What is Android?

Android is a software stack for

mobile devices that includes an OS,
middleware and key applications.
User applications can be developed
using Android SDK which supplies a
host of APIs needed for
development using Java
programming language.

A slice of history
Google acquired Android Inc.,USA in 2005
with establishing OHA.
Announced Android in 2007 and released
source code.
reached version 2.1 releasing Googles Nexus.

Continue..

Versions.

Smart phone market

The architecture
consists of five software layers:
1) Linux;
2) Libraries;
3) Runtime;
4) Application Framework; and
5) Applications.

Android looks like..

Dalvik Virtual Machine

Security and permissions

Android is a multi-process system, in which each application
runs in its own process.
Most security at the process level through standard Linux
facilities.
Additional securities through permission mechanism that
enforces restrictions on the specific operations that a
particular process can perform.
In Android security architecture no application, by default, has
permission to perform any operations that would adversely
impact other applications, the OS, or the user.
This includes reading or writing the users private data,reading
or writing another applications files, performing network
access.

About OHA:
OHA - Open Handset Alliance
a consortium of several companies including
HTC,Intel,LG,Motorola,NVIDIA,Samsung,T-Mobile, Google and
so on.
Established by Google after acquiring Android
Inc.,California,USA.
Declared Android open source.