While Facebook’s announcement focused on the “Home” homescreen app that can run on any unforked Android, HTC has just confirmed to me it worked with Facebook to modify Android to give its First handset features not available in the downloadable version of Home. Specifically, the First can pipe in email and calendar notifications to your homescreen.
“Yes we had to implement some framework changes and some hooks to do the system notifications”, explained HTC Partner Manager Michael Goodwin. He tells us “all the things that could appear in your Android notification tray can appear within Facebook Home” thanks to the changes to Android. During the event, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg also mentioned that the HTC First was optimized to give the best possible “Home”experience.
This confirms my scoop from last week that Facebook would debut an HTC handset running a modified version of Android that would give it extra functionality. The HTC First is now available for pre-order for $99.99 from AT&T, and will ship on April 10th for arrival on April 12th.
HTC’s President Jason Mackenzie explained why HTC put in this extra effort to optimize Home for the First. “It’s to provide a consistent experience. To offer the easiest, simplest solution for the customer. They shouldn’t have to get Chat Heads or messages from Facebook one way, and find out if you have text messages or email some other way. This delivers on Facebook and Mark’s vision of bringing your friends to the forefront instead of the applications.”
Home from Google Play only shows Facebook content on the homescreen, whereas on the HTC First and its flavor of Android you can get Google Calendar, Microsoft Outlook email, info about available Wi-Fi networks, and more notifications fed into your homescreen. Additionally, on the HTC First, you’ll be able to swipe up to to show your app shortcuts, and then swipe right to reveal a Google Search bar that doesn’t exist in the downloadable version of Home.
So in fact, the “Facebook Phone” by HTC will offer a more neutral experience than downloading the Facebook Home app for standard Androids.
Watch the video interview with Michael Goodwin of HTC for more details.
