Google Phone

As 2007 nears its end, speculation about the upcoming developments of the Android platform - and, more importantly perhaps, which OEMs and developers will adopt the OS for their hardware - grows.  In a podcast discussing Palm’s next-quarter roadmap, J. Edward Rutkowski and Tadd Rosenfeld (of msmobiles.com and mytreo.net respectively) put forward the case for the somewhat ailing smartphone company to add a gPhone to their line-up.  Given the recent news that the low-end Palm Centro is outselling company expectations, especially compared to the higher-end (and less consumer-focused) Treo series, the unsurprising fact that Palm’s profit margin on the handset is relatively low would be a reasonable incentive to adopt open-source Android. 

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Confirmation that Google has booked two stands at the Mobile World Congress held in Barcelona in February 2008 has prompted suggestions that Android-based handsets will be in strong evidence at the event.  Extrapolating from the sighting of an HTC-designed reference handset spotted by Gizmodo earlier this month, APC Magazine believes that Google will be looking to make a definite showing at the mobile-focused event so as to whet the public and industry appetites prior to commercial Android-based models launching in the second half of the year.

“You can bet that if Google’s handset partners lift the covers on their Android phones during the Mobile World Congress expo, which kicks off on February 11th in Barcelona - or if Google itself trots out a flock of phones to impress this annual powerhouse gathering of the global mobile industry (the company has booked two stands on the expo floor) - that these will be shiny snazzy models endowed with a very high ‘cool’ factor” David Flynn, APC Magazine 

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Just as the creatively overhauled Google interface for the Apple iPhone was heralded as the search company “practising” for their own Android platform, the news that Japanese carrier NTT DoCoMo is considering using Google-powered search and email functionality in their own handsets will likely be viewed as further evidence of paving the way for 2008’s gPhones.  Sources quoted in the Nikkei business daily claimed that from as early as Spring DoCoMo subscribers with compatible handsets will be able to access their Google-based email, calendar, photos and searches through the i-mode network.

“We are currently studying the possibility of an alliance in search services with domestic or overseas partners, but nothing has been decided yet” Hiroto Nakagawa, DoCoMo spokesman

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After lamenting the absence of (public) contenders for the $10m Google Android coding prize, mobile first-person shooter WiFi Army could stand a chance of scooping some of that cash with its blend of GPS, Google Maps and the camera likely to be included in most gPhones.  Developed by W2Pi Entertainment, players register online with a current photo and then rivals attempt to locate them using GPS-fed Google Maps.  Points are scored by “shooting” opponents with the camera; their image is compared to that on the server to confirm their identity. 

Check out the demo videos of WiFi Army after the cut

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Inputting data into a handheld device - and extracting data in a meaningful, easily interpreted way - is a hurdle that, although seemingly low-level, presents a real problem for developers looking to produce data-rich applications.  In Japan, the QR barcode system has been implemented with some degree of success, using matrix codes that can store address or URLs revealed by ’scanning’ them with a cellphone’s camera; Android developer Tom Gibara has created what could possibly be the next level of matrix coding - a system he calls Moseycode - which not only uses matrices to input data but can then overlay the visual output in real-time on the cellphone’s screen.

As the video (after the cut) shows, the Android software can recognise a 2D barcode glyph and then, according to its physical orientation, display varying information overlaid onto the glyph itself or, as in the second video, near to the glyph.  In this early demo, running on the Android SDK platform rather than as a mockup, the Moseycode tracks the four categories (author, location, status and comments) and can be zoomed in/out by moving the matrix code closer to or further from the cellphone’s camera.

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As if the search giant didn’t have enough to do right now, what with fixing the Android SDK and staving off search and mapping rivals, Computerworld’s Stacy Collett has gathered together a number of analysts and set them the challenge of predicting what Google will do next.  The results vary from the predicable (setting up or buying another social network) to the outlandish (buying an Ad Agency), with stops made at the dull (local reviews) and debatable (giving away ad-supported PCs) along the way.

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In a release from the FCC earlier this week, Google is confirmed as one of the 700MHz spectrum would-be bidders, together with mainstream telcos Verizon Wireless and AT&T.  The list of interested parties - separated into those who have fully completed their applications [pdf link] and those who must still do so prior to the January 4th deadline [pdf link] - does not indicate which spectrum chunks each company is interested in, but Google (listed under ‘Google Airways Inc’) is in familiar company, with fellow Open Handset Alliance member Qualcomm also present on the roll-call. 

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Slow development milestones for Android have previously been blamed on Google’s $10m coding “prizefund” forcing app creation undercover; could the truth be that the platform is simply not ready for primetime release?  That’s the strident criticism from developer Adam MacBeth, who has found the SDK toolkit to be riddled with bugs, poorly implemented code and a general absence of support from Google themselves.

“Functionality is not there, is poorly documented or just doesn’t work. It’s clearly not ready for prime time” Adam MacBeth

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Looking like a black/grey version of the white handset Google’s Sergey Brin demonstrated in the Android SDK launch video, a Gizmodo reader sent in this exclusive photo of a prototype gPhone in the wild.  While the design itself is relatively uninspiring (but, assuming it’s a product of HTC, will likely be built well) what’s particularly interesting is the source’s feedback on performance and the platform’s stability.

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Could a spinoff from Microsoft Research end up providing another open-access piece of the Android mobile-internet experience?  That looks to be the word out of Zumobi, a developer of the self-titled mobile browser that uses a unique “tiles” system of organising specific web content - such as Flickr feeds, multimedia content, information from RSS or blog data - and serving it up in a scrolling, resizing UI they’re calling the Zooming User Interface.

“Whether it’s Android [Google's platform for mobile devices], Verizon or Nokia, we want to provide a simple solution for people to access the data” Beth Goza, Senior Marketing Manager, Zumobi

Check out the video demo of the Zumobi beta release, after the cut

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