Besides unveiling its new online Music service during the annual Google I/O developers conference, Google also revealed Android 3.1, which like Android 3.0 has also been codenamed Honeycomb.

 

The latest version of the search giant’s mobile operating system (OS) is build on the same tablet-optimised user interface (UI) and features available in Android 3.0, but also adds some new capabilities for both users and developers.

 

 

Android 3.1 sports performance optimisations that assist in making applications run faster, but also boasts some other new functionality including:

The search giant then went on to reveal some figures concerning its Android mobile OS. It stated that there are now more than 100 million activated Android devices, with 400 000 new Android devices being activated daily. The Android Market now houses north of 200 000 free- and paid applications, whilst over 4.5 billion applications have been installed via the Android Market. 

 

Google also confirmed that the next iteration of Android will indeed be known as Ice Cream Sandwich. The company stated that its aim with Ice Cream Sandwich is to provide users with a single OS, which works on any device, unlike the current setup with Honeycomb running on tablet PCs and Gingerbread (Android 2.3) powering smartphones.  

 

“Ice Cream Sandwich will bring everything you love about Honeycomb on your tablet to your phone, including the holographic user interface, more multitasking, the new launcher and richer widgets,” said Hugo Barra, product management director for Android.