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"This is very impressive stuff," said Vincent Nguyen, executive editor of the Android Community Web site. "It's way better than any of us expected."
The prototype of a phone using Google's free software for mobile devices shown Wednesday resembled the iPhone in its minimalist design and responsiveness to gentle touches and taps. But it also sported some fresh features that may prompt a few iPhone users to upgrade.
A clear geek favorite was the device's ability to double as a compass so that mobile maps constantly reorient themselves, even in the stereoscopic street view. The phone's responsiveness to gestures was also popular. Instead of a password, a person can use an image drawn on the screen, like a circle or star, to protect a device from misuse.
Andy Rubin, engineering director of the Android team, promised to deliver phones with Google's software later this year. He declined to reveal the manufacturer behind the phone shown at the conference.
The unveiling of the first "gPhone" was one of several announcements that underscored Google's determination to compete head to head with Microsoft as the focus of computing shifts from networked PCs to mobile devices and giant corporate data centers all linked together by common Internet protocols.
"The Web is the
dominant platform of our time," Vic Gundotra, a vice president of engineering, told a crowd of more than 3,000 developers. "It belongs to you, it belongs to me, and working together we can move it forward."
Gundotra's power-to-the-people pitch resonated with techies who said they paid $400 to attend the two-day conference to learn how to integrate Google's software technologies, from mobile phone software to data-center short cuts, into their businesses.
"I like Google because they are really upfront about what they have to offer," said Jeff Schnepple, a 21-year-old who co-founded Allrentals.com, a real-estate listing service, in Chico last year. Schnepple said he already uses many of Google's productivity applications, such as Gmail and the Google calendar, to run his business. He was hoping to learn more about the software behind Google maps at the conference.
For now, Google's efforts to woo entrepreneurs such as Schnepple pose no threat to Microsoft, which boasts 4 million people using its .Net programming environment.
Still, Google executives say the evolving requirements of Web computing have created an opportunity for a new player to gain ground.
"There is a always a period of transition where one platform emerges as the dominant platform," Gundotra said.
While the mobile phone software was greeted with oohs and ahhs, the biggest round of applause was reserved for an announcement that Google was opening up its Google Apps Engine to everyone, including the 150,000 developers who had signed up for a waiting list since the technology was released in beta six weeks ago.
The Apps Engine is popular because it makes it easy for a programmer to handle huge spikes in demand if a quirky app, such as buying someone a digital beer or attacking them as a virtual vampire, should suddenly catch on across the Internet. Google also announced pricing for the service, which is currently free.
The service competes directly with Amazon's Elastic Compute Cloud.
Contact Elise Ackerman at eackerman@mercurynews.com.
To see more of the San Jose Mercury News, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.mercurynews.com. Copyright (c) 2008, San Jose Mercury News, Calif. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.
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