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Google has released the latest distribution numbers for the various shipping versions of Android, with the latest version, Marshmallow, picking up a marginal increase.

Last month’s numbers showed Android 6.0 running on only 0.3% of devices, while this month’s chart puts it at 0.5%, making it the least-used version of Android except for Froyo.

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Forbes reports that nearly one billion Android smartphone users that are not running the latest Lollipop operating system are at risk of malicious attacks due to Google no longer releasing security updates for the WebView tool on Android versions at or below 4.3 Jelly Bean. Research firm Rapid7 discovered that Google started the process of ending support for WebView late last year for devices not running Android 5.0 Lollipop.
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Google, as it does at the beginning of every month, has updated the Android distribution data this time reflecting data collected during the last week of November. KitKat continues its slow climb up this month, rising to 33.9 percent from 30.2 percent last month. Every other Android version, as a result, fell in usage.

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The latest Android distribution numbers for a seven-day period ending November 3rd reveal that KitKat is installed on 30.2% of devices that accessed the Play Store during the last week. Meanwhile, the distribution of the over two-year-old Jelly Bean version continued to decline, but remains the leading platform, with a 50.1% share.
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Popular file sharing service MediaFire announced a major update to its Android app this afternoon, bumping it to version 2.0. The update adds a variety of new features and enhancements, both visually and feature-wise. Overall, the interface looks much cleaner in version 2.0 than it did in earlier versions. The overall navigation process remains the same for the most part, but icons, menus, text, and other visuals have been modernized quite a bit.

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Like it always does during the first half of a new month, Google this evening updated its Android Distribution data to reflect a 7 day period ending on August 12th. The data shows the most recent version of Android, KitKat, reach an all-time usage high at 20.9 percent, up from 17.9 percent this time last month. Jelly Bean continued its steady decline, falling from 56.5 percent to 54.2 percent.

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One of HTC’s biggest selling points for its One M8 flagship is the Dot View case, and today, the company rolled out an update to the companion app with a handful of new features. The biggest change is the addition of themes for wallpapers. HTC has bundled 18 themes into the app that you can now set as the case’s wallpaper. You can also choose your own custom image, although some of them may not look quite right.

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Google last night started rolling out an update to Google Play Games that bumped the app to version 2.0. The update includes several new features, some of which were confirmed in the recent Google Play Services 5.0 update, as well. The update today introduces Level-up notification controls, XP rankings, and a few UI tweaks.

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Google this afternoon started rolling out an update to its Play Music app on iOS with a handful of new features. The update bumps the app to version 1.3.0.2190. Firstly, the update finally adds support for gapless playback, which means that there is no pause between the end of one song and the beginning of another. The update also adds the ability to download subscribed playlists in one tap, allowing you to listen to them without a data connection.

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Google’s Chromebook might be busy trying to hammer the final nail in the netbook’s coffin, however the search giant’s Chrome OS platform will soon receive a little competition from a familiar operating system. Today, Archos announced its new ArcBook, a $170 touchscreen netbook powered by Android.

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As it does at the beginning of every month, Google has just updated the Android Distribution data to reflect data collected during a 7-day period ending on April 1, 2014. Notable this time around is that Android 4.4 KitKat usage more than doubled, rising from 2.5 percent last month to 5.3 percent. Of course, that’s still a very small percentage of the total user base, but growing by double in a month signals that KitKat updates are finally starting to make their way to the masses. 

With the rise in KitKat usage came a slight decline in Jelly Bean numbers from an even 62 percent to 61.4 percent . Ice Cream Sandwich declined to 14.3 percent from 15.2 percent last month, while Gingerbread continued to slow demise, going from 19 percent to 17.8 percent.

With this new data, 81 percent of all devices are now running a version of Android 4.0 or greater. This seems respectable, but it’s important to note that Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich was originally unveiled all the way back in 2011. So it’s apparent that Google can still do even more to improve the Android update progress. But things are improving and that’s what matters.

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Google has just updated its Android Distribution numbers to reflect data during a one-week period ending on February 4th. This data is collected by recording what version of Android every device that accesses Google Play is running. Most notably, Jelly Bean has surpassed the 60 percent milestone, going from 59.1 percent to 60.7 percent. KitKat saw very minor growth, increasing from 1.4 percent to 1.8 percent.

No other version of Android saw an increase this time around, with Ice Cream Sandwich falling from 16.9 percent to 16.1 percent and Gingerbread dropping from 20 percent from 21.2 percent.

Also noteworthy is the fact that 80 percent of all Android devices are rocking Android 4.0 or higher, meaning that most have the latest design interface and features from Google.

Google has had problems in the past rolling out updates in a prompt manner to devices, but things have definitely improved over the last year or so. It is, however, disappointing to see the latest version, KitKat, only running on 1.8 percent of devices.

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A piece on ZDNet‘s Korean site reports that Samsung has developed an iris-recognition system to unlock smartphones, and that the technology is likely to be seen in handsets launched next year.

Iris-recognition is generally considered to be the gold standard for biometric identification, allowing extremely fast matches with a very low risk of false matching. It is commonly used for border controls … 
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[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=chUtv1kWIg8]

Cover, a brand new Android lockscreen first showed itself to the world at the tail end of October. The context-aware lockscreen notes which apps you want to use in specific locations and will present them on your lockscreen.

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Billed as ‘the lockscreen that learns,’ Cover is an Andoid app that notes which apps you use in which locations, and then puts the apps you’re most likely to need onto your lockscreen.

At home you might get weather, news, traffic and Twitter; at work, calendar, Google drive and LinkedIn; in the car, maps and music … 
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The latest Android stats from Google show that Jelly Bean is now installed on 48.6 percent of Android devices, and given current growth rates is likely to break the magic 50 percent barrier within a week or two. Jelly Bean became the most-used version of Android back in July.

The rather less impressive stat is that more than a quarter of devices – 28.5 percent – are still running Gingerbread, which dates back as far as 2010. It’s also worth pointing out that there are couple of fudge-factors in Google’s stats … 
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As it does every month, Google has just updated the Android distribution data to reflect the month of July. Jelly Bean is now running on 37.9 percent of devices, with 32.3 percent of those running Android 4.1.x. That’s up from 33 percent this time last month. Gingerbread fell from 36.5 percent to 34.1 percent, which makes Jelly Bean the most used Android operating system. Ice Cream Sandwich is now at 23.3 percent, down from 25.6 percent last month.

Froyo is now at 3.1 percent (was at 3.2 percent), Eclair has fallen to 1.4 percent (was at 1.5 percent), Honeycomb and Donut are both now at just 0.1 percent.

Google collects this data during the first week of each month by logging the devices that access the Play Store. It use to be that the data was collected when the device simply checked-in to Google servers.
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Earlier this week HTC announced that it would not be updating the One S to Android 4.2.2, despite promising the update to users earlier this year. As you can imagine, this news did not go over well with One S owners. We all know that the Android community is a vocal one and won’t take this kind of stuff lightly, and that’s exactly why there is now a petition to get HTC to update the One S to Android 4.2.2 and Sense 5.

The petition, hosted on Change.org, pleads with HTC to rethink its decision to shun the One S from any future updates. More than anything, it seems like the users want an answer. They note that the device is just as powerful as the Galaxy S3, which is getting an Android 4.2.2 update, and that the One S was a great phone and a “highlight of 2012.”

After several months of leaks and rumors, Sony has finally confirmed the Xperia Z Ultra at an event in Beijing. The device is packing a whopping 6.4-inch Full HD display with Sony’s Reality sensor, which the company says provides richer and wider colors. Sony says the device carries support for a stylus or any sort of pencil, which is an interesting feature. The company touts that it is the “world’s slimmest and largest full HD smartphone,” though coming in at 6.5mm and 212 grams, it’s not quite as thin as the 6.18mm Huawei Ascend P6  we saw last week.

Xperia Z Ultra features a 6.4” touchscreen Full HD display with Sony’s unique TRILUMINOS® Display for mobile, creating a wider palette of rich natural colours thanks to Sony’s BRAVIA TV expertise. The breakthrough technology includes X-Reality™ for mobile – Sony’s intelligent super resolution display technology which analyzes each image and reproduces lacking pixels to optimize quality for the sharpest videos. It analyses elements depending on the scene and adjusts them based on pattern, outline and colour composition. It also strengthens subtle patterns and accurately portrays their detailed feel, as well as reinforcing bold outlines. The large Full HD display has been optimised to experience at least 60%*** more of the screen than most other smartphones.

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