Introduction to Android
Miguel A. Labrador, Oscar D. Lara Yejas · 2013
The Android operating system for mobile devices is mainly the response from Google to the slow evolution of the Java ME platform for constrained devices and the carrier-controlled process to make mobile applications available to the general public. At that time, back in 2005, the Java ME platform was the platform most widely used to develop applications for resource constrained devices, such as cellular phones. Although there are still many business-oriented applications developed in Java ME, this platform presented several important drawbacks: • Java ME applications were very tightly controlled by carriers. Applications could not be made available for download freely but needed the authorization of the carrier that provided the cellular service to the application users.