Chinese KitKat

[Shlomo Solomon]

IIRC Android 3 was a tablet only version and the various sub-versions
of 2 were/are for phones. That's probably the reason 3 has disappeared,
since all the tablet specific stuff was merged into 4.

As for apps dying, I agree with Geoffrey, but I would also add that
even an app that doesn't connect to anything eventually stops working
on an older phone/tablet for the simple reason that the apps become
more and more bloated as features (often useless ones) are added so
the same group of apps that ran fine on my Galaxy S a couple of years
ago eventually "choked" the phone and I had to decide if I wanted to
delete half the apps or get a new phone. And BTW, the fact that my
Galaxy S (originally Android 2.2) was running CyanogenMod (equivalent to
4.*) didn't solve the problem.  


On Mon, 06 Jan 2014 04:07:03 +0200
geoffrey mendelson <geoffreymendelson at gmail.com> wrote:

> On 1/6/2014 2:26 AM, Oleg Goldshmidt wrote:
> > Sounds a bit harsh. A device cannot possibly become less useful with
> > time than it was when you bought it (barring a HW malfunction). If
> > it did then what it says on the tin it will still do it now, won't
> > it? Without any new software...
> 
> Eventually apps stop working.  Android is based on the idea that you
> buy an app from someone, and it automatically updates when new
> versions come out. Even apps that cost $0.00 (free).  So an app
> developer can be reasonably sure that if he changes the protocol in
> version 1.3 that by version 1.5 he can drop the old protocol.
> 
> Since most apps connect to a server for something, whether it be 
> authentication, information shared or received or both, and so on,
> they just start to die of old age. The answer is to update them. And
> there lies the rub.
> 
> For example, the big releases of Android were 2 and 4. Android 3,
> does not seem to exist in the wild as it were. I am sure it did at
> one time, and there were major changes between Android 2 and 3. So
> all Android 2 devices, almost all 2 year old cell phones, can no
> longer buy or update an app.
> 
> I laugh every time I see someone selling an Android 2 phone. The
> price they are asking will get you a similar set of hardware running
> Android 4 brand new. It also comes with a brand new battery, and
> since these phones need to be charged daily, a two year old phone has
> a battery with about 700 charge cycles on it, which means it may need
> to be replaced or if not now, soon.
> 
> No manufacturer is updating their Android 2 phones to Android 4,
> however most Android 4.1/4.2 phones (Jellybean) are giving their owns
> the option to update to 4.4 (KitKat).
> 
> So yes, the phones become less useful, and eventually no use at all.
> 
> 
> Geoff.
> 



-- 
Shlomo Solomon
http://the-solomons.net
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