My weekend with Jelly Bean - CNET

Jelly Bean on the Galaxy Nexus.
(Credit: Aloysius Low/CNET Asia)

After getting the loan set of the Samsung Galaxy Nexus updated to Android 4.1 last week, I convinced myself to spend some time (normally set aside for reviews) with the new updated operating system from Google.

So was it fun to use? Yes. Was it completely new? Well, no, not exactly. Will it make you want to update? For sure. Here's why.

While Jelly Bean is just an incremental update for the Android OS, it's what Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS) should have been--especially with stuff like Project Butter, which finally (yes, it's true) solves the stuttering animation issue that usually occurs on Android devices.

Animations finally seem smooth, though opening the multitasking switcher still feels a tad laggy when it loads up, but it's probably less of an animation lag than one caused by having loads of apps "open".

I don't think anyone will fault Google there--the company has really done a great job making the phone feel lag free. The company has also improved on the widgets experience, which frankly made me go, "Why the heck did they not do this in the first place".

In previous Android versions, widgets were basically rigid. To put one in your home screen, you had to be sure you had enough space. Otherwise, you wouldn't be able to place it. It was extremely frustrating to say the least, especially when I had to keep switching phones for review and used widgets to monitor the battery life.

Thankfully, it's now tweaked--some widgets will auto-resize if there's not enough space, and the OS will intelligently move icons aside to free up space. If you're a person who loves to keep rearranging your home screens, you will love this.

I can, however, see why it's not a top priority fix for Google, since average users will likely adjust their home screens maybe once in a long while.

The Galaxy Tab
(Credit: Aloysius Low/CNET Asia)

The biggest and most important addition to Jelly Bean has to be Google Now, a Siri-like assistant that knows where you are and give you relevant information. Google Now was able to guess where I worked and where my home was, and deliver traffic information to assist me in getting to and fro.

In fact, Google Now only activated the work address just as I stepped out of my home today and was on the way to the bus stop. It was able to give me estimates of how long it would take for me to reach the office.

Apart from that feature, I was able to use Google Now to find nearby eating places, make sure I wasn't missing any scheduled appointments from my Google calendar, as well as tell me the weather at a glance. It's much more useful compared with Siri--where some functions are still limited to certain regions.

The weather, too.
(Credit: Aloysius Low/CNET Asia)

Apple is likely to enable Siri's full features in due time--it will be interesting to see just how both Google Now and Siri will match up in the future here in Asia.

Lastly, the Android Notification drop down bar got a nice buff, you can swipe downwards on certain notifications with two fingers to bring up more information. It sounds cool on paper, but it's much harder to do. I found the whole two-finger slide down gesture to be quite awkward to pull off.

Apps can also now let you use the notification bar to interact with the app, though most of the apps that I normally use have not been updated to support this. Well except for Google+, but who uses it anyway?

The Jelly Bean update will be out for the Galaxy Nexus, Nexus S and Motorola Xoom somewhere in mid-July. If you don't mind messing around with your phones, there are actually some hacked ROMS that bring Jelly Bean features, though they are likely to be loaded with bugs.