Tweet
Android 5.0 Key Lime Pie has started baking
Related stories
The future of Android without Andy Rubin points to convergence
Swype-like Nexus Keyboard rumored for Android event
Australian carrier claims Motorola X Phone will be a 'game changer'
Google's showing no signs of slowing its pace of Android development, with Android 4.0 appearing on the Galaxy Nexus late in 2011, followed in July of 2012 by the Android 4.1 Jelly Bean release that arrived powering the super Nexus 7.
But, forward-looking, update-obsessed people that we are, we can't help but imagine how Google's going to maintain the pace of innovation in its next major release of its mobile OS, Android 5.0.
All we know so far is that Google's working away on the K release of Android, which it's developing under the dessert-related codename of Key Lime Pie. Regarding the version number, it's likely that the Key Lime Pie moniker will be given to Android 5.0. We thought we might find out on 29 October 2012 but as yet there is no official word from Google.
So now as we wait on official news of the Android 5.0 release date and features, we can start to pull together the Key Lime Pie rumours from around the web, with the first sighting of Android 5.0 on a benchmarking website, apparently running on a Sony smartphone. There has previously been speculation that Sony is in line to produce the next Nexus phone, which may lend some credence to this rumour.
Android 5.0 release date
In December 2012 Google announced that its developer conference - Google IO - would take place from May 15 to May 17 2013, a month earlier than 2012's June dates. Given that Google announced Android 4.1 Jelly Bean at 2012's IO conference, it seemed reasonable to expect to see Android 5.0 at this year's event.
On 31 January, a Google IO showing of Android 5.0 looked more likely when screengrabs of a Qualcomm roadmap were leaked, showing Android 5.0 as breaking cover between April and June 2013.
But on 24 April 2013, we read that Key Lime Pie may not make its debut at Google IO after all. Apparently, "trusty internal sources" told a site called Gadgetronica that Google has decided to delay Android 5.0 for two to four months to give hardware makers the chance to properly roll out Android 4.2 Jelly Bean.
At the time, we said to take this rumour with a pinch of salt, as even if Google decided not to ship the finished build of Android 5.0 until later in the year, that didn't preclude the company from talking up the new OS at what is, after all, a developer-focused conference.
However, the notion of Key Lime Pie being off the menu at Google IO raised itself again on 26 April when Android 4.3 surfaced in server logs over at Android Police. Those log entries supposedly came from Nexus 4 and Nexus 7 devices running an updated version of Jelly Bean - Android 4.3 - and apparently the IP addresses of those devices trace back to Google HQ. So might that point to a delayed Android 5.0 arrival?
And on 13 May, we got our (almost certain) confirmation that there would be no serving of Key Lime Pie at Google IO from Sundar Pichai, Google's new head of Android. Pichai told Wired that this year's IO is "not a time when we have much in the way of launches of new products or a new operating system". Boo! "Both on Android and Chrome, we're going to focus this IO on all the kinds of things we're doing for developers so that they can write better things," he added.
So now we wait.
Google wasn't entirely quiet on Android 5 at its IO conference, though. As Android Authority spotted, during a session entitled 'Android Protips 3: Making Apps Work Like Magic' Android developer relations tech lead Reto Meier teased attendees with a slide showing an Android eating a piece of Key Lime Pie and later with a game where the options included Jelly Bean and Key Lime Pie.
LOOK THE ROBOT IS EATING KEY LIME PIE IT IS A SIGN!
Android 5.0 phones
Rumours of a new Nexus handset started trickling in during the third quarter of 2012, as we reported on 1 October 2012. There was speculation that this phone would be sporting Key Lime Pie, but sources who spoke to AndroidAndMe correctly claimed that the handset, which turned out to be the Google Nexus 4, would be running Android Jelly Bean.
While the Nexus 4 didn't appear with a helping of Key Lime Pie, speculation that we reported on 21 January 2013 suggested that the Motorola X Phone was the Android 5.0-toting handset that would be revealed at Google IO. According to a post on the DroidForums website, the phone will also feature a virtually bezel-free, edge-to-edge, 5-inch display. The Motorola X wasn't on show at IO but we're still expecting to see it break cover this year.
The same leaked Qualcomm documents cited above also made mention of a two new Snapdragon devices, one of which will be, unsurprisingly, a new Nexus phone.
That Nexus phone is most likely the Google Nexus 5. We weren't surprised that it was absent from Google IO, given that the Nexus 4 only went on sale at the end of 2012.
On Monday 18 March, supposed images of the Nexus 5 surfaced, with the handset apparently being manufactured by LG. If the accompanying specs, leaked along with the photo by the anonymous source, are true, then the Nexus 5 will feature a 5.2-inch, 1920 x 1080 OLED display, 2.3GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 processor and 3GB of RAM.
Androids out in force at Google IO 2012
While we warned that a sighting of the Nexus 5 at Google IO was unlikely, rumours that we wrote up on 19 April reckoned that there would be an Android 5.0-powered Nexus 4 launched at the event. Apparently, the revised handset would feature 4G capability and improved storage of 32GB. That rumour turned out to be incorrect as the only handset launched at IO was Google's take on the Galaxy S4, which is running Android 4.2.
If rumours that we covered on 30 May are correct, then HTC will be bringing us an Android 5.0-powered 'phablet' in the form of the HTC T6.
Featuring a 5.9-inch full-HD screen, the HTC T6 would be squaring up against the also-rumoured Samsung Galaxy Note 3, which is likely to break cover at IFA 2013. According to tipster evleaks, the T6 will feature a 2.3GHz quad-core Snapdragon 800 processor, 2GB of RAM and 16GB of internal storage.
Comments