Android operating system

Every day we hear about Android, iOS, Linux, Mac, Firefox OS and many more operating systems and actually, we do not know very well all the characteristics of each one, how it is normal. But two of the operating systems we hear the most about today are: iOS and Android. The latter, Android, is a free / open source based mobile operating system found on millions of devices from different houses: Samsung, Nokia, ZTE, HTC and many more. In general, Android is designed mainly for touch terminals and the current version of this operating system is 4.4, also called: KitKat. If you want to know everything about the mobile operating system that is used the most on a daily basis, you just have to keep reading.

The true story of Android

This operating system was developed at the offices of the company «Android Inc». In 2005, Google bought the company and was responsible for updating it every year so that users could enjoy a free operating system where anyone could upload content.

Until today, Google has innovated in many elements with Android: from the Contacts application to the integrated Google search engine or "Google Now".

The official appearance of Android to the world was held on November 5, 2007, where a group of almost 80 companies decided to unleash open source for mobile devices.

Fundamental Android Features

One of the things that most impresses

Android users is the number of updates it has each year to fix minor bugs or errors. But the Android innovating updates are those made each year at Google I / O conferences. Let's see the general characteristics of Android:

• Devices: Android generally accommodates high resolution displays, VGA, 2D graphics, 3D graphics, and traditional phones.
• Storage: SQLite is used, a database that is used to store data on the phone.
• Connectivity: This operating system supports many connections: GSM / EDGE, IDEN, CDMA, EV-DO, UMTS, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, LTE, HSDPA, HSPA +, NFC, WiMAX, GPRS, UMTS and HSDPA +.
• Messenger service: Android is compatible with SMS and MMS, but everything is reduced after the existence of the application store where there are instant messaging applications such as WhatsApp or Telegram.
• Browser: The operating system has a very basic Internet browser based on WebKit that runs on the JavaScript V8 engine.
• Java support: Inside, Android has an architecture in Java, but outside, it does not have a virtual machine based on this language.
• Multimedia support: It supports a large number of multimedia files natively: WebM, H.263 / 264, MPEG-4 SP, AMR, AMR-WB, AAC, HE-AAC, MP3, MIDI, Ogg Vorbis, WAV, PNG, GIF and BMP.
• Streaming support: RTP / RTSP and HTML5.
• Support for additional hardware: Photo and video cameras, touch screens, accelerometers and other elements can be incorporated that expand the number of functions that Android allows.
• Development environment: Developers can use any software that allows them to create Java applications such as Eclipse (built into Android).
• Google Play Store: Android has an application store where developers publish their applications, which expand the number of functions performed by the factory operating system.
• Multi-touch: Android supports any type of multicaptative screen.
• Bluetooth: The Bluetooth connectivity that Android natively carries has A2DF and AVRCP support.
• Video call: If the terminal has a front camera, Android can make video calls through Google Hangouts.
• Multitask: On Android, we can leave applications running in the background without spending a lot of phone resources.
• Tethering: Transfer your 3G connectivity from your device to another through the connection: «Tethering».

Android Released Versions

The nomenclature used by Google to name the Android versions is very simple: the name of each large version of Android will have an initial letter of the alphabet, that is, the first version will have the A, the second the B ... These are the versions that have been published to date:

• Apple Pie
• Banana Bread
• Cupcake
• Donut
• lightning
• Froyo
• Gingerbread
• Honeycomb
• Ice Cream Sandwich
• Jelly Bean
• Kitkat (present)