Database Users

Android system & App UI/GUI

Hi everyone, I have been a lurker on this forum for sometime but registered recently. I bought a Nexus one to replace my 3GS on the release day, and I must say. I absolutely adore it. I have a few questions for you guys, if anyone could shed some light on this for me it would be great.
So, basically I have been looking around the internet, various forums etc to try and grasp why the nexus one does not have smoother scrolling. By smooth I mean the actual animation attributes. I am aware that the Nexus one is fast at scrolling (and faster then the iPhone 3GS in almost every way) however, the nexus one does not handle scrolling as elegantly.
Let me define what I mean by smooth. I do not mean the hardware is not fast, as it clearly is. I mean that the GUI has not been further enhanced in the way the iphone has, to actually mimic a smooth flowing operation.
From what I have gathered on my search it could be one of a few things:
1) Android is still quite new so they have simply not gotten round to adding this yet as it is not a priority.
2) The hardware (up until this point) did not have good enough power to do so, as a result it was not included in the previous and current android releases.
3) The multitasking causes interruptions to the processor cycles during scrolling so can sometimes give a jagged/laggy scroll (I already hear you thinking: AH but this is due to other apps loading at the bottom, well the iphone scrolls exactly the same and is loading apps too).
4) The scrolling element of the UI does not utilise GPU acceleration and thus is purely relying on CPU, which means it is fast but not smooth.
My reason for asking this is simple, I am wondering what I can expect from future versions of android. I absolutely have no doubt that this platform is the future (at least for me) of mobile devices, but I would very much like to see some of the (perhaps unnecessary) GUI enhancements that the iPhone has.
My other area of interest is the market place and more specifically the creation of applications, I am by trade a UI designer, so I cant help but notice that the apps on the market place are pretty... actually lets not beat around the bush - none of them really share any common UI or style.
I am aware that the iPhone SDK provides a UI library which in turn means iPhone developers have somewhat of an aid in creating their apps, and also helps to keep native consistency with the iphone experience. Is this going to be something that changes with android (or is it even something that has started to change within the 2.1 SDK?).
When you guys read this post I hope you do not see an iPhone fanboy that has come here to bash the Android platform. I am just using my experience of a previous system to try and make sense of where the Android platform may go in the future.
These questions come out of love, not frustration or criticism. I love Android and really hope some of these issues are addressed because I feel it does everything else incredibly well. I could have made a post about all the things I love, but hey, you guys already know this . Anyways, let me know your thoughts.

I honestly hope that android doesn't get a lot of standard UI stuff, boxing in developer creativity. There is more than one way to make a good UI and I don't see the need for every app to look the same.

I was more talking about making something available to developers if they need it, incase they do not have the design skill set to do it or the resources to pay someone else to do it.
This would mean that at the least apps would look as good as the stock UI if not better (when capable developers wish to do more).

i read somewhere that the reason the iphone is so smooth at scrolling is down to its very low screen resolution, at first i was thinking nah but there certainly isnt any high end or mid tier touchscreen phone with a res as low as the iphones 320 x 480 at 163 ppi

I believe the iPhone UI uses OpenGL ES 2.0, while Android still supports something like 1.0, 1.1 or 1.3. I forget.
But, we'll have OpenGL 2.0 support soon, and I think their [Google's] roadmap has it somewhere before Android 3.0
dreamdestiny said:
i read somewhere that the reason the iphone is so smooth at scrolling is down to its very low screen resolution, at first i was thinking nah but there certainly isnt any high end or mid tier touchscreen phone with a res as low as the iphones 320 x 480 at 163 ppi
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I agree. The higher res also contributes to the slowdown (versus earlier Android devices like the G1 with much less RAM). This was especially apparent on the Droid, as it has less RAM and Android 2.0 is probably a tad less slick.

Yes, the iphone is pushing lower resolution. But, previous devices to the Nexus one where too pushing lower resolution.
I feel like I am going mad here, surely people notice the fact that iphone has built in animation styles on all scrolling, zooming - android does not. why?

I too have asked this question and haven't gotten a response. I stumbled upon this recently:http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=6914
This is something we've investigated a couple of years ago already and that we revisit
regularly. Of course we thought of using the GPU, but there are non-trivial issues on
many Android devices (a G1-class device for instance supports only one OpenGL
context at a time, which would prevent you from using any OpenGL based app like
games or augmented reality apps.) In our past experiments we even found many
cases in which using the GPU was slower than normal rendering.
New devices might allow us to overcome the past limitations that made GPU support
a not-so-good solution.
The "choppiness" and "lagginess" you are mentioning are more often related to heavy
garbage collection than drawing performance.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

It just seems the refresh rate is slower. The garbage collection mentioned for example. As the code matures it will get better. Plus I read about an update to the Dalvik VM that should help, "Dalvik Turbo VM" It should bump up speed a good bit. Between that and the JIT performance will increase a lot.

This isn't really an issue anymore with Froyo on Nexus One-class devices. Install Froyo, then install Launcher Pro or ADW Launcher and everything is smooth as silk. App scrolling, home screen scrolling, animations, app startup times, all of these are much smoother on my Nexus One w/ Froyo than an iPhone 3G, and at least on par with a 3GS.
The web browser still can bog down a bit when rapidly scrolling complex HTML pages though (Slashdot, Engadget, etc.), seems to be something with the way Javascript events are handled since the issue more-or-less goes away if you disable Javascript. I think the scrolling algorithm needs a bit of work in browser to make it as smooth feeling as the iPhone 3G/3GS are.

rcgabriel said:
This isn't really an issue anymore with Froyo on Nexus One-class devices. Install Froyo, then install Launcher Pro or ADW Launcher and everything is smooth as silk. App scrolling, home screen scrolling, animations, app startup times, all of these are much smoother on my Nexus One w/ Froyo than an iPhone 3G, and at least on par with a 3GS.
The web browser still can bog down a bit when rapidly scrolling complex HTML pages though (Slashdot, Engadget, etc.), seems to be something with the way Javascript events are handled since the issue more-or-less goes away if you disable Javascript. I think the scrolling algorithm needs a bit of work in browser to make it as smooth feeling as the iPhone 3G/3GS are.
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Pretty much this. I noticed what OP was talking about until I put Froyo on, now everything is silky smooth.

Froyo makes scrolling ok, so no issues here

MaximReapage said:
Pretty much this. I noticed what OP was talking about until I put Froyo on, now everything is silky smooth.
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Click to collapse
I disagree, while yes froyo is majoy improvements from 2.1 i still get lag especially on live wallpapers its horrid. this is what i said in reference to that issue:
"I agree also, Romain guy your have been listening to the community implementing such features this should be one of them to really listen to. I can't even enjoy the standard launcher i have to use launcher pro or ADW just to have smooth scrolling even in froyo(pre-release) at times. There should be a simple switch to enable or disable 3d accelerations like how ubuntu does it with Compiz. Your seriously telling me your cannot implement a auto-detection feature to see if the phone can handle it and if it can, then the 3d accel is enabled for that phone?
THIS IS BLASPHEMY!"
I understand what people are saying by downloading ADW etc but if I'm a new user buying android most people don't know about ADW for instance my ex-coworker who have a T-mobile MyTouch 3g slide her phone is horribly slow. I had to manually add launcher pro for her to feel the difference and even she is like wow what a difference. My point is most people first hand will automatically think the phone is slow and not on pair with the iPhone. Smoothness in a nutshell should come straight out stock android without the need for a replacement. just my opinion.

mykenyc said:
I disagree, while yes froyo is majoy improvements from 2.1 i still get lag especially on live wallpapers its horrid. this is what i said in reference to that issue:
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Click to collapse
You're complaining about lag with live wallpapers? Comparing it the iPhone which DOES NOT HAVE live wallpapers? Turn them off, stop complaining, and compare apples to apples. Same goes for pretty calendar, weather, news, facebook widgets etc.

torchedlh said:
You're complaining about lag with live wallpapers? Comparing it the iPhone which DOES NOT HAVE live wallpapers? Turn them off, stop complaining, and compare apples to apples. Same goes for pretty calendar, weather, news, facebook widgets etc.
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I said especially with live wallpapers meaning even worst. Please don't tell me to stop complaining because i am not complaining I'm voicing a opinion that can benefit us all. So if your not here to help on the benefit please leave.
thanks.

mykenyc said:
I said especially with live wallpapers meaning even worst. Please don't tell me to stop complaining because i am not complaining I'm voicing a opinion that can benefit us all. So if your not here to help on the benefit please leave.
thanks.
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You're also using a pre release version of Android that is very well documented to not be ready for general usage, of course there's going to be issues with it, really goiing to have to wait for the official release to compare scrolling

quantic01 said:
Yes, the iphone is pushing lower resolution. But, previous devices to the Nexus one where too pushing lower resolution.
I feel like I am going mad here, surely people notice the fact that iphone has built in animation styles on all scrolling, zooming - android does not. why?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The iPhone uses animations to help reduce the perception of the amount of time it takes to load things. It's eye candy to cover up a fault. The N1 just about instantly switches everything, there is no waiting, so that the few animations it does have take more time than just loading.
It's why I've turned off animations. The eye candy just wastes seconds and CPU cycles.

My biggest concern isn't the launcher since it can easily be remedied by a 3rd party launcher. I think the bigger problem is the scrolling in the web browser.
On Android because scrolling isn't a separate process given to the GPU, scrolling gets progressively slower as the number of dynamic elements(javascript and especially flash) increase.
However, on an iPhone, scrolling is independent of what elements are displayed on the website. Therefore, as the dynamic elements on a webpage increase the scrolling is still just as smooth as a simple website like these forums.
I think using the GPU for scrolling has been needed for a while now but Android really needs it with the addition of flash.

z0phi3l said:
You're also using a pre release version of Android that is very well documented to not be ready for general usage, of course there's going to be issues with it, really goiing to have to wait for the official release to compare scrolling
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regardless of the fact i think you'd be pretty naive to think the stable ota will magically be lag free. it have everything to do with launcher2 and the fact everything is handled by cpu. We have powerful phones no reason why we shouldn't be able to let GPU handle the UI...instead of defending google we should all be asking them to be able to toggle between gpu acceleration or not same way animation is toggled on and off.

Gingerbread... What Is In Store For Us?

I'm interested in hearing peoples opinions on this.
1. Do you think Gingerbread will bring a complete interface overhaul? I'm talking animations, images, layouts, multi tasking, notifications, launcher & more
2. Do you think it'll be like sense, improving social network integration, tidying up a lot of images images and adding a bit more functionality to widgets etc?
3. Do you think it'll be like a skin, simply taking image files that exist throughout Android and making them look more modern?
If they do infact do (1), do you think we'll lose functionality of some applications? Will apps have to be designed or positioned differently on Gingerbread?
I'm very excited for this, especially after seeing a video of MeeGo OS running on a smart phone, it looked so fly. In my opinion Google is going to need big changes to compete with MeeGo's interface (Not saying MeeGo is gonna take out Android, just saying it looked really nice & polished compared to Android's current state).
Google did good work in 2.1 with the launcher, app draw, animated backgrounds etc. but the stock images, buttons etc look so old. I think it needs an overhaul!

Well apparently 3.0 is gonna give the whole UI and device a revamp of looks so i cant wait to see what they do, I hope they make android become as polished as ios and bring smoother scrolling in.
LevitateJay said:
I'm interested in hearing peoples opinions on this.
1. Do you think Gingerbread will bring a complete interface overhaul? I'm talking animations, images, layouts, multi tasking, notifications, launcher & more
2. Do you think it'll be like sense, improving social network integration, tidying up a lot of images images and adding a bit more functionality to widgets etc?
3. Do you think it'll be like a skin, simply taking image files that exist throughout Android and making them look more modern?
If they do infact do (1), do you think we'll lose functionality of some applications? Will apps have to be designed or positioned differently on Gingerbread?
I'm very excited for this, especially after seeing a video of MeeGo OS running on a smart phone, it looked so fly. In my opinion Google is going to need big changes to compete with MeeGo's interface (Not saying MeeGo is gonna take out Android, just saying it looked really nice & polished compared to Android's current state).
Google did good work in 2.1 with the launcher, app draw, animated backgrounds etc. but the stock images, buttons etc look so old. I think it needs an overhaul!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

msavic6 said:
...and bring smoother scrolling in.
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Click to collapse
This... very much, this.
It's amazing to me that third-party launcher replacements offer perfectly smooth scrolling and the stock OS doesn't. I don't get it.

I also want a whole new camera interface with more control, and a built in note pad,to-do list, the basic functionality of a regular cell phone, better market support like the ability to block certain developers apps from appearing and higher quality apps as well as maybe a ui revamp in the market app. Also make more use of the gpu for graphcs. One last thing add a stock widget that displays time and weather and make it AMAZING.
Thats all i really want
OH and a better stock keyboard.
Sent from my Nexus One using XDA App

My predictions.
- Hopefully a new Multitasking UI
- Improved or customizable notification bar( hasn't changed since 1.0)
- General graphic UI revamp.
A Google employee said of you look at the Nexus One gallery app,expect a similar vibe for the whole UI in Gingerbread.

Oh god, we're just two days into august, the speculation can't start now. Gingerbread was mentioned to be released at the end of the year, which probably means Q1 of 2011. That's quite a ways away!
Once you get this gingerbread speculation rolling, we'll never see the end of it, considering it's only august!

Forge94 said:
A Google employee said of you look at the Nexus One gallery app,expect a similar vibe for the whole UI in Gingerbread.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I really like the sound of this although I can't think of how they would do this? I really wanna see a web os like multi tasking too

erikikaz said:
Oh god, we're just two days into august, the speculation can't start now. Gingerbread was mentioned to be released at the end of the year, which probably means Q1 of 2011. That's quite a ways away!
Once you get this gingerbread speculation rolling, we'll never see the end of it, considering it's only august!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Speculation can never begin too early!
If anything, we're late.

I think they are gonna allow us to customize the UI as we see fit. All those Themes and UI's in the Nexus Forum will be able to be added to stock Android's without rooting.

Blueman101 said:
I think they are gonna allow us to customize the UI as we see fit. All those Themes and UI's in the Nexus Forum will be able to be added to stock Android's without rooting.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Neat idea, although I think they'll still need a very nice & tidy stock version/overhaul to go with this as a lot of people will review the stock interface, rather than how you can customise it & many will never bother changing it too I imagine! (I don't understand those sort of people )

I think most of this UI overhaul is pure speculation based on the fact that google hired Palm webOS Designer Matias Duarte. He cannot possibly bring so much change in the few months he has been at google. But I will keep my hopes high that they can give a more smoother UI experience (where android phones/netbooks with additional graphics chip can take advantage of its hardware).
A strong and capable google official Theme Maker app (like metamorph) can bring alot of enthusiasm behind it. Would be tough though with so many unique android devices out there, how can they accommodate them all? :S

mythamp said:
I think most of this UI overhaul is pure speculation based on the fact that google hired Palm webOS Designer Matias Duarte. He cannot possibly bring so much change in the few months he has been at google. But I will keep my hopes high that they can give a more smoother UI experience (where android phones/netbooks with additional graphics chip can take advantage of its hardware).
A strong and capable google official Theme Maker app (like metamorph) can bring alot of enthusiasm behind it. Would be tough though with so many unique android devices out there, how can they accommodate them all? :S
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i agree. i also believe that many people speculate that Duarte will bring in many UI changes, but as you said we are talking about 3 months which isn't enough time for a person manage to change the whole look of an OS.
i would be happy if google could at least get their act together with the homescreen which is still laggy as hell and the app drawer which has laggy zoom animations on froyo.
Having all those great benchmarks is cool and sometimes froyo is really fast, but especially the homescreen is a huge letdown.
And the homescreen is the place which you will see most of the time...

Shahpur.Azizpour said:
i agree. i also believe that many people speculate that Duarte will bring in many UI changes, but as you said we are talking about 3 months which isn't enough time for a person manage to change the whole look of an OS.
i would be happy if google could at least get their act together with the homescreen which is still laggy as hell and the app drawer which has laggy zoom animations on froyo.
Having all those great benchmarks is cool and sometimes froyo is really fast, but especially the homescreen is a huge letdown.
And the homescreen is the place which you will see most of the time...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If it's laggy with you i suggest you return your device and get a new one... because this problem doesn't exist on the 3 nexus ones i've used.

I didn't realise he only had 3 months to work with it... :/
Although I imagine he has quite a team working with him to get a lot done in whatever time they have!

I'm running stock Froyo and I don't notice any lag in the homescreen and the app drawer. I installed Launcherpro before and I didn't notice any difference in scrolling. Both stock homescreen and Launcherpro homescreen have smooth scrolling.
Maybe someone can direct me with a video that can show me what a laggy scrolling is like.

yeah i dont get the laggy scrolling either, but then again i use launcher pro for so long now. i'm getting really sick of people comparing choppy scrolling, i want to make a video showing otherwise!! i'll admit certain UI lists do get choppy. but most are not so.

oh and doesnt anybody listen to android podcasts? last week android guys podcast leaked a little rumor that gingerbread was all about tablets, heard from someone directly involved. make of that what you will.

im personally against making the UI look more like iOS... i like the direction that windows 7 mobile is headed with the simplistic 2 tone menus and choice of text over icons.. things like pretty scrolling and fancy animated icons add more bloat

nobody said anything about making the UI look like an iphone, it was said to make the UI be AS POLISHED as the ios is.
norazi said:
im personally against making the UI look more like iOS... i like the direction that windows 7 mobile is headed with the simplistic 2 tone menus and choice of text over icons.. things like pretty scrolling and fancy animated icons add more bloat
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

Gingerbread will make Android look like the Gallery app. If you watch the Google I/O videos on YouTube you see that a new music app is being used which has the UI of the current Gallery app.
So when they were showing off FroYo back at the conference, they already had some work done for Gingerbread.

Gningerbread teased in voice search video tutorial

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dugI-robCuQ

Make that Gingerbread....that's what i get for rushing a thread before lunch.

Nice find. Am I alone in preferring the current look?
Sent from my CM6.1 powered HTC EVO 4G using Tapatalk

niiiiice!!!!!!!!!

I hoped in new and more transitions effects...
but the major thing i don't understand is why some google widgets are white, and others are black...why don't keep it coherent, it would result much better

Even though green is my favorite color, it didn't look to good in the low quality pics that had been leaked so far. They were all blurry and I think over-saturated as well. But seeing it clearly now it looks much better then I had previously thought.
Also, I like that it's being demonstrated on an N1 still. Take that NS

Here's a screenshot of it, for everyones convenience.

More thumbs from the video at Engadget.
The new launcher graphic looks awful; and what's up with the boxy look of everything? Basic UI stuff like radio buttons look AWFUL now. I'd rather they look completely flat (black/white only) then the cartoon-like gray-ish flat graphics they decided to use in Gingerbread - in fact, I much prefer the Froyo look. Popups are now boring looking, even more so than before which is quite a accomplishment. The status bar is a mixed bag, in the blurry pics I hated it, now I only kind of hate it. I think I can get into a black bar but the icons looks worse - not that the olds were perfect but they were overall better than what I'm seeing here.
Overall I'd rather have the old Froyo look with 3D-gallery-app-like UI overhauls of other central apps, more core OS animations and maybe HW acceleration.
-Just an opinion from somebody who works professionally as a designer and who had high expectations for 2.3/Gingerbread.

Award Tour said:
had high expectations for 2.3/Gingerbread.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Why? Google has never said what changes are coming in Gingerbread, and EVERY bit of factual evidence thus far has pointed to no major UI changes.

Hopefully you are able to choose between a white or black status bar and the froyo or gingerbread dock.

GldRush98 said:
Why? Google has never said what changes are coming in Gingerbread, and EVERY bit of factual evidence thus far has pointed to no major UI changes.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
that my friend...i believe is actually true.
it seems as though gingerbread is going to be a somewhat minor update. changes to the market, maybe changes to music and one or two more things.
if it does turn out to be a relatively minor update (compared to froyo) i would expect that honeycomb will be released a lot sooner than expected...maybe February/march

adam18488 said:
that my friend...i believe is actually true.
it seems as though gingerbread is going to be a somewhat minor update. changes to the market, maybe changes to music and one or two more things.
if it does turn out to be a relatively minor update (compared to froyo) i would expect that honeycomb will be released a lot sooner than expected...maybe February/march
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Fair enough; but who wouldn't consider this to be the most significant visual change since Android's initial release? I would, and like I said, the visual changes in my opinion have so far been bad.

moelester518 said:
Hopefully you are able to choose between a white or black status bar and the froyo or gingerbread dock.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Don't count on it.

Looks like someone made a boo-boo, the video has been taken down now.

yea, the video has been removed by user.

ahahah i saw it but you can't

The people over at Google HQ obviously need to consult with the MIUI graphic designers (consult with someone, please..). No, I don't want Android looking like an iPhone, but the other various changes they made simply just kill the default Vanilla design. Especially the music application. Honestly stock Android looks pathetic at this point compared to other User Interfaces.. very disappointing.

Eclair~ said:
The people over at Google HQ obviously need to consult with the MIUI graphic designers (consult with someone, please..). No, I don't want Android looking like an iPhone, but the other various changes they made simply just kill the default Vanilla design. Especially the music application. Honestly stock Android looks pathetic at this point compared to other User Interfaces.. very disappointing.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm a dual iPhone/Android user, and while iOS is still ahead in terms of looks (stock vs stock), stock Android wasn't bad. I actually kind of like it to be honest, just needs a little bit more work. This though is a step back.
Sent from my CM6.1 powered HTC EVO 4G using Tapatalk

http://mashable.com/2010/12/02/android-gingerbread-demo-video/

Just about the most unimpressive home UI tweaks Ive ever seen.
They just made a few things green.
Maybe theres more but Im certainly not expecting it.
Someone needs to explain how some random guy makes Launcher Pro and thus Android home UI inifintely more usable and uniform. Yet google cant even get the dock portion right.
Googles reputation of making things not pretty continues. Im expecting 2.3 to be a very very big letdown.

What are you looking forward to?

Ok I saw ics like most and im somewhat excited by the possibility of this update on the sgs2.
Now rather than focussing on ports, dev issues, etc. How about we talk about what were looking forward to the most?
Personally I've always found the ui of android lacking compared to its piers like iOS and WP7. My personal interest is in the new look, im running the excellent theme by vertimus and its made using the phone more enjoyable (odd I know) I think options like folders on the homescreens, and even the handling of the running apps makes the ui seem far more user friendly.
my second point I like is the facial unlock, i've never liked unlocking phone via codes or patterns, one people can learn them, and second there labourius
So i'll ask once DO NOT START RANTING ABOUT THE PORT, DEMANDING, ETC. JUST TALK ABOUT WHAT YOU'RE LOOKING FORWARD TO.
moderators if you think this is a bad post feel free to shut it down, and ill hold tongue re ics til a later time, id also suggest if some derails this topic u ban them, as a warning..
So what you looking forward to?
Sent from my GT-I9100 using XDA App

i demand to have a beta build to play with and i want it NOW haha i wanted to be a troll oh yeah by the way when is the release going to be
Just messing...anyways what i am looking forward to the most from ICS. well firstly the ultra smooth fujutweaks that make it extra crisp and smooth when scrolling through the homescreens. also the new layout and animations. to be honest mate although GB is good im just looking forward to the whole OS and i am wondering what the devs of gaming applications and other apps can do with the new beast once it comes out

Matriak31 said:
i demand to have a beta build to play with and i want it NOW haha i wanted to be a troll oh yeah by the way when is the release going to be
Just messing...anyways what i am looking forward to the most from ICS. well firstly the ultra smooth fujutweaks that make it extra crisp and smooth when scrolling through the homescreens. also the new layout and animations. to be honest mate although GB is good im just looking forward to the whole OS and i am wondering what the devs of gaming applications and other apps can do with the new beast once it comes out
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
+1
Sent from my GT-I9100 using xda premium

And as a side note.. Its a shame all the keyboard heroes couldn't shut their mouths n there by ruining your thread
Sent from my GT-I9100 using xda premium

Ban the Matriak31, BAN HIM!!!
jokes
Yeah I think ICS will bring Android up to the same bar as it's piers, i'm also interested to see if the camera will be instantanious as the Nexus, this will be very useful to myself.
Also you guys have any views on the colour swap google have introduced, i mean green for how long now? and were switching to a colour which i'd call cyan... cyanogen?

diablous said:
Ban the Matriak31, BAN HIM!!!
jokes
Yeah I think ICS will bring Android up to the same bar as it's piers, i'm also interested to see if the camera will be instantanious as the Nexus, this will be very useful to myself.
Also you guys have any views on the colour swap google have introduced, i mean green for how long now? and were switching to a colour which i'd call cyan... cyanogen?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i wouldn't mind the colour change to be honest..Reminds me of Tron

I'm looking forward to the new awesome smoothness its reported to have . Hopefully force closes and lag will be a thing of the past come ics. and do u think Samsung will launch a new version of tw for the update? Or just release ics and add in the new features wit tw4 :L
------------------
sent from my galaxy s2, using my fingers.

I think iOS has a good interface for a toy with that app drawer and nothing more where you don't even have widgets and you have to go to settings to enable or disable wifi, etc.
Now its about android or wp7 and yes... a real improvement for the intarface is wellcome.

To be honest, I am more than satisfied with my sgs 2 right now. However I will say I do look forward to hardware acceleration. I might not see the difference, but its still appreciated. Also maybe some system improvements would be nice so android would be more efficient at handling resources.

Quite a lot actually...
The camera interface and multitude of extra features that ICS has on offer.
Not much of TW. I mean TW has got better, but is still not in Sense's league (which actualy is pretty big resource hog, the reason why htc phones have never had good battery life). I wouldn't extra software tweaks and additional apps (bloatware..), but keep it non obtrusive.
Keep it as close to stock in terms of visual overlay. Stock ICS does look amazing.
Better battery management, no android os bug.
Better audio quality in video recording.
Better optimised browser and tabbed browsing. All of us do use third party browsers but an excellent stock browser wont hurt. Not everyone is a nerd and we do expect some things to be good , out of the box.
Steer clear of trying to copy ios.. (Sammy you know what I am talking about).
Loads of expectations but well that is just me.

I'm excited about the new multitasking, launcher, and redesigned UI and Widgets.
Sent from my GT-I9100 using xda premium

King Shady said:
I'm excited about the new multitasking, launcher, and redesigned UI and Widgets.
Sent from my GT-I9100 using xda premium
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Click to collapse
+1
Basically we were left out when honeycomb came out. They got the deal and we didn't so this is the update that brings us in the same league.
I am looking forward to Linux kernel 3. Efficiency Improvements. Better games with joystick support. Word like spell check throughout UI. Even smoother graphics. Kick ass mobile platform besting multi tasking. Data usage control like a BOSS.
Am waiting to see what Samsung does to ICS. I feel with touchwiz 4 they did an awesome job.
Sent from my GT-I9100

Honestly, this phone is close to perfect, as was my Android-running HD2 before it, but anything that improves battery life is particularly appreciated on the sgs2... I know its the old conundrum of battery tech not improving at a time of touchscreen frenzy, but a phone is a phone - something you occasionally need to depend on - and 24 hours does not cut it.
Sent from my GT-I9100 using XDA App

It should be as battery resourceful as an iphone. xD

I'm looking forward to what the manufacturers are going to do...
What is HTC going to do with sense, what about Touchwiz, Motoblur etc etc?
The ICS UI/launcher looks great and my question is: Does it it need further modification by those companies?

I'm looking forward to rubbing my iphone using friends noses in the dirt!
Nah, just the smoothness and overall optimized speed and look of the ui. Not too big a fan of touchwiz ui though! We'll see.....

Cobesz said:
I'm looking forward to what the manufacturers are going to do...
What is HTC going to do with sense, what about Touchwiz, Motoblur etc etc?
The ICS UI/launcher looks great and my question is: Does it it need further modification by those companies?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's not about looking great, it's about being different. We ain't no ios or wp7.
$1 gets you a reply

It seems a lot of users are unaware that touchwiz is hardware accelerated, including the stock browser. I underclock my sgs2 to 500mhz and its just as smooth and slick as default 1200mhz, no difference what so ever. If you use other launchers, you will notice the difference big time. Only really need the extra power for graphically demanding games like Shadowgun and Blood and Glory, and Flash player.

MDaveUK said:
It seems a lot of users are unaware that touchwiz is hardware accelerated, including the stock browser. I underclock my sgs2 to 500mhz and its just as smooth and slick as default 1200mhz, no difference what so ever. If you use other launchers, you will notice the difference big time. Only really need the extra power for graphically demanding games like Shadowgun and Blood and Glory, and Flash player.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The extra power for graphically demanding games isn't coming in the form of ICS. For that we need an improved GPU which unfortunately won't be until the sgs3 is released. That being said, try Siyah kernel, you can overclock the GPU and have no graphical issues.
---------- Post added at 05:22 AM ---------- Previous post was at 05:20 AM ----------
I'm hoping ICS reduces OS fragmentation. Sadly though, I fear it will only lead to more of it.

Improved battery management. Really, I don't ask for much.

Google on hardware acceleration in ICS

Nice explanation from google regarding hardware acceleration, a must read one
http://blog.gsmarena.com/googles-dianne-hackborn-talks-about-hardware-acceleration-in-android-says-it-had-it-in-it-all-along/
Original post
https://plus.google.com/105051985738280261832/posts/2FXDCz8x93s

Very interesting indeed.
What do you guys notice with enabled hw acceleration (build.prop tweak and set in most custom ROMs)? Do you think it is always smoother? Do you even feel a difference?

great find.. ICS is starting to infect my urge to upgrade
but it says that hw acceleration wont be available for nexus s and below..
so on default hw accel. is only enabled on dual-core phones?

Gorjess said:
great find.. ICS is starting to infect my urge to upgrade
but it says that hw acceleration wont be available for nexus s and below..
so on default hw accel. is only enabled on dual-core phones?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It seems to be like that, also the GPU should be strong enough to handle it,else only cpu rendering

The article is enlightening, but comes across as an excuse for laggy interfaces on Android when one considers IOS manages much smoother transitions with apparently lower spec hardware.

Frostfree said:
The article is enlightening, but comes across as an excuse for laggy interfaces on Android when one considers IOS manages much smoother transitions with apparently lower spec hardware.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well.. that is so true. And probably one of the reasons iOS still rulz
A quick visual overview between and android device vs and iDevice.. would have the android device cry
This is one of the reasons I am really eager to have ICS on my sgs2!
I want to see some smoothness

I saw on Beyond3D linked Andrew Munn's thoughts to Dianne Hackborn's post
https://plus.google.com/100838276097451809262/posts/VDkV9XaJRGS
Its a bit of a downer and still a long ways to go.

At last. All this hw acceleration 'hacks', enablers, tweaks, bull****...
it really got on my nerve.

Can't say i've ever had a problem with smoothness on SGS2 with touchwiz. Seems it must be hardware accelerated. That's why the phone can do any live wallpaper I throw at it and won't slow down, lag or skip. Stock.
Throw on a home screen replacement like Launcher Pro, ADW or Go Launcher and live wallpapers are useless mind.
I-phones are nice and smooth, but that's because the whole screen is filled with lovely la la baby icons, you can't see the wallpaper, it has nothing running in the background, no widgets, the operating system stays the same with every iteration bar some crap additions like notification centres and Siri, and has no live wallpaper.
I know which phone I would choose.

biffsmash said:
Can't say i've ever had a problem with smoothness on SGS2 with touchwiz. Seems it must be hardware accelerated. That's why the phone can do any live wallpaper I throw at it and won't slow down, lag or skip. Stock.
Throw on a home screen replacement like Launcher Pro, ADW or Go Launcher and live wallpapers are useless mind.
I-phones are nice and smooth, but that's because the whole screen is filled with lovely la la baby icons, you can't see the wallpaper, it has nothing running in the background, no widgets, the operating system stays the same with every iteration bar some crap additions like notification centres and Siri, and has no live wallpaper.
I know which phone I would choose.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
And that's my friend why I now love samsung and my GS2 so much
It is the only android that makes android really proud

i would love to know you are getting TW to run smooth without lagging, because mine lags like hell on fresh stock rom. especially when the wallpaper scrolls with the homescreen. TW just never worked for me.

I'm running cyanogen and never seen any lag, even with very heavy customization.
Sent from my GT-I9100

As said, twlauncher is really butter smooth even with a live wallpaper, the only problem with twlaucher is resizing and multi dpi. Twlauncher wont use fullscreen when using 200 or 180 dpi.

djunited said:
i would love to know you are getting TW to run smooth without lagging, because mine lags like hell on fresh stock rom. especially when the wallpaper scrolls with the homescreen. TW just never worked for me.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Then you must have a faulty phone? Touchwiz has been buttery smooth on every single TW rom I have tried.
Sent from my GT-I9100 using xda premium

Android can never be as smooth as iphone?
Android will be laggy even with HW acceleration, the reason is
http://www.tipb.com/2011/12/06/android-ui-smooth-ios/
http://www.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/n1e89/follow_up_to_android_graphics_true_facts_or_the/
But i am very much happy with my SGS2.

hariprs said:
Android will be laggy even with HW acceleration, the reason is
http://www.tipb.com/2011/12/06/android-ui-smooth-ios/
http://www.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/n1e89/follow_up_to_android_graphics_true_facts_or_the/
But i am very much happy with my SGS2.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
""UI rendering occurs on the main thread of an app
UI rendering has normal priority"""
As long as the task is running in cpu we can talk about threading and setting thread priority, but once the task switches to GPU(as in ICS) there will be no need for thread priority and where the rendering of UI takes place.
So if any apps makes use of hw feature in ICS, they should be smooth enough to run at 60fps for rendering.

King Shady said:
Then you must have a faulty phone? Touchwiz has been buttery smooth on every single TW rom I have tried.
Sent from my GT-I9100 using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not sure about that.other launchers are very smooth.phone runs everything fine.what fault coupd there be thats making tw not as smooth as most describe it to be.

Agree with the posts that say TWLauncher is the smoothest on the SGS2, I've tried most of them. Live wallpapers have little effect on that smoothness, and that can't be said for other launchers.
Overall, the SGS2 is as smooth as the iPhone 4 I had.
However, I did play with a WP7 Lumia 800 the other day, and it is definitely the smoothest UI I ever used.
The ip4s is pretty smooth too... but I'd trade a tiny bit of smoothness for the sheer possibilities with Android.... but I have to say I was really quite impressed with WP7.

Was using my mobile clocked down to 500 mhz.. as a downside my go launcher started to lag like anything, switched to stock TW, to my total disbelief, the stock launcher is insanely smooth even when downclocked to 500 mhz. Stock launcher is purely hardware accelerated for sure.

I use hyperdroid which uses a build.prop tweak to enable hardware acceleration. Now even if i place go launcher's apk in system/app folder, still i cant see it running as smoothly as touchwiz. So is that tweak really working with other launchers. I deleted original touchwiz and rebooted but still go launcher lags a lot as comapared to tw. Anyone knows what exactly that tweak does?
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