I'd say Gingerbread will still be the most pre-installed Android version during all 2012.

Sadly I agree. Its also why I'm not too concerned that my n1 wont get a supported upgrade - I'll be needing a device that's down where the users are to dev & test. Ics will have to wait a bit.

Unfortunately I suspect you're right.

That's highly doubtful. After the source is available the full transition to the new OS by all manufacturers, even the cheap ones, seems to take about 6 months. Gingerbread source was released last December and there were no Froyo devices being sold by summer.

>there were no Froyo devices being sold by summer

What? There are still Froyo devices being sold now, as described in the article we are currently discussing:

That’s because every US carrier is still selling - even just now introducing - smartphones that will almost certainly never run Gingerbread and beyond.

Example: http://reviews.cnet.com/smartphones/huawei-impulse-4g-at/450...

Stores are filled with Froyo Tablets & Phones. Not like a year ago. But still lots.

The other point is that iOS is chockfull of crapware, though for some reason people ignore crapware if it comes straight from Apple. iOS 5 even prevents you from hiding some of the crap inside folders, I noticed this with the Newsstand app.

I think you're kind of missing the point of why the carrier crapware is bad. It isn't solely because you can't hide it or remove it, it's because in addition to that it is generally really poorly written software that has a terrible user experience and often only exists as an advertisement to some other product or service (ie. NASCAR app). Additionally in the case of some manufacturers and carriers, the standard UI is replaced with potentially less usable, but more importantly non-standard, creating an inconsistant user experience which fragments the platform.

TL;DR: if you buy an iOS device you get a consistant user experience. Thanks to the crapware, from Android you do not.

Why is that even significant? Do you have 5 iphones you use in your every day life that jumping between them would be painful if they had slightly different OSs? Doubtful. Phones have had inconsistent UIs for almost a decade before iphone, and all the iphone did was become the most popular. Razrs had consistent UIs right? But compared with a generic flip phone they were different. I don't see why all of the sudden this fragmentation and inconsistent UI is a such an evil thing or even a noteworthy subject. The manufacturers settings have no effect on apps unless they block the market place entirely. Then again I suppose the people writing articles about this subject are apple-enthusiasts and/or techies. I rarely see Jane Doe writing about fragmentation - and there is a good reason for that.

Pre-installed Apple applications are a whole different league from, for example, a pre-loaded unremovable trailer video for Confessions of a Shopaholic, which actually came on the last phone I had before the 3GS.

While the iOS bundled apps are usually quite good, what if you really don't like the built-in e-mail client?

I remember apps being rejected based on replicating functionality that already existed in Apple-branded apps. Is this still common?

The reason you can't hide Newsstand in a folder is that it IS a folder.

Limiting yes but it's not "preventing" you, it's just a constraint.

I do agree that it's irritating that you can't uninstall certain stuff though. Stocks is the main example which I think a majority of users have little or no interest in and up until iOS5 the Apple weather app was decidedly meh.

ICS makes preinstalled apps removable? Even one Google preinstalls, like Maps and Gallery and Twitter?

You can hide it within preferences which is probably the main issue with many users. From what I've seen these apps matter very little in terms of storage.

Newer (late 2010+) phones have finally learned to start putting a reasonable amount of onboard NAND, so app storage isn't near the problem it used to be. The "disable" feature sounds like it also `chmod -x`'s the app in question so it can't start, not just hide away the icon.

The one bit I'm worried about is if carriers are going to be able to comment out the feature (and the data controls, which I'm far more concerned about getting removed)

I suspect they will not be able to remove the feature as long as it's an official Android phone. My initial guess is that this will be added to CTS, or at least the list of requirements for things that work on Android.

Thus far, Google has shown a remarkable lack of backbone when it comes to the carriers. They're free to kill/restrict tethering, block non-Market apps, disable SIP support, not to mention the non-removable bloatware situation that motivated the app-disable feature in the first place. I'm not yet convinced they're willing to say 'no' to the telcos.

Depends on the phone and how much crapware is installed. I ended up having to flash my UK Orange-branded HTC Desire because they'd installed so much that there was only enough storage left to install a few user apps.

Newer phones are much better off in this regard.

I am using a branded T-Mobile HTC phone and I cannot agree more about unwanted crapware. I have a "Top Ten Apps" app on my phone which is preinstalled by T-Mobile, is not removable und runs permanently as a background process with 14mb ram (and I never started it) -.- I don't need to mention all those facebook, twitter and other "social" stuff where I don't even have accounts for.

Ha. Non-Orange phones are much better off in this regard (at least in the UK). And non-branded phones are even better.

I don't think carriers have realised just how much ill-will their crapware/crippling branding process engenders. In the past, they created a market for tools like Davinci, even though I resent having to use something like that to get MY hardware back into a sane state (and risk bricking it in the process). Now, they're pushing people towards rooting their Android phone. I haven't yet rooted my new (non-contract-encumbered) S2, but I'm sure it's just a matter of time. When I do, I'll be sure to install my usual selection of advert-filtering, revenue-denying proxies while I'm at it...

How does it solve the issue? By making the UI better? But won't OEMs want to "differentiate" by installing their own bloated flashy custom UI?

Not to mention the uninstallable adware and junkware installed and always running in the background. Does ICS solve this?

Yes, ICS solves that.

Even if the apk is installed in system partition (that means you can't uninstall it), you can mark it hidden and the system will never take it into account at startup, intent broadcast or in other situations. It is as good as removed (except that it physically can't be removed, because you may want to restore the phone to factory settings).

i give it two days after launch for a cheap model sold by AT&T to came with ICS patched to ignore certain nascar apps.

>you can mark it hidden

Is there a UI function in the OS(for example by right clicking on the icon) for that or should it be done via a adb shell?

It's available in system settings:

http://thisismynext.com/2011/10/20/bloatware-kill-switch-ice...

Do you really call "sweeping the crap under the carpet" "solving" the problem? I call it a workaround, at best. Users will often want the used space back too, not just hide the icon.