Matias Duarte explains Tablet UI in Jelly Bean and why Nexus devices have no SD card

At some point, we all wonder how Google makes the decisions they do. Especially regarding Android. While most of their efforts are widely liked by nearly everyone, there are some things we wish they’d explain in greater detail. Things like how they came up with the Tablet UI. Okay, what we really want to know is why no SD card love in the Nexus devices. Matias Duarte sat down to help explain things.
His explanation about Tablet UI is truly fascinating. Duarte explains that the Tablet UI in Jelly Bean was the result of market research done to see how people use devices. It was concluded that pretty much everyone uses their phone in portrait mode most of the time.
With tablets, though, it was found that people hold tablets in all sorts of ways. Upside down, right side up, and any other orientation. So the tablet UI design in Jelly Bean was done to help accommodate people who hold their tablets any which way.
Duarte goes on to explain that with the tablet UI, the three navigation buttons we’ve all come to know are always where you need them. It doesn’t matter which way you hold it. That helps bring uniformity to the platform and users don’t need to learn how to use their tablet a new way just because they’re holding it differently.

Cool stuff, so why no MicroSD cards in Nexus devices?

Not a lot of people are going to be happy with that answer. As Duarte explains, “We take a different approach. Your Nexus has a fixed amount of space and your apps just seamlessly use it for you without you ever having to worry about files or volumes or any of that techy nonsense left over from the paleolithic era of computing.”
Thus, Nexus devices don’t have MicroSD card slots. They are simply too old of a technology and apparently they confuse people. Many people probably wouldn’t mind this if there were better storage options.
While the Galaxy Nexus had 32GB of storage, the LG Nexus 4 has been reported as only having 8GB and 16GB offerings. It’s disappointing that Google believes everyone would be happy with only 8GB or 16GB of space with no room for expansion. Many people use much more than 16GB of space.
If you’d like to read a transcript of the answers Matias Duarte gave, you can find them over at Droid-Life. Is anyone satisfied with Matias Duarte’s answers? Or are they rather disappointing? Let us know your thoughts.

Posted in: Android, Android 4.2 Jelly Bean, Google Nexus 4, Matias Duarte, MicroSD Cards, Tablet UI