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Hey HN, (author of that article here) was wondering if you guys had any general feedback. I'm an evolving tech writer and I'm always looking for pointers.

by haseman 17y ago

nuclear_eclipse 17y ago
#3 sounds more like complete sarcasm, and just didn't seem to fit with the rest of the article in tone or meaning. Regarding #8, have you explored the way that "Alternate Resources" [1] allows you to better handle fragmentation issues? I've found it at least to be useful enough to provide a few alternate layouts based on screen orientation, but it would be nice to get further feedback from fulltime Android developers about it. Things like how useful it is in the real world with real, fragmented devire types seems hard to come by... [1] http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/resources/resources-i18n.html#AlternateResources http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/resources/resource...
- haseman 17y ago
  Thanks for the feedback. #3 was meant to be a more than a little sarcastic, but I guess it didn't mesh well with some of the others. There are really two types of fragmentation. The first is UI screen size, which isn't too hard to work with. The second, and uglier, is code fragmentation. This is where a piece of code might work totally differently on two separate platforms. Right now Android has a lot of the former, but it's looking like there's a lot of the latter to come.
  - pkulak 17y ago
    How could code run differently on one Android 1.6 device from another?
    - haseman 17y ago
      While Android might be internally consistant, the hardware drivers that support it isn't. Everywhere your software interacts with the hardware is suspect for fragmentation. Google will have compliance testing to force OEM's into correctly supporting the Android runtime. However, their only leverage is the inclusion or not of their Google Apps and the "Made with Google" logo for the back of the device.
    - blasdel 17y ago
      The handset makers (mostly HTC) have taken to shipping the same kind of "value add" UI changes that they did with Windows Mobile. What's most unfortunate is that it's not even bullshit -- they are actually adding real value! HTC's on-screen keyboard is better, and they add in some of the multitouch events that Google foolishly left out.

Hey HN, (author of that article here) was wondering if you guys had any general feedback. I'm an evolving tech writer and I'm always looking for pointers.

by haseman 17y ago

Hey HN, (author of that article here) was wondering if you guys had any general feedback. I'm an evolving tech writer and I'm always looking for pointers.

nuclear_eclipse 17y ago

#3 sounds more like complete sarcasm, and just didn't seem to fit with the rest of the article in tone or meaning. Regarding #8, have you explored the way that "Alternate Resources" [1] allows you to better handle fragmentation issues? I've found it at least to be useful enough to provide a few alternate layouts based on screen orientation, but it would be nice to get further feedback from fulltime Android developers about it. Things like how useful it is in the real world with real, fragmented devire types seems hard to come by... [1] http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/resources/resources-i18n.html#AlternateResources http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/resources/resource...

haseman 17y ago
Thanks for the feedback. #3 was meant to be a more than a little sarcastic, but I guess it didn't mesh well with some of the others. There are really two types of fragmentation. The first is UI screen size, which isn't too hard to work with. The second, and uglier, is code fragmentation. This is where a piece of code might work totally differently on two separate platforms. Right now Android has a lot of the former, but it's looking like there's a lot of the latter to come.
- pkulak 17y ago
  How could code run differently on one Android 1.6 device from another?
  - haseman 17y ago
    While Android might be internally consistant, the hardware drivers that support it isn't. Everywhere your software interacts with the hardware is suspect for fragmentation. Google will have compliance testing to force OEM's into correctly supporting the Android runtime. However, their only leverage is the inclusion or not of their Google Apps and the "Made with Google" logo for the back of the device.
  - blasdel 17y ago
    The handset makers (mostly HTC) have taken to shipping the same kind of "value add" UI changes that they did with Windows Mobile. What's most unfortunate is that it's not even bullshit -- they are actually adding real value! HTC's on-screen keyboard is better, and they add in some of the multitouch events that Google foolishly left out.