I have a samsung s6102 and s9100 and some applications I'm working on. The problem is that I'll like to test my app on real devices and I was thinking we can do something togheter. anyone who has a question aboiut how his apps works on my devices, I'm open to test. also I'll like to know how my application acts on your devices.
Maybe this type of services is already available, but I didn't find it.
Any idea about how can I test my app on real devices, without buying them?
Samsung offers such a service.
However, there are quite a bit of limitations to that. Your best bet would be to either buy a few devices that cover the majority of features. I personally have 5 Android devices which cover various hardware specifications and screen densities. Additionally, if you have friends with Android devices, you could see if they are open to having you test your app on them. You could also hold private betas with other developers you might meet in chat rooms or on forums.
Also, if you do buy devices, make sure that you buy from more than one manufacturer, and that some devices are low end, some high end, some mid ranged, some big, some small. Also, I'd recommend buying at least one Nexus device.
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I'm in the market for a basic Android device. My main reason for buying one is for learning to develop mobile apps. While the Eclipse IDE offers a virtual Android device for testing apps, it's not the same thing as a real Android device and won't put me on the same wavelength as Android device users. (The most obvious example: Visibility is poorer in a bright outdoor environment than indoors.)
Some questions:
Is a tablet PC the type of device I should get? I get the impression that it's more versatile than other devices. I don't need a smartphone, because my dumbphone works well for me, and I don't even use it that much. And I HATE the idea of being locked into a specific wireless provider. I'm not interested in ebooks, because I still like books on paper better.
Should I get a device with Android 2.3 or 4.0? On the one hand, over 90% of current Android users are using version 2.3.3 or earlier. On the other hand, 4.0 is better and will be gaining market share. (Would buying an Android 2.3 device now and buying an Android 4.0 device later be my best bet?)
In addition to wifi, what else should I look for?
Are there any brands/models I should avoid? I remember hearing that the Packard Bell PCs were the most unreliable. The Yugo was a terrible value. (An old Oldsmobile Cutlass clunker was a better value - at least as reliable but MUCH cheaper to buy.)
Is there any point in buying used? The listings on Ebay and Google Shopping don't show the used tablet PCs to be that much cheaper than new ones, and there are more new tablets than used ones available.
Ebay listings currently (5-23-2012) show over 200 Android 2.3 tablets selling for $55-$90:
http://www.ebay.com/sch/iPads-Tablets-eBook-Readers-/171485/i.html?Operating%2520System=Android%25202%252E3%252Ex%2520Gingerbread&LH_BIN=1&Internet%2520Connectivity=Wi%252DFi%7CWi%252DFi%2520%252B%25203G%7CWi%252DFi%2520%252B%25204G&_nkw=android+2.3&_dmpt=US_Tablets&rt=nc&LH_ItemCondition=1000
Ebay listings currently (5-23-2012) show over 200 Android 4.0 tablets selling for $83-$107:
http://www.ebay.com/sch/iPads-Tablets-eBook-Readers-/171485/i.html?Operating%2520System=Android%25204%252Ex%2520Ice%2520Cream%2520Sandwich&LH_BIN=1&LH_ItemCondition=1000&Type=Tablet&_pppn=r1&_dmpt=US_Tablets&Internet%2520Connectivity=Wi%252DFi%7CWi%252DFi%2520%252B%25203G%7CWi%252DFi%2520%252B%25204G
What do you think?
This question is probably off topic.
But here are my thoughts:
If you want to develop the truth is you should try to have access (be it ownership or just access) to any devices that you intend to support with your applications. This is certainly not possible for everyone, but there are ways that you can maximize your value while building a device collection by aiming to hit the largest swath of different types of devices.
You have no obligation to be locked into a contract (or even any service) for a telephone. If you go to a carrier store you can purchase a device at full price and leave the store without activating any service on it (In general, subject to change at the whim of whatever store you are in =) If you intend to by a phone for full price expect the range of prices to be $380-$600. From what I can tell about your situation I would think that a phone is best route for you to start off with. In addition to being able to buy from a carrier, Google also from time to time directly sells a "Nexus" device which is released with stock(ish) android OS (no skins etc..) The current device in this line is the Galaxy Nexus which is being sold directly through the (former) Android Market That is a good choice because it is more or less the latest generation of hardware, and the newest OS (these Nexus devices tend to receive their OS updates in a more timely manner than carrier tied devices). In fact the first Nexus device was marketed heavily toward developers, this line of phones was meant to be used for development.
Is a tablet PC the type of device I should get?
If you intend to create applications for tablets then yes. If you intend to develop phone applications you should really be testing on a phone.
Should I get a device with Android 2.3 or 4.0?
Ideally both on different devices. If you must pick one, then it depends on your budget 4.0 is only on the newest devices right now so they are likely going to be more expensive than some of the devices you can find with 2.3. (although $399 for the Galaxy Nexus might be hard to beat in price, even for some of the 2.3 devices for sale)
In addition to wifi, what else should I look for?
On phones that can be readily purchased in the US your choices are basically boiled down to only a few things. Screen Size (anywhere from tiny to pretty damn big for a phone), HardwareKeyboard(in a few different shapes and sizes), Camera (if you care about it). In general most of the other features are fairly standard (i.e. bluetooth, gps, accelerometer, etc..) The other thing to consider would be "Oomph", despite being called phones what people are carrying around today are small computers. They have CPU, GPU and RAM just the same as PCs. Battery life is the last major divisor, there is a fairly wide range of battery life expectancy (hint, massive screen and multiple cores need lots of battery). However since you don't seem to want to use this device as your phone some of this stuff may not matter as much to you.
Are there any brands/models I should avoid?
Anything in the list of your first ebay link. In general (in the US) the major phone manufactures are: HTC, Motorola, Sony, LG, Samsung. There are many other devices out there that are nice as well. But these guys are generally the ones consistently pumping out the most used phones. Idealy you should aim for a spread of device's made by different manufacturers. The custom skins and addons they like to use in their versions of the OS tend to like extra testing. Having one of each will help you help the largest chunk of your users.
Is there any point in buying used?
There are good deals to be had on nice but slightly dated phones. If you don't know what you are looking at I'd stay away though, it could be easy to get ripped off.
Well it does not seem like you need a very expensive device. Guess you could buy Google's and Samsung's old Nexus S which is not the newest around but still has android 4 because it's Google's "offcial" or something. And since it rolled out with 2.3, you should be able to download the old version somewhere and flash it. That phone should be cheaper, especially second-hand.
I mean since there are so many devices with different screen sizes and all you can't really find one that will reveal what other device-users will think of your apps.
Carrier options should be a non-issue for development. You can buy any Android phone for any
carrier including unlocked, and that should not affect your development flexibility.
Get the lowest version you can have. 2.3 and 2.2 have the most market shares right now. There is no reason to get 4.0, unless you are developing specifically for Android OS 4.0 and above (meaning that you actually use API that only exist on 4.0 and above and not lower).
Your development platform also affects what phone model to use. If you use Windows, get a phone that comes with Windows drivers. It'd be a bummer to buy one only to find out that Windows can't detect it. Mac and Linux do not need drivers, as they are both UNIX based.
You should get a phone. If you don't want to use it you don't have to... but most likely the majority of your users will be on a device. If you want a device that is always up to date and is great for testing I recommend the Galaxy Nexus.
Since most Android phone users are not on the most up to date os version, I prefer testing on a phone with 2.3
If you temporarily need a phone to test your app, Sony Mobile developer program has a phone loaner program in US and Canada where you can borrow a device for up to 30 days.
http://developer.sonymobile.com/wportal/devworld/phones/borrow-a-phone
/Magnus E
Sony Mobile
I want to develop some apps on Android and I need to buy an Android Phone or Tablet for testing my apps.
Which model should I buy?
Do you think it is better to buy a tablet directly? Just like iPad, I can test both HD and Normal apps on it easily.
Thanks.
Raymond
Android comes in numerous screen resolutions and sizes. So whatever phone you are buying you can test only for minimal number of user-group.
So buy any good phone with high hardware facilities to test functionalities. To test UI, the Android emulators will help you a lot. Create various screen size emulators and test your UI on them.
I think this link will help you to design for multiple screen sizes:
Supporting Multiple Screens
Why don't you try emulator? From my experience almost everything will work faster on Android device. Thus if something works ok on emulator it would probably work better on real device.
If you do want to buy some hardware I recommend a phone or tablet with good support from manufacturer. The device should work for a long time so it's good to be able to upgrade Android in the future. There is no sense in buying a phone with Android <= 2.3 if it has no chances for upgrades to 4.0+
You think to yourself: what this question has to do with programming? Let me explain.
I had a SE K770i and tried to write a software on it that records sound and sends it to the server. And it occurred that the development framework on this phone limits and makes it hard to send big chunks of data.
So now i use older phone. But would like to start write some kicking bad-asses software for some new technology. So i figured out i ask you guys what is the most programmer-friendly hi-tech phone right now that is cheap and popular.
What the phone needs to have:
good software development documentation
must be cheap
must have recording, touch screen, video and sending data via internet support
must have nice access to all this resources from source code
must be popular
And it should NOT be Apple, because i can't effort 200 dollars a year to write some apps and don't like the whole verification think.
What hi-tech, cheap phone is a right way for a mobile developer these days?
As HW goes, perhaps this one which is a cheep android phone which received a lot of positive acclaim http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZTE_Blade.
Given the recent developments with symbian and Nokia, I think it might be a decent bet to develop for the Android platform. Given the features you list, either the Google Nexus or any of the Samsung Galaxy series phones would be a good fit. On the android developer website though, google lists the Nexus as the device that one should test all apps on, especially since (IMO, I could be wrong) it is closest to Android-and-nothing-else. Other phones, such as Samsung etc., have Android but also some other APIs on them.
Update: Since you mention a price <= $500, I would suggest the Google Nexus S or a Samsung Galaxy Pop/Fit etc. That would fit nicely in with your price range.
First off, sorry if this is too subjective, I just didnt know how else/where to ask.
Anyway, in the light of all my recent questions, I'm getting ready to release an Android app soon, and most of the testing has been done on my phone, the Droid. I really dont have the money to test on "multiple" devices, nor do I know anyone with an older phone that I could ask for help that would possibly get any kind of bug. Not to mention, when I do get a bug report, how would I go about fixing it for that particular phone without having to buy it to make sure it actually gets fixed, or that the person didnt just came across a one-time freakish accident of a glitch?
How do you guys solve these kinds of issues?
You can test the vast majority of issues via the emulator:
Check out this data on platform versions and screen sizes to get an idea of what configurations you should test for.
Based on that data, I'd test at least one configuration with API versions 1.5, 1.6 and 2.1, and versions with medium and high density resolutions.
If you wanted to test physical devices, I would guess that the G1 and the Droid would be the top two... G1 would give you the lower API versions, and Droid would give you the 2.1.
Depending on your application that may be sufficient. Applications that make heavy use of OpenGL extensions might need to test further, since that is the area where there is the most difference from device to device. I don't think that the emulator is sufficient for that. See this thread on the differences.
Other than that, I would just send out a demo version of the app to a few friends or an appropriate forum. If you find problems once you launch, collecting log data from users having problems can be very helpful. I wouldn't worry too much about device specific problems though, I don't think they are that common.
Disclaimer: I'm a Motorola employee in our developer services team. I don't speak for other OEMs.
Cover the range of devices that are enumerated in the "supports-screen" manifest element. Also, take into consideration when compatibility is mode on and off. Screen sizes and market filters seem to me to be the biggest things that trip developers up. Some of this you can test with the emulator and others you need real hardware.
OEMs provide SDK "addons" that allow you to run emulator images with the skin and screen size/density of their devices. Download addons from the OEM's developer sites. Motorola's addons are available at developer.motorola.com. HTC and Samsung do the same.
A commercial alternative is Mob4Hire. They have real people on real networks who can test your app for you.
Good luck
I have few friends wich have different android devices. Before app publishing I give it to them for tests. Sometimes any users submit bugreports to market, sometimes sends it to you by email. There is impossible to have all android devices and test own app on it. This is ok.
It might be worth having a look somewhere specialist such as http://www.xda-developers.com/
They've got a sizeable community there of reasonably knowledgeable people and its not uncommon to see people posting betas of apps there for consumption and feedback. There are also dedicated subforums for each phone which may assist when attempting to resolve problems on certain handsets.
I am an iphone application developer, all iphones have very similar Operating systems, and the size and everything is the same, so I don't need to create applications specific for each iphone.
But with android there are different phones, different sizes, So How can I possibly know that my app works, and looks fine on all these devices
I don't already own an android but I completed my first application using the simulator. Which android phone do u suggest for testing? I am an AT&T user and Iuse an iphone. Can I simply insert my sim-card in the new android to be able to test my app on the device?
The android virtual device lets you change the virtual hardware to match all of the current shipping phones. There are ways to receive device crash reports from a shipped application to help diagnose force closes or other grievous errors.
You need an unlocked phone to use another SIM card. The Nexus One is available unlocked out of the gate, and comes with an AT&T version. The only AT&T (as sold by AT&T) Android phone (Backflip) is stupidly crippled and should be avoided. You can also buy an Android Dev Phone, which is currently "middle of the pack" in terms of hardware. You can also easily find numerous other Android capable handsets - pick depending on your target market. Some phones are now old: for instance, the G1 is on its way out.
you won't need to worry about different screen size . take a look at Supporting Multiple Screen article . I'm not sure for the late ones because I'm also working with Android Emulator .
1 - Take a look at this Google IO session for load of tips on making your app work across devices. It's not that hard at all really
2 - I'd recommend the Nexus One if you need a phone just to develop on. It's representative of what you'll be seeing in devices in the coming years. If you want a current representative phone take a look at the HTC Legend (Mid-end) or the HTC Wildfire (Low-end). There's also the Droid and things like that but you can only get them on Verizon I think. I'm not too knowledgeable about availability in the US, I'm from the UK.