A Dash Of Web and Mobile Development

One of the big features of Android commonly touted as being a key difference between it and the iPhone is “multitasking.” Android users commonly say how obviously necessary this is in any modern computing device, while iPhone users don’t see the need or claim they don’t want it either because of a perceived performance hit or potential battery drain.

First off, we have to clarify the concept of multitasking. On a desktop, notebook, netbook, etc., you will frequently have multiple programs open at a time and often more than one is visible on the screen. In most cases, these programs are actively running (usually with priority given to the application in focus) and using some processing cycles. Sometimes the background applications do need to use resources, such as an instant messaging client or music player. Sometimes they don’t, such as when you are actively playing a game but left a browser window open in the background. The Reality Of Mobile Multitasking continued »