Steady on! What is an industry without competition, I for one am glad that Apple haven't still got the smartphone market all for themselves...

Android is a worthy alternative to the Apple kind, the main difference being that Android is simply the operating system (like windows) and many manufacturers make the hardware to run them on.

Android is (by os) the most popular in the smartphone industry, and Samsung has also overtaken Apple for market share in the sales of smartphones for the most recent quarter.

The quality of the hardware is vast in Android phones, which means you can indeed get a phone much cheaper than an Apple alternative. The high quality devices are however fantastic, and my phone the Galaxy S2 has been regarded as the best phone in 2011 over Apple's best offerings through many reviewers.

It is so refreshing to know that I am not the only old fart on here called Mike who is baffled by the age we live in....

Mike, if it can do anything to reassure you: as a free-lance IT'er I am supposed to keep in touch with technological progress; but today's telecom market is giving me a very hard time at that, and no indication tomorrow will be easier.

Perhaps I need to further explain that the Android O/S can run on several devices, more or less related, such as mobile phones, music/video players, &C ; all of them portable and with some flat display, usually a color LCD.

You need to choose a device which does the job you need to be done.

A lot of people don't need a "smartphone" at all. In fact I have only just moved to one (a Nokia 700) from a Nokia E51. The 700 is very small and much smaller and lighter than an Iphone or other similar devices. I made the move only because this one has a GPS so it can the free Nlkia road nav app, log the track while flying, and the display is good enough for weather maps etc.

Also most normal phones are much better for making phone calls than the smartphones, which (notably the Iphone) are notorious for poor signal reception, which is a major factor if you live/work/travel in the countryside. Here in the sticks, it is always the case that our Iphone4 becomes unusable long before the Nokias.

A lot of people also don't need a tablet. If they examined their real "portable computing" needs (if any) they would realise they should actually buy a normal lightweight windoze laptop. An Ipad is functionally crippled compared to a windoze laptop; it is mostly a multimedia consumption device which is also a good web browser. It is good for running apps which are sufficiently functionally limited to run with the finger-gesture interface, and that rules out most apps for creating stuff.

You also don't save much money by avoiding Apple. Their build quality is generally good, and an Android device of similar quality costs similarly. The Ipad2/3G is about £500 and so is the Samsung Galaxy 10" tablet. Both of these are very similar although obviously the latter is much more open (unless you jailbreak the Ipad, which you can't do just yet :) ). I've just jailbroken our Iphone4 and it is great, to be able to simply have drag/drop access to everything in there.

You might want to note that "Aviation Tools" requires permission to make phone calls without your intervention. Not that I don't trust the manufacturer, but I'm not letting any app onto my phone with that permission set. People fall upon hard times...

Apps can send a phone number to the phone for you to press "call" without this permission. The purpose is probably legit, for calling weather services or whatever, but if it keeps calling weather services abroad through a bug or intentionally, it'll get expensive on your phone bill.

Then there are pay calls. Remember those calls people were getting where one signal came through from a peculiar country code? Those who simply dialled back got no tone, no nothing. Some made several attempts to see who was calling. The calls something like €10 each. Someone in Nigeria was making a small fortune. Do we really want apps which are able to call out at will... ?

I'm an Android app developer, just bought a new Sony Tablet S, is there a specific app that you wanted?

to PlymouthPixie - what applications
 

excellent, here is the shopping list:
- moving map application containing all European 1:500 000 icao charts.
- XM weather like for Europe - you are to solve the date availability issue
- flight plan filling capability - including IFR CFMU autoroute
- NOTAMS download and smart auto filtering

All that free of charge of course and available no later than end March.
....and now seriously:
Don´t waste you time with E6B or W&B calculator, I am really wandering about some moving map application - I guess it must be possible to combine some free map source with airspace definition files - I am almost sure that the gliding community using GPS logger has such files....I am on track to get a tablet, I have almost decided for Android (perhaps Sony S you are mentioning) but availability of applications seems to be issues there. But the market share of android is going up all the time so I am hoping...to became one of your testers..I do not want to end up with Ipad.....

Not even with the imminent skydemon release on it?

For existing apps with rolling map capability, look for AirspaceAvoid and Naviator. The latter is still missing CAA charts though, and I have requested twice that the developer should introduce them but there seems to be no interest in it. I believe more voices should sound towards the developer of Naviator as it's a fantastic app but next to useless without our local charts!

Pixie,

I too have a Sony Tablet S, very good bit of kit I am yet to try it in the air though. I would love to see a decent backup navigator, but the two I have previously mentioned don't do the job well (although AirspaceAvoid has UK charts, the UI is clunky and blocky IMO).

ft,

I believe the reason Aviation Tools requests the ability to make calls is down to the fact that the airport contact numbers are included in their database, so you can actually call them from the airport page. I cannot recommend this app more, it will list airports around you and all the information you could need.

James

PlymothPixie*,
I understand that the normal development environment for Androids is Java, or some look-alike. But there seems to be a gcc around for it, too; how hard would it be to to port my homebrew C code, written for the Liunux environment, to Android? More generally, how feasible is apps dev on Android in C?



*a deliberate typo, to make up for Foxmoth's frustration.

Skydemon on ipad
 

well why not. So far I have seen just "no comment" on this, do you know for sure it´s comming?

Suffice to say it is a fairly open secret. Beta version being tested now.

Android is basically Linux under the hood, and you are absolutely correct that C or C++ code can be compiled with Android's version of GCC using the NDK (Native Development Kit). Many organizations do this as a way of having their core functionality portable across different platforms, while using Android's Java APIs for the user interface and other "glue logic".

In fact, it recently became possible to write entire Android apps, including user interaction, using C/C++ rather than Java.

(I am also a software developer for Android and other mobile platforms.)

looked at the Naviator site but so far I can not see much of European data? How good is Naviator for Europe?

I use Airspace Avoid and Pocket FMS (on the PC) which makes a pretty good combo. I understand as well that Airspace Avoid will get a lot of flight planning functions before too long. Right now, any flight plan saved in Pocket FMS on the PC (V1.6 or higher) will automatically be available for AirspaceAvoid (recent version) and displays there. Good start.

I do hope that Jeppesen will finally port at least Jep View over to Android. Now that the 10 inch tabs are out, there really is no reason for them not to unless they are in bed with Apple. In which case I do hope someone else comes up with a solution for Android.

I use the Galaxy Tab, the 7" original one, and am very happy with it. I also tested Airspace Avoid on a cheap chinese Tab (A81E) and it works just fine. Out of an old Yoke mount I attached the universal kind of connector which allows to connect a bracket for both of them to have them in the plane. Once Airspace Avoid can do the flight planning and tracking as well, that will mean good bye to the Garmin 296 which keeps loosing signal.

I actually think it's a fantastic app, but the EU charts are very lacking. Although all the important waypoints are present (VOR, DME, Airfields), and you can even direct to on ICAO code or even just airport name, the charts are very basic. Only 3 colours indicating towns, land and water, towns are just a splat on the land. Really not enough to navigate with visually, although you could get direct to headings and vor track quite well.

I have contacted the developer twice now, and he has said on both occasions that there are 'copyright' issues which prevent it happening. I fail to understand how this developer is facing these issues when there are many other apps using CAA charts (mainly for iOS mind you) and even their own made charts (airspace avoid). I don't know if anyone else requesting the same would tempt this developer, but it's got some fantastic features and a more detailed chart would top it IMO.

There is good map info available, without any copyright hassles, at the openstreetmap project. I was going to integrate this in my own soft (which only shows planned and effective routes, up till now, plus some waypoints) but couldn't yet find the time for it; and am not hopeful for the future either.

Perhaps when Sky Demon is released for the iPad (Sk-iDemon?) they might do an Android version. They said they wouldn't look at either...

That would seem to be a logical next step given the huge inroads being made by Android.

I'm the developer of the Naviator application. It's not entirely true that I'm not interested in improving the EU charts. I'm currently working on some improvements to the map that I hope will make it much more useful for VFR flying in Europe as well as the rest of the world (the 3-colour base map will be a thing of the past).

If anyone knows a good data source for European airspace boundaries, I'd love to hear about it.

Cheers,
Mike

our engineless friends flying gliders are using such files for their loggers/ipaqs...
Czech republic, Germany
etc...but I am quite sure I have seen all the national files at a single location in the past........