Google quietly rolls out test version of Android upgrade

Google has released a test version of its annual upgrade to its Android software without usual fanfare heralding latest operating system powering most smartphones. Android 11 will offer several new features making it easier for people to find tifications about incoming texts. It also gives users ability to quickly open a digital conversation by pressing on a floating “bubble” identifying person on or end of a text. new Android bubbles mirror a feature that Facebook has been using in its Messenger app for years.

next version of software also is designed to do a better job of guarding people's privacy, something Google is frequently accused of invading as it collects information to sell ads.

Users will be asked if y wish to grant an app access to ir location for one time only and n Android won't allow access until user authorizes it again. Android 11 also will automatically identify when an app hasn't been used for an extended time and turn off previous permissions that users may have forgotten y granted in past.

beta version is primarily downloaded by app makers while Google continues to work out bugs in software before operating system is offered for free to owners of smartphones running on Android. But smartphone manufacturers and wireless carriers don't always quickly push out next version of Android software to users, leaving many devices running on older versions of software for years.

Google usually previews next version of its Android software during an annual event held in May near its headquarters in Mountain View, California, with thousands of app makers and computer programmers in audience.

But pandemic forced Google to cancel that event this year and shift it to a virtual garing that it planned to hold last week. But that plan also was scuttled amid mass protests roiling cities across U.S. in wake of death of George Floyd, a black man who died in police custody in Minneapolis after a white police officer pressed a knee into his neck.

new versions of Android are are quickly offered to owners of Google's Pixel phones, but those account for a minuscule fraction of more than 2 billion devices running on various versions of Android.

In contrast, more than 80% of iPhone users typically download annual upgrades to Apple's iOS, software powering those devices. Apple plans to preview next version of its iOS June 22 during an event that will be held online instead of an in-person event that attracts thousands of people from all over world to Silicon Valley.