
               | now is how buried some actions can be, especially in apps
               | like Safari and Music, some things which should be a
               | press away can take 3-4 taps to complete, which while not
               | really annoying does make me feel like a grandpa just
               | tapping away at his phone to share an image or add a song
               | to my queue.
        
               | handrous wrote:
               | I like iOS devices as a slab of glass & metal that
               | _becomes_ various tools (apps). Since there 's nothing
               | else that operates that way, the more it becomes like a
               | general-purpose OS, the farther we get from having
               | _anything_ available that behaves that way.
               | 
               | The shock of the move from 6 to 7 was pretty large. 6:
               | "slide to unlock" slider that looked like a physical
               | slider-latch, like one you might slide to unlock a
               | container, and was so obvious in what it did, that it
               | hardly even needed text to be usable by anyone. 7: "swipe
               | to unlock" in thin text on... the background? So what do
               | I swipe? Oh, the _screen itself_ , which is a completely
               | different metaphor for interaction, and entirely
               | unintuitive to people who don't think like that. That
               | kind of thing, repeated across the entire UI.
               | 
               | Most of the multitasking stuff they've added, are just
               | weird modes I accidentally put myself in then have to
               | spend time figuring out how to get out of them. I'm sure
               | they're pure rage-inducing hell for most people, who are
               | even worse at tech than I am.
               | 
               | I think the loss of the home button, one of the most
               | brilliant UI elements of all time, is a big loss for
               | intuitiveness/usability for people who aren't immersed in
               | very digital-native metaphors. It was such a great safety
               | net for people. "Oh shit, what's this?! HOME BUTTON! Ah,
               | now I'm in familiar territory". Swiping the screen up
               | from the bottom _is not_ a complete replacement for that.
               | 
               | Overall it's just far less relaxing and straightforward
               | than it used to be. Used to feel like some kind of hyper-
               | advanced "slow tech" sort of thing. Now it's a lot closer
               | to just being another computer OS. I wouldn't care,
               | except there's no alternative that provides the old thing
               | that I liked better.
        
       | riffic wrote:
       | did they stop giving these cutesy dessert-related nicknames for
       | some reason?
        
         | hnburnsy wrote:
         | > Going with a new naming scheme for the 10th version of
         | Android makes a bit of sense; it's a landmark release. Still,
         | given how difficult it is to put a common dessert to the letter
         | Q, I noted to Google's Sameer Samat, VP of product management
         | for Android, that it was awfully convenient that Google picked
         | this release to switch up the naming scheme. "We're going to
         | deal with that skepticism," he says. Google's actual reason for
         | switching the naming, he says, isn't that Q is hard, but rather
         | that desserts aren't very inclusive. "We have some good names,
         | but in each and every case they leave a part of the world out,"
         | he argues. Android is a global brand, used by more people in
         | India and Brazil than in the US, so going with an English word
         | for the dessert leaves some regions out. Pie isn't always a
         | dessert, "lollipop" can be hard to pronounce in some regions,
         | and "marshmallows aren't really a thing in a lot of places,"
         | Samat says. Numbers, at least, are universal.
         | 
         | https://www.theverge.com/2019/8/22/20827231/android-10-q-goo...
        
           | conradfr wrote:
           | Weird, I remember tourists from seemingly all over the world
           | loving the different Android statues in front on the Android
           | building on Google campus.
        
           | dont__panic wrote:
           | You could make the same argument that _names_ aren 't
           | inclusive -- after all, not everyone can say "Jean Valjean"
           | but "24601" is universal, right?
           | 
           | It doesn't really matter, but it's weird reasoning. Cutesy
           | touches like the dessert names help humanize tech company
           | products and anchor them in reality. It's a shame to give it
           | up because we can't find universal desserts, which is a
           | strange claim to make anyway -- wouldn't anybody, anywhere,
           | appreciate a marshmallow? Why not pick some foreign desserts
           | from unappreciated countries to bring attention to them,
           | instead of abandoning the concept entirely?
        
             | lapetitejort wrote:
             | > wouldn't anybody, anywhere, appreciate a marshmallow?
             | 
             | Doubtful. Cacao farmers have never tasted chocolate [0].
             | Foods and desserts are not universal. The sugary slop I eat
             | in America would be appalling in many places across the
             | world. Not to mention the portion sizes.
             | 
             | [0]: https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2014/08/01/336919
             | 715/th...
        
           | fortyseven wrote:
           | So when importing, we're expected to be tolerant and embrace
           | other cultures unique qualities...
           | 
           | ...but when exporting, we have to sanitize cultural
           | expression so as not to confuse or offend.
           | 
           | This is all a bit silly.
        
           | NikolaeVarius wrote:
           | Are you kidding me. Are we going to now accuse IKEA of
           | cultural imperialism since their furniture uses Swedish
           | names?
           | 
           | Whats wrong with just taking random foods from around the
           | world?
        
           | VortexDream wrote:
           | Weird that their solution was to get rid of the names instead
           | of just using more desserts from other cultures. If they want
           | inclusivity and to bring awareness to other cultures, seems
           | like the best option, no? Now nobody gets to see their
           | favorite dessert as an Android OS name.
        
         | sleibrock wrote:
         | Probably because they're copying Apple's way of marketing iOS.
         | Flat numbers.
        
           | postalrat wrote:
           | Apple invented numbers for version numbers? Amazing.
        
         | smnrchrds wrote:
         | The names were not only dessert-based, but also alphabetical.
         | The last one to be named in this fashion was Pie. They probably
         | couldn't find a good dessert name starting with Q, so they
         | discontinued the practice.
         | 
         | OS X names used to be big cats too until they ran out of good
         | ones. Now it's locations in California. Who knows what it will
         | be next.
        
           | forinti wrote:
           | What a lost opportunity to have an Android Quindim.
           | 
           | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quindim
        
             | smnrchrds wrote:
             | Or Qottab. It's not that there are no desserts with Q, but
             | there are none that are as well-known and widely-used in
             | the anglosphere as pies and marshmallows.
             | 
             | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qottab
        
               | rusk wrote:
               | Queen Cake - oh well what could have been
        
           | reayn wrote:
           | Quiche could've worked
        
             | dont__panic wrote:
             | I've only ever had savory breakfast quiche (sometimes for
             | brinner, I guess). Is it commonly eaten as a dessert?
        
               | MisterTea wrote:
               | Quiche is a custard though the Wikipedia entry does not
               | mention any non savory versions.
        
               | reayn wrote:
               | I've never eaten it before only ever heard of it, though
               | after some "research" there does seem to be dessert
               | variants of it.
        
         | BearOso wrote:
         | No, this one is Sno[w] Cone!
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | merrvk wrote:
       | How many things will I have to fix for this release?
        
         | hulitu wrote:
         | It's better if you don't know.
        
       | r-physicist wrote:
       | I am positively impressed with the new "Material You". Really.
       | Don't want to stay in my comfort zone. Some positive stress for
       | the brain to adapt to the new situation. All UI seems a little
       | soft and friendly. For me missing IOS functionality with gestures
       | from top to bottom to lower down any app for more convenient
       | control with one hand
        
       | Ocha wrote:
       | Last time I used android it was version 4.1 boasting how it
       | improved responsiveness of the system. Here we are with Android
       | 12 still trying to improve responsiveness and smoothness of the
       | system...
        
         | vb6sp6 wrote:
         | I feel like this has been solved for a while now (at least on
         | pixel devices in my experience)
        
         | unixhero wrote:
         | It is really good and has been like forever. You of course have
         | to spend equal amounts as for an iPhone to get a high end
         | experience, and it was like that back then as well. Many people
         | failed to understand this and bought shitty underpowered
         | handhelds, and blamed Android for being laggy.
        
       | no_time wrote:
       | Looks like grandparent mode is enabled by default with all the
       | whitespace and even lower information density. What's the
       | endgame? In 20 years only a single letter at a time on the
       | screen?
       | 
       | >Any information processed in Private Compute Core requires
       | explicit user action before it can be shared with Google (...)
       | 
       | If they know everything about the data going in and coming out
       | it's still useless.
       | 
       | Also what important APIs did they axe now?
        
         | vetinari wrote:
         | > In 20 years only a single letter at a time on the screen?
         | 
         | Don't you think that a letter is a bit optimistic? What about
         | colored buttons with icons, ala Idiocracy?
        
         | causi wrote:
         | As someone who grew up using 160x160 and 320x320 PDAs, the idea
         | a smartphone now uses a 1080x1200 rectangle to only give me
         | eight buttons makes me want to throw up.
        
           | Isthatablackgsd wrote:
           | As someone who used 132x65 pagers back then, my Blackberry
           | RIM 850 can display more information in the screen than my
           | Samsung Note 8. I loathe this "maximum white space!!" UIs as
           | well. My boss prefers the grandparent-mode UIs whereas I
           | prefer compact with every space is being used as possible. I
           | like to have high-density texts like the old day of Reddit to
           | minimum screen-scrolling.
        
             | nix23 wrote:
             | Oh man, blackberry's where such perfect communication
             | devices, fast writing no additional bs...i miss that time,
             | it was the perfect mix of smart and dump phone...and
             | nothing more was/is needed.
        
               | jaytaylor wrote:
               | See: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28517447
               | 
               | "Ask HN: Do you still miss your RIM BlackBerry?"
        
               | naikrovek wrote:
               | oh yeah we all look back super fondly on the dozens and
               | dozens of nested lists that somehow was considered
               | passable as a user interface.
               | 
               | I'm no fan of the current whitespace-heavy UI paradigm,
               | but to say BlackBerry did it better is definitely not
               | matching my own memories of my BlackBerry devices at all.
        
               | Isthatablackgsd wrote:
               | It is the design paradigm of Blackberry is what we
               | prefers because it shows information of what we want and
               | need without any fuss. The modern design paradigm is so
               | backward and marketing-oriented, filled with ads and
               | paddings the way bean counters have in mind. The 90s/00s
               | era have a good design in mind that are human-oriented
               | and natural to use. Now, everything felt off and harder
               | to memorize those extra steps. My Blackberry make it feel
               | like an important tool and easier to use (they are refers
               | as Crackberry back then), modern smartphone tries their
               | best to be hostile toward their users no matter what. If
               | we stay on the goal of human-oriented design with modern
               | style, then our design paradigm will be vastly different
               | than what we have now.
        
               | naikrovek wrote:
               | I agree with the sentiment about UI designs today, and I
               | think that those horrible lists of the BlackBerry were
               | just as bad, for the very same reasons.
               | 
               | some of those list items took some action immediately,
               | some opened further lists, and there was no
               | differentiation visually, for example. some may call that
               | "tool-like", but I call it "lacking important contextual
               | information", and it's just as bad as other UIs which
               | lack important cues.
               | 
               | > modern smartphone tries their best to be hostile toward
               | their users no matter what
               | 
               | they definitely do not try to be hostile. I sense an
               | attitude on this site lately which is probably best
               | summed up as "everything new is stupid" and that is just
               | as misguided as believing that modern smartphones are
               | intentionally hostile.
               | 
               | MAYBE they're _unintentionally_ hostile. Maybe, but I
               | doubt it. Smartphones are imperfect, yes, and dark
               | patterns DO exist, yes, and I can 't recall ever seeing
               | anything hostile in Android or iOS or iPadOS, ever.
               | organized poorly? sure. oversimplified? yep! hostile?
               | never.
        
         | naikrovek wrote:
         | always nice when an optimist joins the conversation. everything
         | just lightens right up.
        
         | 5e92cb50239222b wrote:
         | Screens keep getting bigger, while tweets stay the same size.
         | You need something to pad the rest of the space.
        
           | VortexDream wrote:
           | How about more tweets? The information density on modern
           | everything is utter garbage.
        
             | reayn wrote:
             | I doubt anyone here wants _more_ tweets. I personally wish
             | the twitter UI would just be entirely whitespace (or a fine
             | chirping blue if they 're feeling adventerous) for their
             | audience to sit and enjoy; I can genuinely find no
             | drawbacks to such a UI rework.
        
         | citizenpaul wrote:
         | Well at first IT people complained because boomers wouldn't
         | learn how to use computers. Now they (sorta)did and they want
         | one letter per screen. Since they still control the majority of
         | the market share that is what we will get by default.
         | 
         | Its really the getting old denial mode. All of those people
         | need reading glasses not huge font. Seriously the in house
         | attorney where i worked(like 70yo) had his phone font set so
         | large it was like 2-3 words per screen on email and text.
        
         | thomasahle wrote:
         | > all the whitespace and even lower information density. What's
         | the endgame?
         | 
         | I don't think fashion has an endgame.
        
         | mminer237 wrote:
         | It now opaquely covers the entire screen when you look at a
         | single notification.
        
         | k8sToGo wrote:
         | I feel the same about it. Also now the settings it's just a
         | bunch of text without icons.
        
         | hammock wrote:
         | >Looks like grandparent mode is enabled by default with all the
         | whitespace and even lower information density. What's the
         | endgame? In 20 years only a single letter at a time on the
         | screen?
         | 
         | Just playing to their customer. As time goes on, the
         | demographics of Android users get older and less savvy as
         | everyone else switches to iPhone. (not snark, I have a Pixel
         | myself)
        
       | mabub24 wrote:
       | This UI style reminds me of the jitterbug phone UI.
        
       | BiteCode_dev wrote:
       | "Private by design so you're in control."
       | 
       | Oh, come on.
        
         | singularity2001 wrote:
         | Was that paragraph meant to be clickable or extendable?
         | 
         | Because I wanted to read what they meant by
         | 
         | "With new easy-to-use, powerful privacy features, you'll have
         | peace of mind"
         | 
         | but noscript blocked any link or something.
         | 
         | "If you see anything that you're not comfortable with, you can
         | manage permissions right from the dashboard."
         | 
         | I doubt I can remove all permissions from Google (?)
        
           | lkbm wrote:
           | > Was that paragraph meant to be clickable or extendable?
           | 
           | The next four sections expand on it: see what apps are using
           | the mic and camera, option to give apps only approximate
           | location data, app permissions dashboard, and the local
           | computation for some data.
        
         | y4mi wrote:
         | That feature definitely is a privacy improvement though.
        
           | [deleted]
        
       | peakaboo wrote:
       | More spyware, yay!
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | MMS21 wrote:
       | Still no full system backup like iOS
        
         | pornel wrote:
         | Sad to hear it's still a problem. I had Android for a while,
         | but device upgrades instead of being exciting, were a thing I
         | most dreaded.
         | 
         | Upgrading Android phones, even with their supposedly new
         | migration assistant via cables, still kept losing most of my
         | apps' device-local data and settings, as if Google didn't care
         | about anything that isn't on their servers.
        
       | handrous wrote:
       | I see three total representations of time... I think? I think
       | that's what I'm looking at on the left screenshot on the "Mon 4"
       | widget? A clock face? One of them's normal (top bar), one (the
       | clock face) looks way more "cutesy" and decorative than
       | functional, so I guess if it's some customization and not
       | standard, that's fine, but what's with the Lock Screen? Why print
       | the time with unusual formatting on there? (I know, I know, the
       | answer is "it looks very nice in screenshots for marketing... and
       | for my portfolio")
       | 
       | Rightmost screenshot: wow, iOS and Android quick-settings screens
       | have converged a lot more than I realized, since I was last in
       | the Android world. Who copied whom?
       | 
       | It's really weird that the rightmost screenshot (the quick-
       | settings screen) bumps the top bar down for a _second_ top bar
       | that just prints the date, in small type.
       | 
       | The permissions and privacy stuff seems OK but I'm surprised they
       | were so far behind on that front that this is _new_.
       | 
       | Screenshot interface is also damn near identical to the one on my
       | iPhone. Again, dunno who got there first, or if it's just
       | convergent design... but wow, it's _very_ close. The  "scrolling
       | screenshot" thing is cool, though I wonder how that'll interact
       | with drawing rules for various app widgets--or maybe it just
       | works on web content? (no clue if my iPhone can do that--I don't
       | think so?)
       | 
       | Phone switching feature--again, I'm surprised this is new for
       | them. Being able to do it from iPhone, too, is a nice touch
       | though.
        
         | nsonha wrote:
         | > bumps the top bar down for a second top bar that just prints
         | the date
         | 
         | sounds like a privacy thing
        
           | handrous wrote:
           | I mean the "fixed" top bar that usually shows the time and
           | battery status, et c., gets bumped down for a _second_ one
           | that just prints the date, on the far left of the screen.
           | This is on the settings screen, captured on the right side of
           | the top graphic on the page.
           | 
           | It's a weird choice for a bunch of reasons--why go to extra
           | effort to print the date on the settings screen, of all
           | places, but not in any kind of a "you can edit this here"
           | context, but only an informational one? Why not find a way to
           | put it on the existing top bar? (it looks like there's room,
           | even with the notch) Why break a "this bar is fixed at the
           | top and doesn't have anything 'above' it in the view
           | hierarchy--all it might do is disappear, not be pushed down"
           | norm for such a minor thing? If you're going to that effort,
           | why only use like 1/4 of the width (even accounting for the
           | notch) that you're claiming, and not display more stuff
           | there? Why not just print that _under_ the existing bar, if
           | you 've decided it needs to appear on this screen?
           | 
           | It looks like a mistake, as is. Like some kind of temporary
           | dev UI element that got left in by accident.
        
         | sbradford26 wrote:
         | The scrolling screenshot feature is the only thing I am semi
         | excited about. I had it on my old Huawei Mate 10 Pro and used
         | it a lot.
        
         | AnssiH wrote:
         | > Phone switching feature--again, I'm surprised this is new for
         | them. Being able to do it from iPhone, too, is a nice touch
         | though.
         | 
         | The feature itself is very old. I think they are implying that
         | in previous versions it did not transfer _all_ your
         | "essentials" and now it does - it isn't really clear to me what
         | exactly they improved, though. And the iPhone bit may be new.
        
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