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Post by Smiler Online on Feb 6, 2015 12:03:58 GMT
What do you think Andromium needs to enable it to provide the perfect desktop experience and make people decide to replace their current desktop for Andromium for most daily tasks.
Well, obviously there is a difficulty with making apps display a more desktop friendly UI when the host device is a Phone, and Windowed mode isn't a common feature in apps.
To be honest, I think that to make it feel perfect, there will be a need for better API's for developers to make their apps more 'Multi-Window' friendly, and when displayed in 'desktop mode' they should automatically switch the DPI setting that the app uses to make the text and icons appear more correctly sized for that environment.
But I imagine that much of this will require Google to integrate this into a future Android build.
You could do some of these things with a rooted device, but I can't imagine that the majority of Android users are using rooted devices.
Also, here is an example of what ARM managed to do in June last year with a few tweaks to the Android OS to help create a desktop experience, unfortunately I haven't heard about any progress with that project. It would be nice to have that DPI scaling & auto switch from phone to tablet UI when in desktop mode.
But I believe that if Andromium can show that there is a need for this kind of experience, then we may start to see Google or even OEM's customized Android builds start to introduce the API's needed to make it easier for developers to make apps more desktop friendly when running from the phone in Andromium.
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kahun
Junior Member
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Post by kahun on Feb 6, 2015 12:38:49 GMT
Well I think there is a way to get normal apps now working in Windowed mode as Samsung had things such as Quad View which splits the apps into 4 on a screen.
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Post by Smiler Online on Feb 6, 2015 13:01:24 GMT
Well I think there is a way to get normal apps now working in Windowed mode as Samsung had things such as Quad View which splits the apps into 4 on a screen. True, but unfortunately that is limited to a few newer Samsung devices & it has issues scaling the UI's to utilize that display real-estate available on external HDTV's. But I would like to see it on more devices & custom ROMs.
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kahun
Junior Member
Posts: 64
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Post by kahun on Feb 6, 2015 13:03:24 GMT
Well I think there is a way to get normal apps now working in Windowed mode as Samsung had things such as Quad View which splits the apps into 4 on a screen. True, but unfortunately that is limited to a few newer Samsung devices. I would like to see it on more devices & custom ROMs. Well my tablet only had Dual View with Sammy's ROM but I used to have a custom one where I had Quad View taken from tab pro 12.2 until i flashed lollipop and I also know that Sammy's apps you can launch in windowed mode.
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Post by Smiler Online on Feb 6, 2015 13:09:35 GMT
True, but unfortunately that is limited to a few newer Samsung devices. I would like to see it on more devices & custom ROMs. Well my tablet only had Dual View with Sammy's ROM but I used to have a custom one where I had Quad View taken from tab pro 12.2 until i flashed lollipop and I also know that Sammy's apps you can launch in windowed mode. So obviously, there is one major OEM doing something in this area, but I don't really see many people taking advantage of that yet (only tech enthusiasts like us). I guess much of the software/hardware is out there, but it needs to come together better... Andromium is one of the parts that we need, but there is still more needed to perfect the 'portable desktop'. *EDIT* Perfect portable desktop experience requirements:Launcher/Desktop UI: Andromium. Now Available. Hardware: CPU: ARM Cortex A15 generation hardware or x86/MIPS equivalent would be fine. RAM: 1GB minimum and 2GB reccomended. Display output: MHL/Chromecast or other wireless display mirroring alternative. Bluetooth/USB peripherals: Mouse/Trackpad & Keyboard. Developer Tools (to enable better multi-window apps on ROM): Only available on some ROM's. Not available to all users as of yet - although some experienced people could use custom modified ROM's to enable this.Other changes to Android that may be needed:Better cursor customization as it is a little too big on phones at the moment.
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Post by Smiler Online on Feb 9, 2015 16:02:41 GMT
Lol, and ARM have just uploaded another video about this 'Seamless Computing' experience to Youtube (Embedded below). This will work really well with the Andromium app to provide the desktop UI. Does this video suggest that we may see technology like this in phones in the near future?, I sure hope so. I hope to see ARM's marketing department put more time into promoting Seamless computing on ARM, in order to get more people talking about it and preparing/developing for it. *EDIT* More info: community.arm.com/groups/android-community/blog/2015/02/09/seamless-computing-your-mobile-as-a-desktopThis blog post may also provide some useful information to help with the development of the Andromium project!.
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Post by Gordon on Feb 10, 2015 0:48:26 GMT
Hmm interesting video, but unfortunately according to their blog, their way to force Universal DPI changes require root access, which is what we don't want to do. It is unfortunately there is no alternative to the Root DPI change APIi in android, it is probably one of the most useful things we can do to make Android Apps more useful in Andromium OS desktop environment.
Keep those post coming guys.
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Post by Smiler Online on Feb 10, 2015 7:14:54 GMT
Hmm interesting video, but unfortunately according to their blog, their way to force Universal DPI changes require root access, which is what we don't want to do. It is unfortunately there is no alternative to the Root DPI change APIi in android, it is probably one of the most useful things we can do to make Android Apps more useful in Andromium OS desktop environment. Keep those post coming guys. I wasn't suggesting that Andromium should copy the whole ARM project, but there is some stuff in there that could help to improve Andromium, and their reports on what worked/failed could be useful info too.
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Post by Smiler Online on Jun 3, 2015 19:13:23 GMT
*UPDATE* For those of you interested, here is a video showing the early example of 'Multi-Window' in Android M. I have hacked my Nexus 5 to enable this, but in its current state it is quite limited (hence they didn't enable it without the need for you to modify your devices build file), but it shows that they are working on adding better support for 'multi-window' apps. It currently doesn't give you much control over which apps are displayed at the top/bottom or left/right, you just select one app and if you want it to display at the top/bottom, then it will show that and some other random app from your recent apps list. But with this being available to developers (after a little build file modding), hopefully devs can prepare their apps to be better in multi-window environments. There is still no support for DPI scaling to allow the app to scale more suitably, but there is still time for that to be added before the final build of Android M. If Google's Android team are looking at supporting projects like Andromium OS, then we only need support for a secondary/desktop launcher & better control of the apps displayed in the windows. Now that Microsoft is working on something like this with 'Continuum for Phones' and Canonical also have announced a device with a similar experience running 'Ubuntu Phone' is coming later this year, it would be crazy for the Android development team to ignore this kind of technology, I imagine that Apple will eventually feel the need to provide something like this next year too as more people discover that this will be possible with 'Windows Phone' etc. In order to make Android M multi-window mode feel a little better I think that Google only need to allow the user to select one app in the recent's and where it goes and then show the apps list in the open space to allow the user to select which app is displayed there. That should enable most apps to work well with 'multi-window' mode without any need for recoding in most cases, then there will just be a need for the devs to add support for future API's allowing their apps windows to be scaled & moved around the display more like their users would expect in order to make it feel more like a typical desktop OS experience. Anyway, I hope that this will help to enable Andromium OS' team to achieve what they set out to achieve
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Post by Gordon on Jun 6, 2015 22:25:34 GMT
Hi Smiler Online, thank you for the update. We have been keeping an eye on Android M and the multi-app feature as well. We are cautiously hopeful in seeing what the finalized version can bring.
One of the biggest huddle we see from the Android M multi-window capability is that they are building with the similar concept and design goal as windows 8.1's tile layout. They are design to snap in-place on a pre-defined location (left side, right side, top right corner...), but is not meant to behave like traditional desktop app's "windows". In my opinion the tile's approach is great for working with multi-app in tablet form factor, but is still not ideal for desktop usage, because many user like the overlapping app approach to multi-tasking, which is not what Tile's multi-window layout design to do.
Furthermore as you commented that the UI scaling is still not design to scale for keyboard/mouse environment, so Andromium OS will still need to use our own custom UI scaling API.
We are very curious to see what new API Android multi-window capability will bring. If we are lucky, there might be a few api we can reuse that can: 1. Reduce the ram usage of Andromium OS 2. Increase UI speed and rendering for Andromium OS.
We will wait and see, but definitely excited.
-Gordon
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Post by Smiler Online on Jun 7, 2015 6:59:15 GMT
Yeah, it is definitely not desktop experience ready, but I am pleased that they are taking some time to work on a multi-window experience, and ideally when they have perfected that, maybe they can start working on an 'overlapping' windowed mode.
Android M still has a few a months left before it will be finalised, and this feature has got a lot of people interested, so I suspect that the developers of Android may feel a need to put in more time & effort to develop this feature further as we see the upcoming monthly preview build updates.
But to be honest, realistically I can't imagine anything more than a refined tile mode to be available before the final M build, but maybe with Android N, they could add the improvements required to provide a desktop experience. But I'm just assuming that they only have a small number of people working on this particular feature.
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Post by Spencer on Jan 29, 2016 20:05:23 GMT
Hello everybody. I am not a "techie" per se. (quality control engineer actually). Anyway, I became intrigued by the idea of using my phone as a desktop as I find that it is typically a hassle to haul my laptop everywhere...whereas I almost always have my phone on me. My internet searches naturally led me to here. Where I work we have two plant buildings and I have a docking station in each one of them. I just have to bring my lap top along and I'm set. Ideally id like to do the same thing but with my phone instead. I know that it obviously isn't the same as windows and all of the software available, etc. But for my home life/home based business I usually use my phone anyway. (exception being typing)
From my point of view a more windows like UI will be convenient an intuitive but also I don't think that I would need/expect my apps to display any differently than on my phone with the exception of some sort of scaling/alternate side window so that the app at least looked familiar.
I don't think a docking station is necessary for each device or family of devices, but a universal one that has a micro USB plug to facilitate a wide range of mobile devices.
If I could get rid of the need for a computer at home I would be glad.
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Post by Gordon on Jan 30, 2016 1:11:08 GMT
Hi Spencer, welcome to the forum, I think you like many of the people in the forum have similar usage requirements to use your phone to do it all, without having to carry around another laptop/desktop computer everywhere. Please come check back in the forum periodically, because we are expect to make a couple major announcement in the next few weeks/months, and will be able to bring a truly universal plug and play solution to our users very soon.
Best,
-Gordon
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Post by dcthomas on Jun 13, 2016 23:20:52 GMT
I'm discouraged about the decision to make the forthcoming new Andromium app exclusive to the Smartbook. Why not offer the app at a cost? I'd certainly purchase it for desktop use as I have no interest in a laptop. As well, why not include enhanced functionality like Universal DPI changes for rooted phones? That way you cover both basic and advanced users of the app.
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Post by Gordon on Jun 17, 2016 19:09:55 GMT
Hi Dcthomas, thank you for your feedback.
We are strongly considering making the Andromium OS an paid app, and provide the redeem code to our Superbook users, when they support/purchase the Superbook. So users like yourself can continue to use the Andromium OS for your desktop needs.
Best,
-Gordon
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