With a Little Work Android 2.2 Can Look Good on Tablets, Says TouchDown Exchange Developer
A recent bit of news had Google expressly commenting that Android 2.2 wasn’t optimized for tablets, and the tech world immediately lost hope in currently announced tablets using that version of the OS and below. Instead the great Android tablet renaissance that was supposed to be coming this holiday season has been pushed back to early 2011 in anticipation of Android 3.0, an iteration of the OS that is being designed with slate devices in mind. Still, NitroDesk, developer of TouchDown Exchange for Android, is coming out saying despite what people have heard developing great looking apps for Android 2.2 tablets isn’t impossible.
We have seen it before in the Samsung Galaxy Tab, which gave a makeover to many core apps to properly take advantage of screen real estate. TouchDown has undergone the same tweaking, bringing about an app with split screen views to fill the entire large-resolution screen space. Here is what NitroDesk founder Goutham Sukumar had to say:
“Despite recent messages in the press about Android being not suitable for large screen devices, what we found is that the Android SDK is very capable of letting developers create applications which are optimized for tablet screens. While it is true that there are no separate controls for creating widgets like tree views and resizable splitters, it is quite possible to create applications which use the real estate effectively. It just requires some work on the developer’s part to get there.”
True, this is merely talking about the OS in terms of apps, and does point out that there are still quite a few limitations. But just like the iPad, regardless of the OS version on the tablet developers will always need to tweak their handheld apps to better fit screen real estate. NitroDesk will be showing off their new version of TouchDown next week at CTIA in San Francisco.
[via MobileBurn]