The next version of Android won’t be version 5.0.
Although we already knew it would be known as “Jelly Bean,” the actual version number had not been confirmed. Many just expected it would jump up to 5.0.
But given the rate at which Google has been updating the Android platform, apparently those number increases need to come down a bit, so Jelly Bean will actually be Android version 4.1.
It will make its debut at the Google I/O conference, which begins next week, and it’s believed that the Galaxy Nexus, one of the first phones to get Android 4.0, will be the flagship Jelly Bean device.
We still don’t know much about Jelly Bean, but it may be coming out sooner than expected, even though there have been problems with the Android 4.0 rollout process.
Both the Nexus S phone and the Transformer Prime tablet issued upgrades, only to have users complain that their device started freezing or crashing uncontrollably. As a result, manufacturers have become increasingly tepid about their ICS rollout plans.
Motorola announced this week that it would not be updating most of its devices until the second quarter of 2012.
Jelly Bean might be available very shortly thereafter, completely overshadowing the Ice Cream Sandwich upgrade process. Android 4.1 has its eye on tablets as well as potentially notebook and netbook computers.
Google wants to make a splash in the market where both Microsoft and Apple are capturing a lot of attention with their respective operating system updates this year.
