👓The Google Glass companion app might find a new life with Android XR

If you're wondering what that mysterious Android Glasses Core app that appeared in Android 15 QPR2 Beta 1 is, here's some details of its history + never-before-seen screenshots.

🗨Android 15 QPR2 may add a dedicated settings page for backing up contacts

The new contacts storage page will make it easier to choose which account you want to back up your contacts to.

More details + a screenshot of this page can be found in this article.

🖱⌨️Google is preparing to make keyboard and mouse support even better in Android 15 QPR2

The company is working on new features like bounce key threshold customization, repeat keys, and more.

Details + screenshots of these new features can be found in my latest article on Android Authority.

Many users have asked me: What are the pros and cons of using Android's upcoming Terminal app to run Linux apps versus something like Termux?

Here are the differences, as explained by a developer of Termux:

"Advantages:

1. The VM will have standard Linux Distributions, so all the packages of the distro should be downloaded from its packages repositories. Termux only provides ~2000 most popular packages in its repositories, other distros can have 10,000-1,00,000 packages. If running under proot-distro in Termux, then one can have similar amount of packages, but everything runs under proot, which is slow, and not all packages may work and proot is not stable on old devices.

Disadvantages:

1. The VM will have performance loss due to KVM usage compared to Termux running natively.

2. The VM will be isolated from the Android system, this is where most of the problems lie. I doubt external storage (/sdcard) will be allowed to be accessible directly from inside the VM, so use cases of users processing files on their storage, like downloading music/video/image files, etc with Termux and accessing them in other apps, would not be possible. The Android APIs won't be accessible inside the VM either, like ones which apps like Termux:API or Tasker uses, lot of users rely on them to automate things, a way to fix that would be to run a sshd server in Termux and then connect to it from the terminal in the Linux app with ssh and then run the commands, but that will cause some latency issues. Termux also supports on-boot tasks for its own commands, there may be some way to boot the VM at startup, depending on if there is external access, otherwise users would have to manually start the app.

3. The VM will be isolated, so any root access will be only for inside the VM itself, and not for root access to Android system, like Termux can get with su/sudo if rooted with Magisk, etc.

4. Terminal will be inside a WebView connected over the server, so should have slower performance than a native Terminal in Termux using native Android views. WebViews are generally slow for large amounts of text, especially for scrolling, like try opening the Android docs/source site on even a recent phone with ~8GB RAM, older phones often just crash the browser. One could run a sshd server in the VM and then connect to it from Termux with ssh and that should likely be faster, and should support multiple terminals at the same time. I don't think currently the VM app supports multiple terminals, that's another difference, although terminal multiplexers like tmux could probably be used inside the one terminal that's available.

5. Not all devices will support AVF, at least not for Android < 16 or higher, so Termux will still be needed on such devices. Additionally, running a whole Linux distro in a VM will require CPU, storage and memory in addition the one already being used by Android OS itself, so low end devices will likely have issues with performance or multi-tasking. Termux runs on Android host itself, and uses only < 100MB RAM, and 150MB (arch-specific)/230MB (universal) storage space by default, so runs great on even Android 5."

Thanks to agnosticapollo for taking the time to write this out!

How Android feature development is changing with Trunk Stable

You may have seen me mention something called Trunk Stable before. It's one of the BIGGEST changes to Android in years, but Google hasn't really talked about it much.

Here's how it changes things.

Thanks to the folks from Code with the Italians for having me on their show last week to talk about this!

Google confirms that the Terminal app will work in Android 15 QPR2 Beta 2!

A Googler on the Issue Tracker confirmed what I found, that the Terminal app in Beta 1 currently requires manual setup and a userdebug build.

Beta 2 will include a newer version of the Terminal app that can download the Debian image from online on regular user builds.

If you want to see what the Terminal app will look like once it's fully working, see this post.

The "limit to 80%" charging feature has returned for Pixel users running Android 15 QPR2 Beta 1!

When QPR2 Beta 1 first rolled out, the feature was missing, but now it's back. This feature first rolled out with QPR1 Beta 2 and is expected to go live in the stable QPR1 update next month.

This feature's availability is controlled by server-side flags.

Thanks to nemy_new on X for the image!

UPDATE 2: I found Google's support page for Health Connect's new backup & restore feature, and it says this feature is only available on Android 14 and later, ie. devices with the Health Connect Mainline module and not the Play Store version of the app.

🌐 The Pixel Tablet finally gets Google VPN support in Android 15 QPR2

Google's tablet was initially excluded from the rollout of its free, Pixel-exclusive VPN by Google service, but that's finally changed with the latest Android beta.

Details can be found here.

💻 Source: Google is turning Chrome OS into Android to compete with the iPad

Android is becoming Google's operating system of choice when it comes to PCs, and in a few years, I've heard we'll even see Chromebooks ship with Android.

More details can be found in this article on Android Authority.

A few months ago, I heard that Google was working on an Android laptop, but I didn't know if it would have Pixel branding or be released as a product.

Today, Android Headlines revealed that Google is working on a Pixel Laptop, & I believe it'll run Android instead of Chrome OS.

Wow: the DoJ's antitrust enforcers are "set to propose that Google uncouple its Android smartphone operating system from its other products, including search and its Google Play mobile app store," according to Bloomberg.

The DoJ has reportedly also "pulled back from a more severe option that would have forced Google to sell off Android," but forcing the company to stop bundling GMS would still be huge.

Details are sparse on what exactly this would mean. Notably, device makers can technically already ship Android without GMS (it's just AOSP in that case). However, if they want the Play Store and Play Services (which they do because that's where all the apps/useful APIs are), then they currently have to bundle Chrome, Google Search, and other Google apps as well.

The EU already put an end to the forced bundling of Google Search and Chrome, which is why there's a separate GMS license for EEA launches. But that hasn't happened in the U.S. yet, which is possibly what the DoJ wants to see happen.