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Bottom line (according to TFA): The Tab 10.1 is a much more credible product than the Xoom, but it's not quite competitive with the iPad. If Google wants to co

Bottom line (according to TFA): The Tab 10.1 is a much more credible product than the Xoom, but it's not quite competitive with the iPad. If Google wants to compete, it still needs to build a vibrant third-party application ecosystem in order to make Android tablets a good option for regular users.

drivebyacct2 15y ago
Hm, I'm curious... what do people want to see Google do in order to convince them? People are developing for Android in droves on mobile phones because they finally (and I do mean finally, the writing on the walls was clear before any major Android app explosion)... do they not assume that a similar effect will happen for Android tablets?
- ugh 15y ago
  It hasn't happened yet and reviewers don't have a time machine. What should they write? "Well, the app ecosystem sucks but might well improve in the future, maybe"?
  - drivebyacct2 15y ago
    Uh, I was asking what will motivate developers. I agree with the consensus here. If it's not shipping with apps, and it's shipping with features missing... it should be reviewed that way. And besides, saying "Oh, 3g sucks but you can mail it off for a week to get LTE" is 100% completely different than saying "We expect the Android tablet ecosystem to grow". Do you think I bought my D1 thinking that I'd be stuck with a trash Facebook app and basically no other apps to speak of? Again, I don't expect or even have a desire for reviewers to go out of their way to make such excuses... my entire post was just questioning WHY the ecosystem is so dry, even though the Honeycomb SDK has been available (albeit in a flawed state initialy) for so long.
- zmmmmm 15y ago
  It's off to a pretty slow start. Android on phones was coming from nothing. On tablets it's different - I expected a much faster takeup with at very least a huge number of developers doing minimal tweaks and updating graphics just so they could be in the small pool of tablet apps and get more exposure by calling themselves "HD" or "Honycomb compatible". But if I understand right (and I'm not able to test this directly) there is still only a very small number of apps specialised for tablets. I think part of the problem was the very anemic Xoom launch which simply didn't get many devices into developers hands, especially outside the US, and the quite unusable Honeycomb emulator which also turned off many devs from even trying to support Honeycomb. Google tried to fix that at Google IO but they should do much more. It's worth noting another part of this is confusion about how Android works - there is no reason to create a "honeycomb specific app" on Android. The whole point of Android's layout and fragment infrastructure is to let you easily make an app that seamlessly caters to any number of form factors. So the idea of looking for and counting apps that are dedicated to Honeycomb is silly - it's not surprising there aren't many of those, and those that do have specific support for Honeycomb aren't necessarily labeled that way in the market like they are in iTunes (which is a problem with the market).

drivebyacct2 15y ago

Hm, I'm curious... what do people want to see Google do in order to convince them? People are developing for Android in droves on mobile phones because they finally (and I do mean finally, the writing on the walls was clear before any major Android app explosion)... do they not assume that a similar effect will happen for Android tablets?

ugh 15y ago
It hasn't happened yet and reviewers don't have a time machine. What should they write? "Well, the app ecosystem sucks but might well improve in the future, maybe"?
- drivebyacct2 15y ago
  Uh, I was asking what will motivate developers. I agree with the consensus here. If it's not shipping with apps, and it's shipping with features missing... it should be reviewed that way. And besides, saying "Oh, 3g sucks but you can mail it off for a week to get LTE" is 100% completely different than saying "We expect the Android tablet ecosystem to grow". Do you think I bought my D1 thinking that I'd be stuck with a trash Facebook app and basically no other apps to speak of? Again, I don't expect or even have a desire for reviewers to go out of their way to make such excuses... my entire post was just questioning WHY the ecosystem is so dry, even though the Honeycomb SDK has been available (albeit in a flawed state initialy) for so long.
zmmmmm 15y ago
It's off to a pretty slow start. Android on phones was coming from nothing. On tablets it's different - I expected a much faster takeup with at very least a huge number of developers doing minimal tweaks and updating graphics just so they could be in the small pool of tablet apps and get more exposure by calling themselves "HD" or "Honycomb compatible". But if I understand right (and I'm not able to test this directly) there is still only a very small number of apps specialised for tablets. I think part of the problem was the very anemic Xoom launch which simply didn't get many devices into developers hands, especially outside the US, and the quite unusable Honeycomb emulator which also turned off many devs from even trying to support Honeycomb. Google tried to fix that at Google IO but they should do much more. It's worth noting another part of this is confusion about how Android works - there is no reason to create a "honeycomb specific app" on Android. The whole point of Android's layout and fragment infrastructure is to let you easily make an app that seamlessly caters to any number of form factors. So the idea of looking for and counting apps that are dedicated to Honeycomb is silly - it's not surprising there aren't many of those, and those that do have specific support for Honeycomb aren't necessarily labeled that way in the market like they are in iTunes (which is a problem with the market).