Android M comes with a full host of new aptitudes

May 30, 2015 07:44 GMT  ·  By

Just like anticipated in the weeks prior to the Google I/O 2015 conference, the tech giant released Android M, the next version of its highly popular operating system.

While Google detailed only a handful of novelties on stage, the complete change log proved to be quite extensive and long.

Immediately after the keynote, Google released the Android M Developer Preview for owners of the Nexus 5, Nexus 6, Nexus 9 and Nexus Player which allowed curious parties to experience the new changes upfront.

Apart from offering granular app permission, support for adoptable storage devices or a new Dark Mode, Android M also brings some power improvements into the equation.

Prolonging battery life on mobile devices has been on Google’s main focus list for years and the tech giant is taking steps to reduce power consumption of Android devices.

Google has a new strategy for improving device life cycle

One big part of the new approach is a feature called Doze which puts the device into a low-power sleep state when it is not in active use.

Doze takes advantage of motion detection sensors to perceive when your phone is idle. Once it has been given the green light, Dose will put the phone in a deeper sleep state than earlier versions of Android could.

After which the device will be still woken up periodically to sync and perform background tasks.

When Doze is "on," pretty much all operations onboard of the device are halted, wake locks are ignored, Wi-Fi scans are not performed, syncs don’t go through and network access is disabled unless a high-priority Google Cloud Message pushed through. Most alerts are also disabled.

In theory, although dozing does effectively hibernate a feature or an app, it will still allow those features or apps which are dozing to perform at high profile tasks or duties they need to. So for instance, if your alarm clock was in “doze” mode, then it will be able to sound when the alarm was supposed to.

Interestingly enough, there are three apps set to ignore these battery optimizations by default and these are Google Play Services, the Play store and Download Manager.

All the restrictions outlined above will allow the Nexus 9 to round double the idle run time, according to Google. But as it usually is with all new things, there is a tradeoff here.

Users will not have up-to-date syncs across all apps, trading app freshness for battery life. There’s also another concern, hopefully the classification of apps in high priority mode can be configured to allow users more control over what affects their device.

Will it work?

On top of that, I have to wonder if the reported doubling of standby time will actually be seen in the real world. Doze only makes a difference to standby power consumption if a person uses “misbehaving” apps in the first place.

Google probably tested the two Nexus 9 tablets while loading them with apps notorious to be power hungry. But most apps have little reason to wake the phone constantly.

Still we shouldn't ignore this category of "bad apps," It might be argued that Google needs to put unused apps into complete stand-by, as opposed to just disabling their network. Badly developed apps will usually run in the background even when they are not in use.

In order to extend your screen off battery life, Android M will now monitor your activity levels, and if it detects that your devices have not moved in a while, it will start to “doze,” prompting the device to wait longer to up for scheduled repeating events.

Which makes me think of another question, how long will it take for a mobile phone to actually wake up from a deep sleep mode like this? I’d have to guess you’ll probably be experiencing a pretty consistent lag, something that users will not take kindly to.

However, Doze applies to Android M devices that are rarely used, and since most of us tend to keep our smartphones in our pockets while we go about our day, its effects are probably not going to be all that obvious.

New Doze feature arrives with Android M (2 Images)

Device in Doze Mode
New Power and Charging feats explained at Google I/O 2015
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