Android's 12L Feature Drop Aims To Be a Big Improvement for Folding Phones (theverge.com) 40
At this year's Android Dev Summit, Google announced an upcoming update for devices with larger screens, which includes tablets, foldables, and devices that run ChromeOS. From a report: Google is calling the update 12L, and it's supposed to make Android 12 run smoother on big screens. We first heard the possibility of a "12.1" update in late September, and it looks like many of the rumored features are true. 12L optimizes the layout of a device's UI, adjusting the placement of the home screen, lock screen, notifications, Quick Settings, and more. Google notes that any screen 600 density-independent pixels (dp) and above will display a two-column layout that makes use of the entire screen. In the example Google shows, the Quick Settings menu is pushed towards the left side of the screen, while the notifications panel is locked to the right, giving you the ability to access both simultaneously -- all without opening one app and closing another. 12L also introduces a new taskbar that makes it easier for users to quickly switch between different apps. Dragging and dropping an app from the taskbar opens it up in split-screen mode, which Google notes it has enabled for all apps, whether they're resizable or not.
Just say no. (Score:2)
Why are foldable devices being pushed on users? The only benefit is more screen space whereas the downsides are numerous.
It's a bad idea that needs to die.
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It's late gramps, let's get you to bed. You can go outside and yell at the clouds in the morning.
On a serious note, I remember thinking the exact same thing when camera phones first came out. I couldn't fathom why anybody would need/want such a thing. Now look at where we are. I, personally, don't mind the idea of a foldable phone and would happily trade thickness for a smaller footprint. If it's not your bag, don't buy one, but you can't pretend like you speak for every user.
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Why are foldable devices being pushed on users? The only benefit is more screen space whereas the downsides are numerous.
It's a bad idea that needs to die.
Say it with me... "it's okay for some things to exist that aren't for me."
Also, you'd be surprised how things evolve. Remember when iPhones were tiny and Samsung introduced the Galaxy Note? People were freaking out, making fun, complaining about how big it was. "Can't fit in your pocket." "Looks stupid up to your ear." Fast-forward a decade or so and Apple doesn't make tiny phones anymore and most smartphones are about the size of the original Note. Turns out... having all that screen space is usefu
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DosSwap (Score:3)
I absolutely love that it's 2021, and the most modern of modern operating systems is desperately adding features that were new four decades ago, in DOS.
And this is why I don't care to do anything on my phone. It's just an enormous step back. clipboards, multi-tasking, seeing multiple (way more than two) applications at once, drag'n'drop, what's next?
Oh yeah, playing multiple sounds concurrently. That'd be swell.
How about connecting to a peripheral device when there are three devices and two computers in the same room, all permitted to access each other? Especially when that "room" is traveling at 100mph.
Oh, oh, oh! How about transferring a file.
Raise your hand if you thought you'd hear about dosswap and null modem cables today.
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> Raise your hand if you thought you'd hear about dosswap and null modem cables today.
There's not much difference between that and Nearby File Share over Bluetooth. It took like 30 years. The one innovation seems to be restricting access to your contacts, ok fair, but what were they going to do, allow anybody at Starbucks to push shit to your phone?
There is really a lack of imagination by the people who green-light features there. It can't be a lack of imagination by the engineers or a lack of money, j
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I absolutely love that it's 2021, and the most modern of modern operating systems is desperately adding features that were new four decades ago, in DOS.
And this is why I don't care to do anything on my phone. It's just an enormous step back. clipboards, multi-tasking, seeing multiple (way more than two) applications at once, drag'n'drop, what's next?
Oh yeah, playing multiple sounds concurrently. That'd be swell.
How about connecting to a peripheral device when there are three devices and two computers in the same room, all permitted to access each other? Especially when that "room" is traveling at 100mph.
Oh, oh, oh! How about transferring a file.
Raise your hand if you thought you'd hear about dosswap and null modem cables today.
Some day they'll figure out a way to let you assign colours to UI elements. But given how long it's taking to get a single "dark mode" rolled out, I wouldn't hold my breath.
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"...features that were new four decades ago, in DOS."
What features are "desperately" being added to Android that existed 4 decades ago in DOS? Have you ever used DOS?
It should go without saying that DOS didn't provide a GUI, multitasking OR the ability to execute more than one app at the same time. This is a comment only a moron would make.
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Okay, so you are the one who never used dos. If you did, you certainly didn't explore it professionally. My sole point here was to say that dos had a gui, multitasking, and the ability to execute more than one app at the same time. I even gave you a keyword to lookup. Here's another: TSR.
Funny how you can miss the entire point. Did you bother to read my very first word?
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Phones do all those things, have done for years. Multiple sounds are no problem, use that regularly when driving and navigation voice prompts cause the music to drop in volume while they are spoken. Multi-tasking has been in Android since day 1, clipboards for a decade or more etc.
The idea of only having one or two apps on screen was the necessary improvement that made mobile devices usable with just a finger. The screen is too small for a desktop-style multi window interface.
File transfer works fine, not s
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Pointing at the file transfer part, none of what you've described is a file transfer.
A file transfer is connecting one phone to the other phone, and having a file copied across. It can be bluetooth, it can be a usb cable, it can be infrared, it can be nfc. It can even be wifi, with one phone as the hotspot (even though that's fraught with mayhem).
It can't be e-mail. It can't be google drive. It can't be an external usb drive. It can't require billions of dollars of outside infrastructure.
I'd love it if
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It's called Nearby Share. Let's you send files over wi-fi or Bluetooth. It's similar to Air Drop on iPhone.
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And it has zero outside dependencies? I can use it, with my offline phone, and someone else's offline phone? And I don't need to force them to download an app onto their private work phone locked down by their IT department?
I call bull on you.
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Uh yeah actually, it doesn't need internet access and is part of Android so most phones have it. Back to V6 I think.
Just try it.
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Well, I guess "almost all" doesn't cover mine. I'll pretend to be shocked. I'm on android 10.
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What phone?
I think it's disabled by default, you need to turn it on. If you share something, and then in the share menu look at the full list of options it should be in there even if it's turned off, and it will prompt you to turn it on.
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Doesn't matter. If I can't reliably walk someone through using it, then it isn't good enough to be dependable. So we fall back to e-mail.
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It's absolutely trivial to use. It's right there on the share menu. What more do you want?
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You now need to tell me where the share menu is. And you aren't even sure if I have a share menu. Or if it works. Or if I've blocked google, disabled my share menu, or broken something internally.
What I want is to be able to transfer a file to someone as easily as handing them a piece of paper. Where their side is irrelevant. It's yours now. And not get into an IT issue where I sent it to them but maybe they don't have it.
If I send you a package, do you worry that your front door doesn't open? Does a
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If you don't know how to use your phone I can't help you.
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The problem isn't me. The problem is that my recipient doesn't know how to use their phone. And since they are paying me tens of thousands of dollars at a time, I can't say to them what you just said to me.
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You want a magic app that works even if the person doesn't know how to use a phone, but is also secure?
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I said absolutely nothing about secure. Most of life isn't at all secure. There's a three-inch wide stripe of yellow paint separating you from certain death every day. There's a dead-bolt next to a glass window. There are pipes of toxins openly venting your bedroom while you sleep. It's so very easy to kill you without anyone even noticing, and that's before we think of a man with a baseball bat riding the subway.
I want to be able to give something to someone, without needing to also provide tech suppo
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I'd say do not want, security first which means at least basic phone skills will be required.
Besides, if they can't operate their phone what's the point of sending a file to it? They can't use it anyway.
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Congrats, you just went bankrupt because you insisted on protecting a publicly-accessible document, that you've published on your public web-site, from a person that you wanted to read it.
Maybe think of the security of your family, of your business, of your finances, of your food-source, ahead of the security of your personal poetry.
Meanwhile, you might want to put armour on your car, bars on your windows, security fencing around your air conditioner, and around all of your home's ventilation pipes (wouldn'
Re: DosSwap (Score:2)
File transfer via WiFi: get Trebleshot (got it from F-Droid, the one stop shop for Android open source wares), share your files via Web link. Naturally, both devices need to be on the same network, can be via hot spot or WiFi access point/router network.
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Okay, perhaps I didn't make myself clear enough.
I need to be able to walk someone through the process over the phone -- without seeing their side, and without tearing my family apart.
Re: DosSwap (Score:2)
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You're going to ask the seven-figure-salary angel investor to install something? And then to give you access to their phone? And you're going to first walk them through installing teamviewer?
You might be forgetting that you're the one who needs them, not the other way around.
Re: DosSwap (Score:2)
Drop? (Score:1)
Doesn't dropping a feature mean that you're discontinuing it?
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Doesn't dropping a feature mean that you're discontinuing it?
One might think so. But this is common slang for introducing something new. "My new album drops tonight at midnight."
Smooth (Score:2)
Iâ(TM)ve tested android devices since theyâ(TM)ve first came out. While theyâ(TM)ve gotten better, theyâ(TM)re never truly been smooth. Nothing beats the pixel perfect scrolling smoothness of an iPhone, or Windows Phone before MSFT discontinued it.
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Then you've never had a conversation with an Android user ever.
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Fundament (Score:1)
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Well, stop holding your phone wrong!!
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In the menawhile it struggles to operate properly when you put any standard phone horizontally.
Maybe it struggles in the "menawhile", but here in the real world landscape mode seems to work just fine.