With Android “skins” like Motorola’s Motoblur and HTC’s Sense basically telling Google that the standard Android UI isn’t good enough, Google will make the user experience a top priority in its next update.
Since Android first came out in 2008, Google has done a lot to update the framework behind the operating system, with minor interface tweaks here and there. But the main look and feel of Android has hardly changed.
Unlike the iPhone, third-party manufacturers are free to tweak the interface of Google’s OS, and some have. Critics praise these “skins” as much more inspired and functional than what now looks like a rather bare-bones display in the “standard Android” interface.
According to Tech Crunch, Google will be tackling this issue as the leading addition to the next Android update, codenamed “Gingerbread.”
The majority of Android phones still apply the core user interface that Google has created, and Google doesn’t like to feel inferior to anyone, so the next Android update could very well be the most major update yet.
Android has been updated 7 times in its 2-year existence. The most recent upgrade, “Froyo” (version 2.2) added Flash 10.1 support for mobile Web browsing.
