Everyday Computing and the Internet -- HKU CCST9003 Common Core

In order to make informed decisions in this information age, everyone needs to have an efficient way to sift through and evaluate the myriads of information that is available through the internet. The ultimate objective of this course (HKU CCST9003) is to help students develop a “computational” state of mind for everyday events. We will also discuss intensively the societal impacts of computing technologies on our daily life.

Showing posts with label Apple. Show all posts

Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Speech synthesis

Lau Kwan Yuen

In this day and age, a machine speaking to us is not a surprise. Stephen Hawking exactly uses the “speaking machine” to “speak” and communicate with the others. Even the mobile phone and electronic dictionary has this ability. The technology is called speech synthesis. This survey would focus on the description, principle and applications of speech synthesis.

Speech synthesis artificially produces the human speech. In 1950s, the first computer –based speech synthesizer was invented. It can be implemented in hardware or software. The computer system used for speech synthesis has several types.

The speech can be synthesized by linking up the speech that are recorded and stored in the database. In addition, a completely synthetic voice output can be created by using the model or characteristics of the human voice.

In 1968, the first text-to- speech (TTS) system was created. TTS system can convert normal language text into speech while some systems can change symbolic linguistic representations such as phonetic transcriptions into speech. This system has two parts, front-end and back-end. The front-end converts text and symbols into written form (text normalization). Moreover, the front-end can assign phonetic transcriptions to each of the words and break them into several phrases. On the other hand, the back-end then changes the phonetic transcriptions into sound.

In some specific application, the speech synthesizing quality needs to be higher. Actually, the quality of the speech synthesizer would be determined by the similarity to the voice of human and the ability to be understood. However, the more important qualities of the synthesizing system is the naturalness and intelligibility. Different syntheses have different features and usage. Some systems would be discussed.

One of the syntheses providing good naturalness is the unit selection. The reason is it applies only a little of the digital signal processing, which always produce unnatural sound, to the recorded speech. Moreover, some other system can smooth the waveform at the point of linkage by using some signal processing.

Another synthesis is the formant synthesis. It does not use any human speech sample to synthesize. In other words, the speech is totally artificial created by using additive synthesis and an acoustic model. The system can use the model to simulate the voicing, noise levels and fundamental, etc.

Various computer operation systems have adopted the speech system. For instance, the two very popular operating system, Apple iOS and Android, have added support for speech synthesis. For iOS used on the iPhone and iPad, VoiceOver speech synthesis is installed for accessibility for some kind of disabilities.

Since Microsoft Windows 2000, the Narrator, a text-to-speech utility for visual handicaps, was added. Also, the CoolSpeech program can be run in Windows to speak text from webpages and text documents.

Moreover, the speech synthesis systems are used in many different entertainment products. For example, some e-book can be read out by the speaker for convenience. It allows people with reading disabilities or visual impairments to listen to the words in the book so that they can enjoy the interest of reading books.

What is more innovative is the speech synthesis has been applied to the software called Vocaloid, which is a singing synthesizer application by Yamaha Corporation. This software lets the users to synthesize singing and create their own song by the virtual singer by typing in melody and lyrics. It uses synthesizing technology with specially recorded vocals of voice actor or singers. The software allows users to change the stress of the pronunciations, vibrato, dynamics and tone of the voice. The Vocaloid software is sold as “a singer in a box” being a replacement for a traditional actual singer. Therefore, the application of the synthesis system is not confined to the area for assistance.

To conclude, speech synthesis is a significant technology in our daily life. It does not only aid the people with visual or verbal impairments, but also bring us new experience of entertainment. The quality of synthesizing the human voice is expected to improve in the future, so that an artificial human voice can be more similar to the actual human voice. Then, the recognition of speech can be easier and more accurate.

References
1.    “What is Speech Synthesis?”
http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-speech-synthesis.htm
2.    eSpeak: Speech Synthesizer
http://espeak.sourceforge.net/
3.    Speech Synthesis and Recognition
http://www.dspguide.com/ch22/6.htm
4.    vozMe - From text to speech (speech synthesis)
http://vozme.com/index.php?lang=en
5.    VOCALOID
http://www.vocaloid.com/

Friday, October 28, 2011

Mobile Device Security: iOS vs Android

Nowadays, it is not uncommon to observe most people around have a mobile device such as smartphone and tablet computer. These devices allow us to stay connected 24/7. The ability for the users to install applications has expanded their usability and thus increased their popularity. However, only a few users are aware of the security aspects of this technology. In this survey, I will compare security features of the two most popular mobile platforms: Apple’s iOS and Google’s Android.

Both iOS and Android have built in security features that were implemented based on four pillars: Application provenance, encryption, isolation, and permission-based access control.

Application Provenance
Application provenance is the technique used to ensure application authors and distributors have an identity that tides to the application.

Apple takes a tight provenance approach to ensure the authenticity of the iOS applications. Every application must be signed by an Apple-issued digital certificate. Apple will verify the identity of the developer and company before issuing such a certificate. Moreover, with the exception of the applications developed under Apple’s iOS Developer Enterprise program, all iOS applications must be published through Apple’s App Store and are subject to vetting by Apple. With a few exceptions, Apple’s approach has been proven to be quite effective.

On the other hand, Google took a relatively loose provenance approach. Although every Android application also must be digitally signed by a certificate, it does not have to be a Google-issued certificate. You can even self-sign the application with an anonymous certificate. To make the matter worse, applications may be posted on the Android Market without vetting by Google, and publishing applications through other channels such as the developer’s website is also allowed. As a result, an attacker can potentially attach malicious codes to a legitimate application, self-signed it and publish it on a website and those non-tech savvy users probably will not notice the differences. As a result, Android is more prone to attacks through polymorphic malware and trojanized legitimate applications.

Encryption
Encryption is the technique used to prevent data loss through unauthorized access. Without the decryption key, the data will look like garbage.

On the latest iOS devices, all data stored in the internal flash memory are encrypted using hardware-accelerated AES-256 encryption. iOS will automatically decrypt the data when it was read. Other data such as email and attachments can be secondarily encrypted by a user passcode. However, such an encryption scheme only provides little protection. A simple jailbreak will allow the attacker to read most of the data including the passwords stored because iOS stores a copy of the decryption key around to decrypt data for the applications running in the background.

Until the recent Android 3.0 release, there was no built-in encryption support on Android devices. Which means most of the Android devices on the market solely relies on the application to conceal sensitive data using the Java encryption API. Otherwise, all data are stored unencrypted on the device. So Android isn’t any better in terms of data loss protection.

Isolation (Sandboxing)
Sandboxing is the technique used to limit access to data and systems. Applications are therefore isolated from each other and the OS.

Applications running on the iOS can only access to a limited set of data such as contacts, calendar and the device ID. But they are blocked from accessing the emails and SMS inbox. User inputs is required if they want to do more, such as initiating phone calls and sending SMS messages. Also, applications are limited to user-mode ones and are blocked from accessing other applications’ data or enumerating other applications and the OS. This isolation model is effective on keeping the applications from causing too much mischief but at the same time also limits the ability to create iOS security applications.

Android on the other hand relies on its Dalvik virtual machine to enforce the isolation. Just like other Java-based platforms, applications on Android are run within its own virtual machine, which is isolated in its own process. Applications are also limited to user-mode ones and are blocked from accessing most system services by default. Although Android limits application’s access to other application’s private data, it allows applications to enumerate and examine other application’s codes. Also, data stored on the external SD card can be read by all applications by default. With the exception of the SD card, Android has an even stricter default isolation model than the iOS and the ability to access other application’s codes make it easier to create security applications.

Permission-based Access Control
Permission-based access control is the technique used to limit access to the data and systems to the ones granted by the policy.

Apple hardwires the access policy into iOS. The only exceptions are the permissions to access to the GPS location data, receive alert notifications, initiation phone calls, and send out emails and SMS messages, which the application can prompt the user and request for permission. So iOS applications do not really have any control over most of their permissions

Unlike iOS, Andriod applications may request granular permission to almost every subsystem. Developers explicitly state the set of permission at compile time and the user can either accept or reject all permissions at install time. While this approach provides greater flexibility to the application developers, it also relies on the user to decide whether it is safe to grant the requested permissions. With over a hundred of different permissions an application can request for, it is difficult for an average user to make such a security decision. This leaves a giant security hole in Andriod.

After reviewing both features of two mobile operating systems, it is obvious that they are different system. Although both platforms are designed with security in mind, users cannot solely rely on these security features to protect their data as there are weakness in both platforms which could open up to attacks. While it is convenient to use these mobile devices to stay connected, users should also be aware of the security implications, and be more educated about mobile security so that they can better safeguard their data.

References:
1.    Android Developers. (2011). The Developer’s Guide. Retrieved from http://developer.android.com/guide /index.html
2.    iOS Developer Library. (2010). iOS Development Workflow Guide. Retrieved from https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/#documentation/Xcode/Conceptual/ios_development_workflow/000-Introduction/introduction.html%23//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40007959
3.    iOS Developer Library. (2010). Security Overview. Retrieved from https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/#documentation/Security/Conceptual/Security_Overview/Concepts/Concepts.html%23//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP30000976-CH203-TPXREF106
4.    Nachenbery, C. (2011). A Window Into Mobile Device Security. Retrieved from http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/white_papers/b-mobile-device-security_WP.en-us.pdf

Thursday, September 29, 2011

Comparison between smartphone OSs

The number of smartphone user increase quickly in the past few years. There are two main factors that will affect the performance of smartphone. They are the hardware of the smartphone and the operating system (OS) of the smartphone. In my critique, I will focus on the OS of smartphone. I will compare different smartphone OS and find their pros and cons.

There are four major smartphone OS. They are iOS, Android, Symbian OS and Windows Mobile. I will talk about their pros and cons one by one and compare them.

First, I will talk about iOS. iOS is developed by Apple Inc. and is used in the products which are produced by Apple Inc., for example, iPhone. It is proprietary operating system and no one other than Apple Inc. can change or modify the system. Also, iOS do not allow user to install third-party naive applications. If iOS users want to overcome the limitation that set by Apple Inc., they need to jailbreak so that they can remove the limitations. Although there are some disadvantages of iOS, there are some advantages. Its performance in entertaining is extremely powerful. You can always see someone use their iPhone or iPad to play games or watch movie. Moreover, many applications are available for the user of iOS. Overall, iOS is a powerful operating system but it is inconvenience to use third-party applications.

Then I will talk about Android. Android is developed by Google. Since it is an open source operating system, it can be modified by Smartphone manufacturers to fit with their products. This system is used by many smartphones made by several famous brands such as HTC, Motorola, etc. As Android is an open source operating system, a large variety of applications is available for Android users. Also, as Android is developed by Google, Android users can use many Google features very well. For example, Android smartphones use Google map and checking Gmail without using Internet browser. However, the number of applications that provide for Android users is still not very much. Moreover, Android use visual keyboard to typing words.
It is not convenience for users to type when compare to real keyboards. Overall, it is suitable for users who always use Internet.

Now, I would like to talk about Windows Mobile. Windows mobile is developed by Microsoft. Windows Mobile is a proprietary operating system. Its functions are very powerful. Moreover, it is designed for business usage and therefore it is very suitable for people who always do business with others. However, since it is designed for business usage, its performance of entertaining is not very good. The resolution of the image of the phone use Windows Mobile is not very high and its video player is not very good. In addition, Windows Mobile is not user friendly, it is difficult to use when people first using it. Overall, Windows Mobile is suitable for businessman but not suitable for people who want entertainment.

Lastly, I will talk about Symbian OS. Symbian OS is developed by Symbian Foundation. It is an open source operating system. Since Symbian OS is one of the oldest mobile operating system, it is almost fully functional. It is mainly target on photo taking, listening music and entertaining. Moreover, due to the longtime of development, it provides more software for Symbian OS users. However, the Internet service of Symbian OS is not very good, it do not have many support of different Internet service. Overall, the market share of Symbian OS is decreasing. It is not competitive when compare with its competitors.

To conclude, different mobile operating system has their advantages and disadvantages. If we want to buy a smartphone, we should choose a suitable mobile operating system due to our requirement and personal needs. Different people will have different user experiments in different mobile operating systems because of their different personal needs and their requirements.

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

History of smart phones

Nowadays, many companies are trying to develop outstanding mobile phone. They are going to make the phone smaller, lighter and have more functions. And they are called smart phone. According to Wikipedia, the definition of a smartphone is a mobile phone that offers more advanced computing ability and connectivity than a contemporary basic feature phone.

There are many types of smart phone, for example, Symbian, Android,Apple, etc. They allow the user to install and run more advanced applications based on a specific platform.

History of Smart Phone

Why do they exist? Thatʼs because everyone is chasing the most convenience device. For example, people can run lots of program,taking photos, surfing on the Internet, chatting with friends on their cellphones. It helps people connect to this world in a more efficient way. Of course, they have their own history.

1) Simon
The first smart phone Simon presents in 1992, which is developed by IBM. It is already having calendar,address book, world clock,calculator, note pad, email,send and receive fax and games.

2) Nokia 9000, Nokia 9210, Nokia 9500 and Nokia 9300
Nokia developed a lot of smart phone products. In 1996, Nokia made its palm sized smart phone called Nokia 9000, which is a Personal digital assistant (PDA). Then Nokia was trying to improve their products. So, the first color screen phone with an open operating system called Nokia 9210 was released in around 1996. Then, Nokia added WiFi and GPS in the phone9500 and 9300 respectively.

3) Ericsson GS88
Ericsson then joined the smart phone race. It released GS88, which is the first cell phone,which can be labeled as smart phone. In 2000,the touchscreen smartphone R380 using new Symbian OS was released.

4) Microsoft Windows Powered Smartphone 2002
After two years, the next company Microsoft also released the“Microsoft Windows Powered Smartphone 2002”. And there are two smart phones released in the same year. They are Palm OS Treo and BlackBerry from Handspring and RIM respectively. For Palm OS Tero,there is a full keyboard. It also has wireless web browsing, email,calendar, and contact organizer with mobile third-party applications that could be downloaded or synced with a computer.

5) Nokia N95
After 5 years, Nokia is back, It releases the Nokia N95 integrating many features, for example, GPS, a 5megapixel camera with auto focus and LED flash, 3G and wi-fi connectivity and TV-out.In 2007, one of the most important companies, Apple Inc., has introduced iPhone. This amazing device can be easily found in everywhere. It is the first mobile phone that mainly uses touchscreen in the control. The OS used in this phone can support swiping, tapping,pinching, etc.

6) Android
Another similar product Android was released in 2008, which is a cross platform OS. Google and also some software developers back android.The first phone to use the Android OS was the HTC Dream. It has integrated Google’s proprietary applications including Maps,Calendar, Gmail, etc.

7) iPhone
Apple has its 2nd generation iPhone. It created the AppStore which is similar to Android platform OS. But for downloading through AppStore, it is not necessary to connect to the computer. iPhone and iPodcan download the applications if there is a wifi network.In terms of platform, there are so many platforms launched by large companies, for example, Nokia launched Ovi Store, Palm launched Palm App Catalog, etc.

Operating System
Apart from the history side of smart phone, the next sub-topic that will be talked is operating system. There are a few important operating system, they are:

• Android
• Blackberry OS
• iOS
• Windows Mobile

Conclusion

Thatʼs maybe the start of the smartphone race. Each compan ywill then develop more powerful smartphone. The operating system must be very creative and helpful.

Friday, September 16, 2011

Society Impact on Smartphone

Have you thought what you can do on the home PC - such as checking and sending e-mails, doing researches - can now be done on a Smartphone; which is way smaller and can be put into the trousers pocket for daily uses?

“In 2007 iPhone reinvented what we thought of as a Smartphone” (Jobs, 2010), which I totally agree. Nowadays, most of the Smartphone promotes the large number of applications that users can download, for example, Apple’s App Store on iTunes, provides a very organize place for both program developers and users to upload and download over 300,000 Apps to use, and the total number of the Apps that has been downloaded reaches 7 Billion times in October 2010 (Apple Inc., October 20, 2010); however, in the old days, there were no such App Store, the applications were to be installed with a CD via a Computer, and there were very limited choices.

Different purposes applications, such as games, education, finance and medication can be accessed very easily. As they are simple and easy to use, this then increased the interest and attraction of Smartphone to different kind of users. For young adults like myself, I tend to have about six pages of games on my iPhone; for my dad, he uses his Nokia Smartphone to read news on the go; while my mum only uses her phone as her ‘cook book’.

Some applications provide the uses for communication (calling and texting each other), for example Skype. Personally, I used to be an overseas student; I think the function of Skype is very useful and easy assessed. Being able to install the application of "Skype" on the phone allows me to contact my parents and friends more easily while overseas – I do not need to call a connection line and type in about forty digits of user number and password, this has make my life much easier, especially in the case of emergency. Cost wise, using Skype to call for overseas number is much cheaper than traditional international calls; in fact, it is free of charge if both parties have an account on Skype (Skype, 2010).

Also, users can access to internet and even personal e-mail via WiFi or 3G network provide by the Phone Network Service Provider. Using the internet service on Smartphone is believed to be as secure as using PC at home; this proves the convenience of Smartphone.

The tale of writing a letter and posting it has became a history, email has successfully replaced the traditional mail, with no doubt. Being able to send and receive e-mail has simplified the ways of living, in additional to the Push services (MobileMe, Yahoo!, Hotmail, Microsoft Exchange) (Apple Inc., 2010) allow us to get email when it is sent, rather than we need to fetch it about three years ago. Moreover, large attachments, such as photos, can be attached on the e-mails for reference; our life has become way easier.

Reference

Apple Inc. (October 20, 2010). Apple Special Event.
Apple Inc. (2010). iOS Data Management. Retrieved 2010, from Apple Developers: http://developer.apple.com/technologies/ios/data-management.html
Jobs, S. (2010). WWDC . Apple Inc.
RCR Wireless. (2010, July 14). The smart phone impact on consumer mobile usage habits . Retrieved from Analyst Angle: http://www.rcrwireless.com/ARTICLE/20100714/OPINION/100719994/analyst-angle-the-smart-phone-impact-on-consumer-mobile-usage-habits
Skype. (2010). Skype. Retrieved 2010, from Skype: http://www.skype.com/

Thursday, September 15, 2011

The nature of computing

Comment 1:

Artificial intelligence (AI)?

Follow-up:

AI is a big topic. We will explore some aspects of AI in later parts of the course. However, one thing that is useful for us now is: How would you define “intelligence”? Is playing chess an intelligent action?

Comment 2:

Weather forecasting?

Follow-up:

Weather forecasting is a grand challenge in the computing field. The reason is that the calculations involve using thousands of variables and complicated differential equations. Furthermore, the time line has also to be finely divided (e.g., in units of milli-seconds) in order to come up with accurate results. Thus, weather forecasting requires great amount of computing power. We will talk about the kind of computing power it needs. Moreover, we will pay a visit to the HK Observatory later to take a look at the machines used there.

Comment 3:

Playing football by robot is meaningful? I personally think that playing football is just a small step, and this small step will contribute a lot in the later development in robot design.

Follow-up:

Good point! Thank you!

Comment 4:

Would like to know the extent of technical knowledge needed/will be taught in the course.

Follow-up:

We will try our best to balance the need of technical knowledge versus the usefulness of the materials taught in the course. Your comments and criticisms are mostly welcome!

Comment 5:

I major in linguistics and I think speaking a language can be regarded as computing.

Follow-up:

Yes sure you are right! Very insightful comment!

Comment 6:

Google and Apple are not the only companies doing searches and smart-phones, respectively. Should not single out these companies.

Follow-up:

Thanks for the comment! I just thought that they are “representatives” in their industries and the names “Google” and “Apple” nowadays have become house-hold names. Yet you are right in that we should not pay too much focus on them, with respect to the technologies that they use.

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

App Stores: the bridge between consumers and developers

Introduction
The term “App Store” and its concept were originally established by Steve Jobs in the iPhone 3G announcement keynote presentation in 2008. Unlike previous digital distribution platforms, the Apple App Store signifies on one touch download, one touch update and the provision of easy access to apps for consumers. After the success of Apple's App Store, it quickly became the main stream service to provide mobile software to mobile devices as competitors of Apple launch similar services. Examples include the Android Market by Google, Blackberry App World by Research in Motion, Ovi Store by Nokia and Windows Phone Marketplace by Microsoft. Currently, the Apple App store and the Google Android market receive the most attention and they are often being compared. However, as the Apple App Store are the most widely recognised app store, this article will focus this particular platform.

The Apple App Store
The Apple App Store is a service for the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad which allows users to browse and download applications from the iTunes Store. The App Store opened on July 10, 2008 via an update to iTunes and on the next day, the iPhone 3G was launched and came pre-loaded with iOS 2.0 with App Store support. As of October 20, 2010, there are at least 300,000 third-party applications officially available on the App Store, with over 7 billion total downloads. Depending on the application, they are available either free, or at a price.

App development
From programming codes to smartphone applications, the Software Development Kit (SDK) for iPhone OS was announced on March 6, 2008. The SDK allows developers running Mac OS X 10.5.4 or higher on a Mac to create applications that will run on the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad. This is now known as the iPhone Developer Program. An annual fee is required to use the iPhone SDK and upload applications to the store. This fee will pay for the maintence of the app store and other anonomyous fee. Finally, to run an application on the iPhone, the application needs to be signed. This signed certificate is only granted by Apple after the developer has first developed the software through the iPhone Developer Program.

Who says iPhone ain’t business?
Although Blackberry mobile phones are known for business use, the iPhone are not for fun and multimedia only. Applications developed through the enterprise program, the "iOS Enterprise Developer Program" (iDEP), allows corporations, non-profits and government agencies to develop applications for internal use. These applications are exclusively for institutional use and do not get published on the App Store. As for iPhone developers, applications distributed through the standard program can be sold exclusively through the iTunes Store, or on the App Store on the iOS devices. Developers who publish their applications on the App Store will receive 70% of sales revenue, and will not have to pay any distribution costs for the application, with the exception of the above mentioned annual fee.

App approval
To get applications into the App Store, developers are required to submit their app and wait for approval or rejection by Apple. It was always complained by developers that the application approval process is lengthy and sometimes applications are being rejected. Rejected apps were given feedback on the reason they were rejected so they could be modified and resubmitted. There were also some controversial application withdrawal incidents, for example the Google Voice application was withdrawn in July 27, 2009. This lead to speculation that Apple did this as Google stepped into the smartphone market with the Android system. The case even went to the court.

However, on September 9, 2010, Apple published the official App Store Review Guidelines for developers. At this time several development restrictions were lifted and many developers of previously rejected applications were asked to resubmit their applications under the new guidelines.

It is a very significant mildstone, as the Google Voice got readmitted to the US app store and a Flash-enabled browser named Skyfire also made it into the app store.

Security problems of the jailbreak community and the Android market
For iDevices, the App Store is the only direct way download native without voiding the warranty. Web applications can be installed on these devices, bypassing the App Store entirely but they tend to have less functionality. So if you want some functionality that the app store does not offer, you may have to try alternatives. Jailbreak is the action to gain root access to the command line of the operating system thus removing any limitations imposed upon them by Apple. Once jailbroken, iPhone users are able to download extensions, applications and themes unavailable in the App Store via installers such as Cydia. Apple considers this act as illegal while under the United States Magnuson–Moss Warranty Act, this is rather debatable. Nonetheless, some jailbroken iDevice users will install priced apps originally available in the App Store. This act is absolutely considered illegal and is an act of priracy and is highly discouraged. It is reasonable to see the installers such as Cydia to provide a real open platform for iDevice users, just like the Abndroid market. However, there are no such app approval process, it is very possible that users of the Android market and jailbropken iDevice users to accidentally install malicious software from third-party websites that may harm your device or even steal your personal data. Therefore, a completely open system is not absolutely perfect as there are certain risks that users will have to bear.

Future implications – the Mac app store
Following the success of the Apple app Store, on October 20, 2010, Apple announced the Mac App Store, a forthcoming digital distribution platform for Mac OS X applications. The platform is scheduled to launch by mid January 2011 and is modeled after the iOS App Store. It will simplify the whole app discovery, comparison and download process. As it is still not being released, not much information or speculation about its impact is given.

Conclusion
Living in the age of smartphones brings us a lot of convinece. Not only that we can browse the web anytime anywhere, the vast majority of applications with different functionalities are a very important factor that contributes to the rapid proliferation of smartphones. It is delightful to know that Apple lowered their requirement for app approval, while still keeping the user environment safe and friendly. Although the Apple App Store is still the priviledged one for now, we can foresee that competitiors will be rising quickly, adding more competition to the smartphone business. As the Chinese saying goes, “with competition comes improvement”, we can expect that App Stores will continue be one of the major components that constantly improve itself in the future.

References