Category: Android

The AccuWeather Platinum app for Android, the pay version of the free app, has been updated today with a new 7-day allergy forecast.  As a pane on the Now tab of the app, you can get not only details on the types of pollen that are in your area but can get a view of what is going to be in the air over the course of the next week.

To get an idea of the types of pollen that are in the air for the day, just scroll through using the arrows on the Allergies pane to see things like grass, tree and Ragweed pollen in your area.  If you have multiple cities that you track in the app, the Allergies pane will reflect the conditions for those locations too.

Nokia’s acquisition of Withings is now complete and we are starting to see the first changes.  This morning, the Nokia Health Mate app started rolling out to users, updating it from the Withings app under the same name.  The app changes are not just in name or the icon on your Home page.  Nokia has done a major revamp of the UI for the app but all of the features of the Withings app are still there for you to access.

Nokia moved all of the navigation in the app to the bottom, giving you a Home, Dashboard, a Leaderboard for activities you are competing against each other, your devices and your profile.  All of this is wrapped in a beautiful white, Material Design inspired UI that looks much more modern than the last update from Withings.

Huawei has released an updated firmware build for the Huawei P10.  The new version is VRT-L09C432B133 for those keeping score at home.  The key part of Huawei’s naming convention is the last four figures, in this case B133.  The earlier part of the build will change depending on which model you have (dual-SIM versus single SIM for example).

The update brings a handful of optimizations to the phone along with the April Android Security Patch.  Unfortunately the update does not bring Android Nougat 7.1.1 or a newer security patch.  As for those optimizations, they are in several key areas.  First, power consumption has been optimized when you are using the P10 for an extended period of time while Wi-Fi performance has also been optimized.  Optimizations have also been made to the UI content display on some screens.  As mentioned, the April 1, 2017 Android Security Update is a part of this new firmware and Huawei also removed the TripAdvisor app from the firmware.

Microsoft Cortana, the company’s digital assistant, has been available on Android for some time now and its latest update brings an exponential improvement in usability to the app.  The new build, version 2.8.0 for those keeping score, allows you to configure Cortana so that it is your default assistant app instead of Google Assistant.  It means that you can now long press the Home button on your phone and it will pop-up Cortana so you can ask questions directly to it.

The new feature in Cortana is not enabled by default so if you want to use it as your Assistant, you will have to configure you phone to do so.  Just go into Settings and use the search feature to find Assist.  This will open up your defaults page on your phone (where you set your home launcher, browser, etc) and you will see a section Assist & voice input.  Tap it then tap on Assist app.  Now you can change it from Google to Cortana.

Google has quietly released Developer Preview 4.1 of Android Things, the Android-based Internet-of-Things (IoT) platform, to developers.  The update primarily focuses on adding new hardware that is supported to the platform as well as addressing bug fixes and performance improvements.

On the new hardware front, the new Pico i.MX6UL revision B board is now supported.  That board supports external peripherals from the likes of Adafruit and Pimoroni which dev’s can use to build their IoT solutions.  The release notes point out that the beta version of this board is not supported.

Yesterday, through some estimates made from the downloading of the Pixel Launcher from the Play Store, several reports surfaced on the number of Google Pixel phones that have been sold.  Based on the listing of the launcher in the Store, it is estimated that 1 million units have been sold since the phone launched in October 2016.

On the surface, given the vast number of Android devices in the market, this seems like a low sales number.  And it is frankly.  Samsung has sold some 5 million Galaxy S8 units in just a handful of months while other phones like the Huawei P10 have also pushed well past 1 million units.

But who cares?  While many will get wrapped around the axle on this low number, it is important to keep in mind Google never intended this device to be for the masses.  It is a flagship device with a premium price and I suspect that Google themselves aren’t too flustered over the low numbers.  Neither should you.