Apple were granted an injunction to stop the sales of the Samsung Galaxy Nexus in the US, last Friday. The ruling came around following an alleged patent infringement. Samsung tried to stay the injunction but they have just lost that bid. Now Google and Samsung have supposedly got a patch ready that is said to address the issue and it could be rolling out as soon as tonight OTA, reports TheVerge.
Samsung Galaxy Nexus update coming to overcome Apple patent infringement
A spokesman for Google has said that they will be rolling out this update to all Galaxy Nexus devices throughout the US regardless of which carrier they are on. The patch is thought to dumb down the search bar on the home screens of Android handsets and will limit searches to only those from the internet. This means that users will no longer be able to perform a search on their handset locally. Which means that such as on device apps, Gmail which is integrated and other search results will not be shown. Voice Search will also have the same restraints and have limited search results.
One of the greatest strengths of the Android OS has been its search ability and so the update is likely to have an effect on usability. Google have not said whether users are able to decline the update so that they can retain the current search functions.
Most the argument has been about Android’s use of the unified search interface. However Google have said that one of the bonuses of Android 4.1 JellyBean, Google Now, will not be affected when the update reaches the general public. The problem only relates to the Samsung Galaxy Nexus said a spokesman for Google. Samsung of course are to make an appeal to the ruling in the meantime.
