Camera apps on Android are very loosely coupled to the OS. They are intentionally left to OEMs to provide because that's the most visible aspect of hardware differentiation, and that differentiation probably depends on software support. On top of that, it would be hard to design an API for every possible camera hardware, apart from a high level API for apps to acquire an image.

>On top of that, it would be hard to design an API for every possible camera hardware, apart from a high level API for apps to acquire an image.

APIs themselves are hard to make, but why is a camera one especially so? The language is well understood, the math and science are well understood. There are only a few ways that cameras themselves work, and even few ways that cell phone cameras work.

Why is it hard?

In advance -- No, Sony/Panasonic/Toshiba/Apple/Whoever locking functions behind magic numbers and proprietary blobs and other 'un-Gentlemanly' things shouldn't count as difficulty in making a Camera API; that's just shit companies being shit to people, not an API problem.

>There are only a few ways that cameras themselves work, and even few ways that cell phone cameras work.

Have an infrared camera that augments the image from a normal camera?

Have a rotationally pop up camera that allows using the same 3 cameras for back and selfie, but also use it to take panoramas. (I miss my Asus ZenPhone flip)

Create photos that allow users to change focus when viewing?

Have two cameras back to back and allow capturing simultaneously to create 360 photos/videos?

Have two cameras side by side and allow stereo vision?

If you have a 0.7x, 1x, and 4x camera, and the user is zooming at 3, use the 1x to fill the frame, but the 5x to have better image quality at the center?

Use the optical stabilizer to take several shots with micro shifts and do super resolution?

We can go on and on. Cameras and even smartphone cameras allow a lot of possibilities. Some of them are already explored by some manufacturers.

All of these are very simple concepts. None require complicated or custom APIs.

> However, the thing the courts have gotten very angry with is that in order to use the Android trademark, you have to get certification, which requires you to exclusively ship a series of Google applications (Chrome, Gmail, Youtube, the Google Photos app, etc) even if you have your own replacement (e.g. Samsung's browser, a native photo app, email client, etc.) and you Must ship with the Google account system up front.

The Daylight Computer doesn't ship with Google applications like this from what I can remember, and I noticed it doesn't actually mention Android on their home page, just that it can "run your favorite apps". It only mentions Android on the specs page under software. I wonder if they did that because of this.

The requirement that amazes me they never gone absolutely done for was that to get certified (to carry the Play Store) you must not release any Android devices which are not certified.

i.e. a given manufacturer would not be able to sell Google based Android devices and separate non-Google based Android devices.

It's as if being able to bundle Windows OEM licenses was reliant on not selling any models with Linux.

Wasn't this something that Microsoft actually tried at one point (and was rightly slammed for)?

It was -- and it's so blatantly anti-competitive and letter-of-the-law (at least in the US) abuse of a monopoly position that Microsoft stopped it almost as soon as they were challenged on it.

Perhaps not "absolutely done for," but there was meaningful action here that resulted in a 4.3 billion EUR fine (of which only 200 million was reversed on appeal).

The action was based partially on the Anti-Fragmentation Agreements (AFAs) mentioned above: https://www.clearyantitrustwatch.com/2022/09/the-general-cou...

IMO there should be mechanisms that prevent this kind of thing from ever occurring, but regulating this in a way that doesn't meaningfully impede other (benign) certification programs is a complex design space indeed!

As long as it's not sold as "Android" to the mass public I don't think there is a meaningful problem. For example, if you go to the trouble of hacking the Play Store on to a Kindle Fire you do know it's your responsibility if it works or not. Google would probably tacitly approve because such activity reduces the need for the Amazon App Store.

ugh?

Huawei sell both. Not in the same market, but they sell both.

I didn't think Huawei had released a certified Android device in many years now, as I don't believe Google would be allowed to act as a supplier to them even if they wanted to.

Back around the Nexus 6P they probably got an exception as Google tried to promote more competition for what was rapidly turning into a Samsungopoly. Samsung later themselves negotiated a position where they could make other changes in ways Google didn't approve of, and that was by leveraging the threat of going all-in on Tizen.