One of the areas where the iPhone/iPad has trumped the Android platform is in the area of good UI design standards. Apple has an entire website devoted to human interface guidelines for the iOS platform. I would not be the only Android developer who has relied on the Apple guidelines in the development of a mobile platform, good ideas are good ideas. Sadly, Google has not made a similar effort for Android. That is not to say the Android User Interface Guidelines are not helpful but the site is more about small technical details and does not have the depth and history that Apple does. However, nature abhors a vacuum and a number of Android developers have created blog sites that address this deficiency. One that I follow quite closely is Android UI Design Patterns by Juhani Lehtimaki. Just in time for Christmas, Juhani has published one of the better Android UI guidelines that has incorporated the past two years of Android development, both smartphone and tablet. His material is an excellent starting point for anyone building an Android app, either natively or through PhoneGap/Apache Cordova.
12/20/2011 9:51 am – update
Someone pointed out to me that Google does provide an initial orientation to new Android developers to assist with UI design.
