It is now available Android 12L, the latest version of Google’s operating system which in this case comes with specific features to obtain the best results on a new generation of smartphones that have folding screens.
The different types of mobile phones with a folding screen need the operating system to take into account different aspects to obtain maximum performance
Foldable mobiles are beginning to gain popularity, and given the peculiar characteristics that they present due to the formats of their screens, the operating system must incorporate modifications capable of adapting to the different configurations that can be presented on the screens of these devices.
As at the moment Apple lacks terminals with this type of screen, Android is the operating system that has had to develop an adaptation to the diversity of solutions with which different brands have opted for the concept of folding screen. Some models are committed to respecting the most common smartphone format, establishing a fold that allows the mobile to be folded vertically in the style of the classic “shell” mobiles. The purpose is that, despite gaining thickness in the pocket, it is not as long as it has been becoming common years ago with screens that comfortably exceed 5 and 6 inches.
This configuration can even allow the mobile to have the screen at a 90º angle, like a mini-laptop, so that, for example, content can be displayed only in the upper part, leaving the lower part as a support and on its screen, for example, showing only the display controls or another app.
Other smartphones, however, are committed to transforming the device into something similar to a tablet (or a phablet). Here they choose a “book format” with which, from regular smartphone use, the screen can be unfolded horizontally until it is closer to a tablet which, in these cases, ends up having a square-format screen instead of the usual landscape format. Therefore, the way of displaying the contents and the interface on the screen also requires specific adjustments.
In any case all these variants need that the operating system adapts its operation to the different variable screen formats depending on the devices, and to go further, to the changes that all these designs can dynamically offer, different for each manufacturer and model. The existing ones and some more that may arise, such as the Z format that folds the smartphone into three segments, so that the final result when unfolding it is closer to a traditional tablet with a wide screen instead of a square one.
Android 12L responds to all these possibilities and needs, as Google announced last year when advancing that this new version of its operating system for mobile devices would be specially adapted to folding devices. Particularly noteworthy is the care that has been taken to take advantage of the additional display space offered by screens in tablet format, and in this sense it is worth mentioning the lower task bar, which, like a computer desktop (or as is already the case in iOS/iPadOS) allows you to have in that part of the screen a row of app icons that can be opened directly with a single touch.
As Android 12L also encourages the use of the split screen, if you want to keep a second app open on the screen, simply drag the icon from the aforementioned lower task bar to the center of one of the segments of the screen to get that in each half of it has opened a different application. A side column of quick settings and notifications has also been incorporated that improves the handling of the device.
Android 12L will have staggered availability. It is initially available for Google Pixel 3a and later devices and will have to wait until the end of the year before it can be installed on smartphones and folding tablets from Samsung, Lenovo and Microsoft.
