Recently, I was disappointed, when I came to know that HTC Hero Android OS upgrade is delayed to June. Since last Oct, I have been using my Android device and started facing issues with device recently. There’re some cause of concerns over running an old version of tweaked Linux OS when I bought the device, but those were thwart by my belief in credible OS and its reputation of release of frequent upgrades/patches. But when Google released the pie chart of Android OS platform distribution recently, I guess the issue is not with me alone, but with those 37.2{af589cdba9d77786c8c861317dbad60bba1e2ebbf56e2ffab874a1b59fde9ce3} (66{af589cdba9d77786c8c861317dbad60bba1e2ebbf56e2ffab874a1b59fde9ce3} actually) Android device owners who are running an outdated Android OS version.
As per latest released data, 32.40{af589cdba9d77786c8c861317dbad60bba1e2ebbf56e2ffab874a1b59fde9ce3} users are using Android 2.1 (Eclair) platform on their devices. Those are probably new users who recently bought Android devices. Then 29{af589cdba9d77786c8c861317dbad60bba1e2ebbf56e2ffab874a1b59fde9ce3} users are running Android 1.6 (Donut) and more than 37{af589cdba9d77786c8c861317dbad60bba1e2ebbf56e2ffab874a1b59fde9ce3} of users are stuck up with Android 1.5 (Cupcake), which is perhaps the oldest marketed platform currently in use widespread. There are very few devices running Android 1.1 and Android 2.0/2.0.1 version OS, but they are very negligible.
Why this data is important? Few days back, when Google released revamped version of Google Image Search for Android, it disappointed more than 65{af589cdba9d77786c8c861317dbad60bba1e2ebbf56e2ffab874a1b59fde9ce3} of Android device users, as revamped image search is only made available to Android 2.1 platform. The same is true when Twitter’s Official Android Application was launched for Android 2.1. The more Google is restricting the new releases to latest Android version, the harder it becomes to fill gaps among Android users. More over user experience varies over different Android OS platforms, making it difficult to judge OS in single nutshell. And at end, Android developers have to focus on release of their applications on different OS versions, making OS (Android Market) outlook more fragmented. Hope Google will sort things ASAP!
