Pure Ice Cream Goodness.

 

Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich has been out for a while now. It hasn't really penetrated the market quite yet but devices are continually being updated all the time as well as unofficial ports and AOSP roms for various devices. Mostly everyone seems to love the new Holo theme that is on stock Android unfortunately OEMs still felt the need to skin it. Now the new versions of the various OEM customizations aren't nearly as bad as previous versions. I feel like Google and the various companies that manufacture Android devices can make things easier on them selves and on the consumer if they do a few things. First of all they need to get together and develop a better system for themeing, skinning, and implementing customizations that is open and will allow the consumer to have the kind of interface that they want on their device. With this system when Android is updated to a new version the company should be able to easily load their customizations from the side without having to do a lot of heavy modifications nothing in the Android system should be replaced or changed by the OEM except to add additional hardware functionality. Next OEMs should be required to release the source for hardware specific drivers to allow for open source software development. There is no reason why the source for the hardware drivers shouldn't be released this would let developers experiment and get their own versions of software to work on the hardware easier and faster without having to write custom drivers or hack up a less working setup. This would cause sells of the various hardware to go up and allow Android as a whole to progress further as an open source project! Now with this new system of themeing any one should be able to compile and run Android on any hardware they choose and then in a separate folder load all their customizations from the side not only will there be more ideas implemented from doing this but updates to devices would go much faster and smoother then ever before! This will also allow in-menu options for the users that want to choose between a OEM customized experience or a stock Android experience without any problems at all. I hope in the future that these ideas come true and Android can be a much more open and less fragmented as a system that will be used and loved even more by developers and end users.

Source: Android 4.0 Platform Highlights