Android was founded in Palo Alto, California on October, 2003. Andy Rubin, Rich Miner, Nick Sears and Chris White were known as Android Inc. They were operating secretly and did not reveal that they were working on software for mobile phones.
Android is a Linux-based operating system (OS) for mobile devices such as smartphones and tablet computers, led by Google it is developed by Open Handset Alliance. Google purchased the developer of Android in 2005, and Android was unveiled in 2007. Google released the Android code as open-source under the Apache License. Android has numerous developers writing applications (apps) all over the world. First of all the developers write their script in Java, and then download the apps from the third party sites or online stores.
In February 2012, 450,000 apps were available for Android but the estimated number of downloads since December, 2011 was more than 10 billion. There are over 300 million Androids in use and over 850,000 devices activated every day.
In August 2005, Google acquired Android Inc. Prototypes were being shown to network operators and cell phone manufacturers. The goal of Android was to create a successful real-world product that improves the mobile experience for end users. Each Android version is named after a dessert;
I. 2.3 Gingerbread – This improved gaming performance, soft keyboard and copy/paste features. ANDROID
II. 3.0 Honeycomb – supported larger screen and tablet oriented.
III. 3.1 Honeycomb – USB host mode information to cameras and other devices.
IV. 3.2 Honeycomb – optimization for a wider range of screen sizes and zoom to fill screens.
V. 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich- This version had new features added to the smartphones such as photo enhancements, offline email searching , facial recognition unlock, network data, and usage monitoring .
Market Share
As of October, 2011 Apple is starting to take the lead in the smartphone market, 37% of the