Imagine this situation: You have purchased a smartphone from a reputed brand expecting future Android OS updates. But later on, brands refuse to push major updates due to some unknown reasons. That’s annoying, right?
Google has been looking to solve this issue since ages, but the search giant wasn’t able to do it so far. Today, the company has announced a new project called as ‘Project Treble,’ ahead of the Google I/O 2017. This time, however, Google is betting big on this ambitious project. Google says that this will be the most significant change to the Android system architecture.
Google will now separate the low-level code written by chip makers like Samsung, Qualcomm, and MediaTek from the Android codebase. This essentially means that smartphone makers can just update the relevant code to make necessary changes.
“With Android O, we’ve been working very closely with device makers and silicon manufacturers to take steps toward solving this problem, and we’re excited to give you a sneak peek at Project Treble, the biggest change to the low-level system architecture of Android to date,” says Google.
“With a stable vendor interface providing access to the hardware-specific parts of Android, device makers can choose to deliver a new Android release to consumers by just updating the Android OS framework without any additional work required from the silicon manufacturers,” the company further added.
Furthermore, Google is urging the chip makers and OEMs to make changes to the AOSP code. The Project Treble is already integrated into the first Developer Preview of Android O, which is currently available for Pixel and Nexus phones.
As mentioned earlier, Google always wanted to improve the Android updates scene of other manufacturer’s phones since ages, but the scenario is still the same. The Project Treble, however, may change the entire Android upgrade system. More details regarding the Project Treble will be announced at the Google I/O 2017 event next week.
