Dec 16, 2010 16:25 GMT  ·  By

The next flavor of Google's mobile operating system, namely Android 3.0 Honeycomb, is expected to come to the market with some pretty interesting changes when compared to the existing flavors of the platform. Some of these enhancements are only rumored for the time being, but there are great chances that others would be indeed included in the next Android release, it seems.

Among some of the most interesting enhancements that Android 3.0 Honeycomb might bring into the mix, we can count elimination of a need for physical buttons on the handsets that would run under it.

Basically, this would translate into having the soft keys available at hand at all times, regardless the orientation of the device.

Of course, there's no telling on whether future Android-based tablet PCs would actually arrive on shelves with no buttons, or only with a single one, just as Apple's products do. The fact that the platform might not need the buttons does not mean that it won't support them.

Recently, at the D: Dive Into Mobile conference, Google's Andy Rubin confirmed that the upcoming tablet PCs running under Android 3.0 Honeycomb do not require physical or capacitive buttons, phonedog notes in a recent article.

According to them, the platform version would indeed offer support for physical buttons, and manufacturers would have the possibility to chose whether to include them or not.

Another interesting feature that might be included in the next Android release when it is made available would be a Google-built augmented reality application that would offer an experience far better than what current solutions can deliver, a recent post on pocketnow reads.

Some of the rumors on the matter suggest that those who already tested the application are very impressed with it. However, nothing was confirmed on this either, and we'll have to wait for the official announcement on Honeycomb to learn more on this.

In the meantime, we should mention another rumor that emerged into the wild today, namely that Honeycomb might actually be released as Android 2.4 and not as 3.0, the way we were led to believe until now.