"They look like they only do the minimal effort possible for Android not to die"
I can understand some Android users have frustration over carrier issues. But every version I have used has been a significant improvement over the prior, especially under the hood. I suppose one can argue that Android allows for too much end user customization (directly or by third party) but I would rather suffer that than the alternative.
Android also runs on old harware. My LG G2, ancient by many measures, runs Android 7.1.1 via AICP and is more responsive in every way than the original stock 4.3. Unless I shatter the screen, there is no reason to replace this phone. Granted, custom ROMs are beyond grandma but for anybody with marginal tech know-how there are step-by-step guides to upgrade. Yet, iPhone owning friends with older models first complain about iOS updates being 'slow' and then eventually run to the store to "upgrade" their phone to the latest iVersion.
IMHO to say Google does just the minimum, especially compared to iOS, is not really the case.
Android is an awful offender in terms of allowing every app under the sun to run in the background however. Does stock Nougat have a system app that allows you to white/black-list which apps can/cannot run in the background?
Samsung's SmartManager allows you to do so and it improved my battery life. Not by 100% but having in mind how notoriously bad Android's standby battery life is, even 2 more hours of SOT is a huge win.
What I am trying to say -- and I don't disagree with all your arguments, please have that in mind -- is that Google can step it up a lot more on the front of the housekeeping, yet they don't.
How long is gonna take for all us techies to realize that the non-tech people hate maintaining tech? Why doesn't Android (and iOS) have mechanisms for never allowing the device's cache to exceed a certain amount, for example?
Again, I don't disagree with you: your arguments are fair, but I believe mine are too.
EDIT: One of the things that seriously alienated me from Google's "vanilla" take on Android is them never allowing mobile Chrome to have content blockers. The amount of trash scripts and popups/popdowns out there on the web is astounding. Actions speak louder than words. I guess they don't want their scripts being blocked as well. That, or they are incompetent.
Would you point me at a web source? I'm considering a Nexus 6P with Copperhead OS, not Google's vanilla Android however.
I am very curious to find alternatives to Samsung's SmartManager.
BTW I am not talking about the "Data Saver" feature. I am talking about iOS-level of disallowing apps in the background -- they are killed and not allowed to run a single millisecond on the CPU, no questions asked. The "Data Saver" is a very minor and niche improvement.
I can understand some Android users have frustration over carrier issues. But every version I have used has been a significant improvement over the prior, especially under the hood. I suppose one can argue that Android allows for too much end user customization (directly or by third party) but I would rather suffer that than the alternative.
Android also runs on old harware. My LG G2, ancient by many measures, runs Android 7.1.1 via AICP and is more responsive in every way than the original stock 4.3. Unless I shatter the screen, there is no reason to replace this phone. Granted, custom ROMs are beyond grandma but for anybody with marginal tech know-how there are step-by-step guides to upgrade. Yet, iPhone owning friends with older models first complain about iOS updates being 'slow' and then eventually run to the store to "upgrade" their phone to the latest iVersion.
IMHO to say Google does just the minimum, especially compared to iOS, is not really the case.