Google to Add Multitouch to More Android Apps
PJ Jacobowitz, PC Magazine, 2/5/2010
Last month when Google launched HTC’s Nexus One” smartphone, its Web browser, Google Maps and Picture Gallery applications all lacked pinch-to-zoom multitouch gestures. Earlier this week, Google released an update for the Nexus One that enables pinch-to-zoom in these applications. It now turns out that this update will not be limited to the Nexus One.
Soon, Google will unleash a new Android platform release called “Android 2.1 – Update 1,” which will include the updates for all Android manufacturers, the company said.
Once Google makes it available, it would be possible for any Android devices that have a touch screen with multitouch capability to offer pinch-to-zoom gestures in the Web browser, maps and gallery applications. That could potentially include every Android phone now available in the U.S. But notice the fine print: Google is releasing this to manufacturers, not directly to users. It will be up to Motorola, Samsung, HTC and the wireless carriers to boil the new software down for their individual phones.
The Motorola Droid (which currently runs Android 2.0.1 and the Motorola CLIQ (which runs Android 1.5) will most likely receive Android 2.1 – Update 1. Last month at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las, Vegas, Motorola chief executive Sanjay Jha said that both phones will receive updates to Android 2.1 “as shortly as possible.” Sprint has also announced that their HTC Hero and Samsung Moment phones will receive Android 2.1 updates during the first half of 2010.
Related posts:
- How to Enable Multitouch on The Google Nexus One Clint Boulton, eWeek, 1/23/2010 Developer Cyanogen has modified Google’s Android 2.1 mobile operating system to endow Google’s Nexus One smartphone...
- Nexus One gets a software update, enables multitouch Chris Ziegler, Engadget, 2/3/2010 The iPhone isn’t the only handset getting bumped today — Google’s just outed a very, very...
- Will Google’s Android Suffer From Fragmentation? MocoNews.net, 11/6/2009 With the introduction of the Motorola Droid today by Verizon Wireless, there are now three different versions of...
In: Android, Mobile Technology · Tagged with: HTC, Motorola, Samsung