Flashback: Android Gingerbread, the OS version that refused to die, was better than you think

02 May 2020
It introduced many features we take for granted today - even basics like supporting a front camera.

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Gingerbread was my first Android system back in 2012 and I still love it because of how open and easily customisable it was. You never needed a computer to root or flash ROMs and kernels etc, or even custom recoveries, everything could be done on the phone and with the phone's stock recovery. To root your phone, you just needed to flash a simple update.zip file and that's it.

Now I understand that it meant it was very insecure because there was no signature verification etc, but still, you could manually access and customise almost every aspect of the system from the phone itself.

    Anonymous, 19 Feb 2024Wrong, it matured with Gingerbread and Ice Cream sandwich There's no right or wrong here. I can see Android already maturing out by ICS, but KK is more fleshed out than ICS, hence why I said "truly" mature.

      • ?
      • Anonymous
      • kQq
      • 19 Feb 2024

      NeonHD, 17 Jan 20241) Android was still in its developmental stages back then ... moreWrong, it matured with Gingerbread and Ice Cream sandwich

        SpiritWolf, 12 Jul 2021God what a trash it was back then. Symbian did beat it in e... more1) Android was still in its developmental stages back then so what did you expect? Android only started to truly mature with KitKat. Maybe that's the experience for you, but for most others it was a positive experience, especially in hindsight. The old Holo interface was truly something else, I miss it.

        2) If Symbian really is better, then prove it. From what I know so far, Symbian always seemed like a primitive OS with a lack of features. Maybe except for Symbian Belle.

          • l
          • lustabitch
          • JxH
          • 05 Aug 2023

          SpiritWolf, 12 Jul 2021God what a trash it was back then. Symbian did beat it in e... moreseriously? inferior?

            God what a trash it was back then. Symbian did beat it in every aspect sans sheer available app numbers and Spygle integration. But Spygle was viewed as 'good boy' and 'rebel' back then so people bought phones with this inferior OS. And before 'Apple fanboy' accusations come, I've never used single Apple product in my life.

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              • Hamza
              • uZa
              • 12 Jul 2021

              After some months the Google unsupported v2.3, my phone's LCD got broke but i still Miss my phone even youtube and whatsapp didn't worked on that device(huawei acsend y220), i love that experience

              i will never forget!!!

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                • 15000usd to a phone
                • p2t
                • 25 Nov 2020

                Deniz uyan, 28 Jun 2020Nope, lm using a sony ericsson xperia pro and lts gingerbre... moreXperia arc s too.

                  • C
                  • Crys
                  • j1v
                  • 04 Nov 2020

                  What do you suggest if someone -me 😁- want to use 2.3 Android? Not as a phone, but for other purposes. Where can I find useful apps?

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                    • Deniz uyan
                    • J9L
                    • 28 Jun 2020

                    Nope, lm using a sony ericsson xperia pro and lts gingerbread So Yeah










                    cool phone

                      Anonymous, 10 May 2020Did you ever use iOS then? It had more than enough if it's ... moreYes, I did.
                      I had far more App crashes, lag, hangs, freezes, shutdowns, restarts, and bootloops on my Early Android Devices, than I had on iPhone/iPad during the same period. No contest.

                      Coming from Windows Pocket PC Edition (later renamed to Windows Mobile), this experience was not foreign to me. Yet, I preferred Android 2.0-2.3 over Windows Mobile, and that preferred over Symbian.

                      Apple's OS was severely limited during iPhone 2G (basically a feature-phone), and it got more and more robust with the iPhone 3G, iPhone 3GS, subsequent updates, and eventually to iOS 4 on the iPhone 4. I remember even Google made a big fuss about it, and said they were going to aim for the same level of smoothness. That's where Project Butter was borne, and implemented on Android 4.1, which kinda did improve smoothness but it was still behind Apple due to the nature of the ecosystems (open vs vertically-aligned).

                      iOS made a huge upgrade with version 7, and Android made a second huge upgrade with version 5.1. Since then it's been smaller iterative improvements/differences. Though I guess comparing Android 5.1 versus Android 10.0, you could say that's now one major improvement. I suppose a similar case can be made with iOS 7 versus iOS 13, the cumulative additions could be seen as a new major update.

                      All things considered, I prefer the Android ecosystem... as long as the device has unlockable bootloader, TWRP, Root, Magsik, and heaps of community developer support (custom drivers, custom kernels, custom roms, custom mods).

                        • ?
                        • Anonymous
                        • I8m
                        • 10 May 2020

                        Kangal, 04 May 2020I guess, maybe I'm just a little harder to please. ...but ... moreDid you ever use iOS then? It had more than enough if it's fair share of hiccups and bugs. And when it finally got a little better... It took a dive for a few generations and held a world lead in Mobile app crashes for years.

                        And while people were on here saying apps never crash, it never lags, and it's not like buggy Android... Yada yada...I would have whole groups of friends around me with apple devices constantly complaining about the lags, and crashes, and issues...
                        And when I say oh but that doesn't happen to iPhone they bust out laughing or just get frustrated with it.

                        Always kind of been there case I guess though.

                          • ?
                          • Anonymous
                          • I8m
                          • 10 May 2020

                          They were some great times. Especially for modding.
                          And phones actually were cheaper then and pushing boundaries.
                          Now you're paying around 1k and compromises across the board.

                            • ?
                            • Anonymous
                            • I8m
                            • 10 May 2020

                            Kangal, 08 May 2020Sorry for late response, I wanted the comment to be detaile... moreThat's way too one Trac narrow thinking that leaves out the aspects of reality.

                            Any new software can be a buggy mess before it's worked on and ironed out....to say the least about your logic....

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                              • AnonD-558092
                              • IBL
                              • 08 May 2020

                              Kangal, 08 May 2020Sorry for late response, I wanted the comment to be detaile... moreNow you're putting your finger on the double-edged sword that is open source software: "You don't like something? Fork it!" In theory, that's a wonderful thing to be able to make a current project your own and not having to deal with the current maintainers' vision if you don't like it. In practice, it leads to the mess you described.

                              It would indeed have solved a boatload of problems if there wasn't such duplication and all resources were being dedicated to a single project. And you listed such projects that indeed worked that way (even if there's not many, like VLC, Linux and LibreOffice).

                              And again you're completely right with Windows. Ironically, Continuum (or something close to its principle) was adopted by Samsung, Huawei and then Google. It's really a shame what poor management can do...

                              Nice comparison too, kind of proving how a third and a fourth option can actually work, though ZerOS would be a bad name. You wouldn't want to get sued by Xerox for having a name that sounds too much like theirs.

                                AnonD-558092, 04 May 2020Not so sure about that. Surely there would need massive cod... moreSorry for late response, I wanted the comment to be detailed.

                                I agree, taking all those OS as they were/are right now, it won't be possible to put them together into one single OS. And even if it was, it would be buggy, clunky, and just an outright mess. And yeah it would require a compatibility layer. Yuck.

                                My point is that individually none of those OS ever had a chance. And in many cases they did work which another OS was doing or had done already. This is the problem with Linux and all open-source projects: it's stupendously inefficient due duplication of work. I'm saying if all that money and coding-time was pooled together, it would be impressive, and if properly managed it would yield an OS that is impressive.

                                But as you alluded to, that wouldn't be enough. It's not enough to have a great OS, or a great hardware, or BOTH. You need to also have a great ecosystem. Many people think the current market, which is a two-horse race, cannot support another ecosystem. I disagree. Imagine if Microsoft took the iPhone 3G and Google One seriously. Just imagine if they completely forgo the Windows CE and Hybrid (or half-measures) and the likes of Windows10 Mobile (with Continuum) was what they released off the bat. Yeah, things would me much different. Now imagine if the open-source community were able to come together for a fourth ecosystem. Sounds impossible, but it truly can/could have been done.

                                Enjoy reading the comparison of ecosystems below:
                                Apple ----------- Microsoft --------------- Google ------------------- Linux ------------------ (Ecosystem)
                                iPhone ---------- Lumia ------------------ Pixel ----------------------- Colt* ---------------- (Brand Name)
                                iOS -------------- Windows Mobile ----- Android OS ------------- ZerOS* ------ (Operating System)
                                AppStore ------- Windows Store ------ PlayStore --------------- Zero Market* - (Application Store)
                                Safari ------------ Edge ------------------- Chrome ----------------- Firefox ---------- (Internet Browser)
                                Yahoo ----------- Bing -------------------- Google Search -------- DuckDuckGo ---- (Search Engine)
                                Siri --------------- Cortana ---------------- Google Assistant ------- Hound assistant -- (AI assistant)
                                iTunes ----------- Groove ---------------- Play Music ------------- VLC Player --------- (Media Player)
                                Apple Maps ---- Bing Maps ------------ Google Maps --------- OpenMaps ------------- (Navigation)
                                Apple Pages --- Microsoft Office ----- Google Docs ---------- LibreOffice ------ (Document Tools)
                                iMessages ------ Skype ----------------- Google Duo ----------- Signal messenger ---- (Messaging)
                                Apple Mail ------ Outlook ---------------- Gmail ------------------- Proton email ------ (Email System)
                                iCloud ----------- OneDrive -------------- Drive ---------------- OwnCloud storage -- (Cloud Storage)
                                Apple Pay ------ Microsoft Pay -------- Google Pay ------------ PayPal NFC -- (Payment System)
                                Game Center --- Xbox Live ------------ Play Games ----------- Lutris games ----- (Game Service)
                                Instagram ------- Veoh ------------------- YouTube ---------------- Vimeo ---------- (Video Streaming)
                                Facebook -------- LinkedIn -------------- Google+ Shoelace --- Diaspora social ----- (Networking)

                                *These are just hypothetical names I think are neat and would fit !

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                                  • DrAB
                                  • 6PP
                                  • 06 May 2020

                                  Back in those days, bought my first android phone Galaxy Gio running GB out of the box. Brings back so many memories of that time.
                                  Heck! I even flashed a custom ROM based on KK on that poor thing with a single core SD S1 running @800MHz . XD

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                                    • DrAB
                                    • 6PP
                                    • 06 May 2020

                                    Nice flashback! Btw all those "new features" were part of the OEM skinned OS.

                                    Remember when ICS was released nd ppl were like there is no more room for improvment we have reached the peak of android. Lol 😂

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                                      • Luxor
                                      • IVI
                                      • 05 May 2020

                                      Can't even install most apps anymore with this gingerbread. Why wouldn't it die yet??!!

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                                        • AnonD-558092
                                        • IBL
                                        • 04 May 2020

                                        Kangal, 04 May 2020I guess, maybe I'm just a little harder to please. ...but ... moreNot so sure about that. Surely there would need massive code and framework rework needed to combine even a few subsets of those separate effort as a new solution. Though for a phone OS, forget major rework. They'd slap some kind of half-cooked compatibility layer to put it on a new product ASAP and only fix it properly in two years minimum, but the issues that would arise from such solution would mean the product gets extremely poor reception, obviously blamed on the new solution, getting a bad reputation, destroying any chance of it ever getting popular and ultimately getting canned.

                                        The solution is obviously to do everything right from the beginning but you'd need a big company to back your project and pledging to incorporate it in one of their phones, which is unlikely to happen soon as you face two issues:

                                        Apps: New platform means no apps. How to convince devs and users that your new platform is worth working on? Past new OSes usually relied on being able to do stuff never heard before, or just being better overall.

                                        OS/2 paradox: If you want to circumvent the first issue, you'll want to add a compatibility layer (presumably with Android). Disregarding GMS issues, this would mean that devs can continue to target Android and users would have to resort to compatibility, which often results in poor performance and issues (which users will undoubtedly blame on the new OS), which keeps fueling the first problem. Or you could also try implementing a whole subsystem for compatibility, but then again what's the point to target the new OS?

                                        Ok, maybe that was easier to do back then, especially as Android was still lame.

                                        Otherwise I agree with the rest of your post.

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