The Android 2.2 update codenamed Froyo unleashed a whole host of features available on the Nexus One and here is a list of what’s new and what dazzled me in this update.

• Phone, applications Launcher, and Browser now have dedicated shortcuts on the Home screen, making it easy to access them from any of the 5 home screen panels.
• LED Flash enabled for camcorders; allowing for videos to be shot at night or in low light settings
• Camera onscreen buttons provide easy access to a new UI for controling zoom, flash, white balance, geo-tagging, focus and exposure.
• Updated Google Search bar to include dropdown for All, Web, Apps or Contacts search. Plus choose which items are searchable, not just those previously mentioned yet specific apps; Messaging, Twitter, Music, etc.
• Portable Wi-Fi hotspot that can be shared with up to 8 devices; Wi-Fi/USB tethering
• Improved performance with better kernel management, enhanced browsing performance & Dalvik performance boost
• Task and application manger; ability to upgrade all apps at once and add background updating
• Bluetooth Voice Dialing for hands-free calling while driving
• Different trackball colour notifications; blue for bluetooth, red for low battery, and the usual white for new messages & call notifications
• Voice input settings let you specify your regional accent (US, UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, India, Generic).
• Multi-language stock keyboard (but doesn’t support Chinese)
• New Car Home design
• plus a whole lot more …

However, the dazzling highlights for me were undoubtedly:

• Better Performance. It’s like an upgrading of RAM – so much more free space makes everything faster. Up to 271M of free as compared to up to 91M previously.
• Auto Brightness. Power widget for the home screen now lets you select auto-brightness. Previously, you had 3 lighting options and my Christmas wish was for an auto brightness option to come so I didn’t have to change it everytime I walked into bright sunlight or meander around in a dark room. Looked like Christmas came early and the auto brightness is probably the best addition to Froyo. Had reservations about what effect it would have on battery life but so far my worries have been unfounded.
• Vibrate. Watching a movie, in a meeting? Need to silent the phone urgently? Lowering the volume quickly could mean totally silencing the phone. Not anymore. Vibration can now be set to always, never, only in silent mode, and only when not in silent mode.
• Colourful Trackball. New SMS – white. Low battery – white. New notification – white. Imagine my surprise when my trackball suddenly flashed RED for dangerously low battery. Blue when my bluetooth was turned on. Why did they even wait with all these? It’s not a useless navigational tool anymore. Red, Stop, Green, Go, I wonder how many hues does the trackball have.
• Flash. For those flashy websites and the not so flashy games, you need Adobe Flash.
• Better call log display. This might just be a minor change, but I still feel a much needed one considering it just summarizes how you might have had 5 calls from the same person appearing once instead of five. Perhaps it’s just me.
• The Google Apps. Google definitely make their apps work best on their own operating system. Strangely, Gmail wasn’t exactly all that smooth previously but now you can browse & tag emails with much more ease. Oh and YouTube videos in HD!
• Voice input now recognizes swear words. No, I hardly even use voice input.

Android 2.2 theoretically supports installing apps to the SD card which undoubtedly would even free up more space, but developers need to first enable this in their apps. My previous concern was eventually the apps would take up all the in-built memory, but it seems this will eventually be worked around as developers slowly enable this.

Google obviously needs to cater to more users from elsewhere to enable multi-language stock keyboards for languages like Mandarin, and what’s up with no accent support for Singaporeans? I reckon Singaporeans are distinguishable anywhere you go in the World. You can fake a British or Australian accent, but not a Singaporean one.

All in all, Google simply amazes with every Android update; it seems to only unlock more and more capabilities each time – from multi-touch ability, to automatic lighting, and multi-coloured trackballs and such in a faster Froyo, simply makes me salivate at what Android 2.3 would unleash on the Nexus One.