As Michael Mulvey points out, it’s not just fragmentation, but Google’s lack of attention to design.
Android’s clusterfuck
As Michael Mulvey points out, it’s not just fragmentation, but Google’s lack of attention to design.
You can always tell when it’s an article from Jim. That’s a compliment, BTW.
As posted when those “fragmentation” images first came out, while the image sizes shown may be correct the developer/designer focus is not.
Simply put: Android apps are intended to be “responsive” [using fragments]. You don’t design pixel perfection across all sizes. You deal w/ the aspect ratios that matter to you and there are only 5 of those. So Apple has 4 to design for and Android has 5. See, no biggie. It’s responsive web dev for apps…nothing new.
He’s clearly nitpicking though. Who cares if the fonts are derivative? Users surely don’t.
As for icons, compare/contrast his link [to Android’s] to iOS 7: https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/documentation/userexperience/conceptual/mobilehig/BarIcons.html. Maybe I’m just a dev so I don’t see it but I can’t see any lack of sophistication anymore on Android than iOS, which he’s clearly a fan of.
As the author himself points out, his experience is based on using a Samsung Galaxy S3. Now, the fact that different manufacturers provide vastly different Android user experiences is certainly part of the Android problem, but I also think it’s important to point out that Samsung’s Android is by far the worst version of Android out there.
Complaining about Android’s UX as a whole based on having mainly used a Samsung Galaxy S3 is like complaining about cars as a whole based on having only driven a Yugo.
I’ve recently switched from an iPhone to an Android device running plain old stock Android, as designed by Google. The UX is not as good as iOS, but all the other advantages you get (integration between apps, a wider variety of different apps that would not be allowed on iOS, etc.) more than make up for the small, but noticeable disadvantage in UX design.
The UX difference used to be huge even a few years ago. It’s not huge anymore. You’re not doing Apple any favors by pretending that it is. Apple needs a kick in the ass when it comes to iOS, not people who mindlessly defend them. Otherwise, you’ll be looking at a Mac vs. Windows situation in a few years, and nobody wants that — not even people who love Android.
The “design philosophy” of Google has always been about good enough, not being the best. Apple’s business model is around design – and they are the best at it. Google’s business model is around sending copious amounts of data to their vast learning engine – and they are the best at it.
iOS is better at a unified design and feel. The differences are there, but not huge now. Google is better at back end services – just compare mail products for example. The differences are huge.
Compare to iOS, Android is a pain in the ass to write for. No question. But both companies are winning at their core business model. The question now is which company is closing the gap faster in their weak areas? I don’t worry about Apple’s ability to keep their design lead, but I do worry about their ability to deliver supporting services. iCloud was supposed to fix that, right?
One other thing: Google’s move from Eclipse to JetBrains for their IDE for Android was a massive improvement for developers. You can’t underestimate how important tools are for coders.
If you want to compare the number of different aspect ratios, do it on both sides. On iPhones, there is only 2 different ratios, not 4 as you state (if you include the iPad, that’s 3, still not 4, but the original article only talks about phone apps design).
Now it is certainly interesting to design for an aspect ratio, but if you do only that, you ignore the minimal size that is easily tappable by the user, and you do a bad design. Designing a responsive interface is not the same as just designing for an aspect ratio, it’s a lot more interesting and difficult.
You won’t miss the tap area by any means. There are specific aspect ratio sizes to use for icons/buttons, all laid out in the Android design guidelines.
You are correct on the iOS aspect ratios. If you did screen sizes alone, on Android, you could lump a bunch of those lines in the referenced graphic easily by focusing on aspect ratio. That’s more of my point. All of those large, seemingly, 10″ tablets would simply be the large aspect ratio so you base your asset sizes on that and start designing.
It isn’t that hard.