OnePlus And Project Treble Explained
Android phones apart from Pixel and Nexus devices have been known to receive slow software updates over the years. OnePlus recently conceded that its devices do not support Project Treble. Here is the reason:
Partitions were not required for Android N and previous versions of Android, all of our current devices do not feature a partition. According to our tests, if we were to modify the partition layout via OTA there is a risk that devices will brick during the partitioning.
The reason appears to be valid as the company decided to weigh the pros and cons of this major change and then decided against it. Even without Project Treble, OnePlus believes that it can still quickly and efficiently release Android updates. The good news for some, however, is that most, if not all, OnePlus devices in 2018 should support Project Treble by shipping with Android Oreo and the new partition scheme.
Project Treble is Google’s effort at reducing the time it takes for OEMs to receive the new OS and optimise it for its devices and then push out the update. A few months ago, Android received a new Vendor Interface, which is largely what Project Treble is about. The VI’s aim is to separate the “Vendor Implementation” (that is, “the device-specific, lower-level software written in large part by the silicon manufacturers”), from the Android OS framework.
The new VI is supposed to sit between the Android OS framework and Vendor Implementation. And the new VI will be validated by a Vendor Test Suite (VTS), which is analogous to the Compatibility Test Suite (CTS) that Google has been using for API testing of apps. The VTS ensures forward-compatibility of the VI.
What all of this means is that if a phone supports Project treble, it is more likely to receive fast software updates as compared to other smartphones that don’t.
