Google Open Sources Android 4.0, Ice Cream Sandwich | TechCrunchThe code for the latest version of Android 4.0, also known as Ice Cream Sandwich is now in the wild.
This is a huge deal for a few reasons.
For one, Android 4.0 includes some major improvements over both Gingerbread and Honeycomb, which are the versions of Android that are shipping on current Android devices. These include new API calls, performance improvements, and more.
But more important: its the first time Google has open-sourced a version of Android thats optimized for tablets as well as phones. Now, obviously devices running Android 3.x Honeycomb have been around since early this year. But Google opted not to release the source code for Honeycomb. The reason? It had been thrown together quickly, and Google had to take some shortcuts to get it out the door (they were also concerned that third parties would try to port Honeycomb back to phones, which it isnt suited for).