Functionality of android back button works quite logically and should not change. Only complaint is that you don't always know when you're going to get taken back to home screen, thinking that there's further steps backwards. I suggest an icon change letting users know when it's going back to home, or switching apps. Increased functionality by holding the back button would also be welcome, on a per app basis. This is where on-screen nav bar would excel in phones.
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Nexus 5
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I find your Android bias laughable. You defend them to the end to make them look good despite the back button not working to their own published description.
And to think, you spend so much of your time pointing out iOS fanboys...
By the way, I'm downloading a new ROM through ROM manager. While it was downloading, I was replying to you. Once it got done, it automatically, without any input from me, switched over to ROM managers flash screen. I was thinking "oh I don't want to be on this screen. I want to go back." So what would make sense for me to do if I want to go back? Well hit the back button of course. But nope, it didn't work properly.
So you have 2 choices. Say the back button works properly (Which would thus mean it is inconsistent and unreliable and you consider that "proper") or admit it doesn't work properly and needs to be adjusted.
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That's a good find. They definitely have a lot of improvements to make to the back button. But I don't see Google making any changes anytime soon. They are starting to pull an Apple in a lot of areas.
Some subtle changes in the appearance of the icon would go a long way towards alleviating any confusion as to what the back button is going to do. That's supposed to be one of the advantages of soft buttons, that they're flexible and can alter their appearance depending on context- the Android back button should change appearance based on what it will do next.
This would be awesome. Then there would finally be a good reason to have on screen nav buttons. Currently Google isn't making them any button than off screen buttons. Let me know when stock Android allows you to make that kind of adjustment. And even adjusting position, order, and key functions. Right now on stock android, they might as well be off screen capacitive buttons that eat into screen real estate 90% of the time.
Sorry Strausd, but I believe you are wrong. People complaining about the back button being inconsistent are not talking about switching between apps. The back button can sometimes take you out of an app when you thought it was going to take you to another screen in the app. No, and I mean nobody but maybe you thinks it should switch apps for you. Why does android have an app switcher? The back button is only suppose to work in apps. That is it. If you don't get that about android then maybe you should move to iOS, but I don't think you are going to find a back button that will switch between apps. Sorry, but I think you are just arguing now for the sake of arguing. You have been explained clearly what the back button should do, but you still choice to argue.
Straus, I really have no bone to pick with you. My recent posts to you about the Back button has little to do with me liking Android more. It has everything to do with explaining to you what the Back button does.
As for the "published description," I've already addressed that in this post: https://forums.macrumors.com/posts/18059331/
The member that quoted that was interpreting it wrong. I even used Google's own apps to demonstrate it and offered a more comprehensive list of functions of the Back button. Even the member that quoted it dropped it after reading my post. You may have quoted my post, but did you actually read it? Cause you're certainly not addressing anything in it.
I've explained everything you brought up about the Back button, including why sometimes it does seemingly switch between apps. Again, I've provided you details in terms of the Back button's functionality. This one being the most pertinent one:
-Return to previous app when on the last activity and the app was launched through intent from another app
Again, it's not a mere coincidence that once you hit a link, then suddenly the Back button is "working properly."
And you've still yet to answer my most important question: How would you ever go back within an app after you've switched to it if the Back button takes you back to the previous app? I have no idea how you'd navigate backwards in the app you've just switched to if the Back button did what you wanted it to.
It works properly.
As I've said before, the inconsistencies with the Back button itself can be fixed (the one I experience once in a while are apps that take you Back to the home screen when there's still more "back" to go back to within the app). This can be improved and made more consistent. Ultimately, it isn't so big of a problem that I wish they got rid of the Back button -- it's still a better form of navigation than not having a Back button, IMO.
Your definition of "working properly" means it's an App Switcher. I don't know how to make this any clearer: it's not an App Switcher. There's already an App Switcher button.
Re-read my previous post (and maybe actually respond to the points and explanations I made?).
Otherwise, I'm sorry you don't understand how the Back button works.
EDIT: Straus, here's one more example for you. I hope you'll address it:
In your scenario, imaging you start at the Home screen. You launch an App (say the Play Store). If the Back button did what you wanted -- that is, if the Back button takes you back to the previous screen even if it's a different app -- the previous screen would be what in this scenario? It would be the Home screen, correct?
So in your world, going from Home screen to Play Store, then hitting Back should take you back to the Home screen. I ask again, how in the world would you navigate backwards within the Play Store app, then? What about the apps that don't have the upper-left back navigational button? You'd essentially be stuck forever in the current screen of that app? How does that make any sense? (It's same question I've asked you repeatedly when using the App Switcher; how would you navigate backwards in the app you've switched to if the Back button sends you to the previous app? You'd be stuck forever in that current screen of the new app, too?)
If the Back button returns to the previous screen, no matter what it is, then the Back button is useless inside an app unless you go forward within the app first -- this makes no sense. At all. And it undermines the point of both the Home and the App Switcher buttons.
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It's all there. I've explained it multiple times in multiple ways. He wants the Back button to do something else.
The Back button has never ever worked the way he's describing, and it never will, thankfully.
I don't know how else one would go backwards within an app after switching to it if the Back button brought you back to the previous app. It just makes no sense. You'd be stuck in the current screen of the new app forever. Absurd.
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Great idea. This would be along the lines of what I suggested, a more dynamic Back button. That's how you'd improve the Back button.
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Straus, one final example:
Notice when you're in an app (let's say Chrome) and you pull down your notification panel to go into the Settings app (via the quick Settings button. I'm not talking about the toggles; I'm talking about the actual Settings app), what happens when you press the back button? It takes you back to the app you were in (Chrome). Here is yet another example of:
-Return to previous app when on the last activity and the app was launched through intent from another app
In this scenario, the OS thinks you're entering the Settings app just to turn something on/off or adjust something. It assumes rightly that your intent is still to go back to the app you were in. That's why that Settings link is there in the pull down panel -- just quick access to change something, but the intent is still to eventually go back to the app you were previously in.
BUT...!
If you were to use the App Swticher (like in your example going from Chrome > to App Switcher > to Tapatalk) then it's a different story. Let's continue using the Settings app. Try this... open Chrome, hit the App Switcher, hit the Settings app. Then try hitting back. What happens? It takes you back to the home screen. This is correct because...
Now, the OS considers -- again, rightly -- that you are essentially done using the app you were in (Chrome). That's why you use the App Switcher. It considers your intent is now focused on the app that you've switched to (be it Settings, Tapatalk, Messages, whatever). Thusly, when you hit the Back button now, it takes you backwards within the app. And once it has nothing left to go back to, it takes you home (the Back button acts as an "exit" so to speak). The OS will keep your previous app running in the back ground, of course, if you should ever want to switch back to it, but for now, your intent, per the App Switcher, is to use the new app you've switched to. The back button acts accordingly.
Does that make sense?
Listen, it's not like the Back button has been "broken" and working improperly for five years since Android's inception. Maybe it was a little different back in its early years, but ever since the dedicated App Switcher button, the back button has worked this way. Nothing is "broken" about it.
Can it get better at being consistent? Yes, indeed. Can the back button become more dynamic in the future? I hope so.
But it cannot do what you're asking it to do. Like I said, you'd be destroying the function of the back button in situations when you've switched or launched a new app. In the simplest example I gave you in my earlier post (going from Home screen > Play Store), hitting the Back button must be used to go backwards in the Play Store app. Taking you Back to the home screen would cripple the navigation of the app you've just launched from the home screen -- and that just makes no sense. Again, how would you go backwards within the new app you just launched if it keeps sending you back to the "previous screen" aka the home screen? Not every app has a navigational button on the upper left corner; I mean, isn't that why the back button was created in the first place? A dedicated button to go backwards within an app.
If the Back button doesn't work for you, so be it. It is, however, working properly. It's up to Google to add more dynamic functionality to it, but it doesn't need to be fixed. And, of course, it's up to the developers to keep the button consistent -- I recognize this is a problem, but it's a different problem from what you're saying.
That's the last I'll say as I've gone beyond belaboring the point.
Back on topic...
More info on KitKat, including USB OTG support, and Optical Image Stabilization:
http://www.androidauthority.com/nex...-android-stock-apps-coming-play-store-279188/
And: Nexus 5 coming last week of October, says new rumor
http://www.phonearena.com/news/Nexus-5-coming-last-week-of-October-says-new-rumor_id47897
Seems like it will retain competitive price point, too. "Half the price of the 5S."
More info on KitKat, including USB OTG support, and Optical Image Stabilization:
http://www.androidauthority.com/nex...-android-stock-apps-coming-play-store-279188/
And: Nexus 5 coming last week of October, says new rumor
http://www.phonearena.com/news/Nexus-5-coming-last-week-of-October-says-new-rumor_id47897
Seems like it will retain competitive price point, too. "Half the price of the 5S."
Pricing sounds good. Lets just hope this is a really good phone. Good camera, 16gb and 32gb, and like we said a good price. If it is not I have my eye on the S4 GPE. Either phone will go well with my At&t HTC One.
I saw that too, but it doesn't make sense. There isn't an iPhone that costs $892 US.
Even if true, that can have multiple meanings: "half the price off contract" vs "half the up-front price on contract", which is much less attractive.
Nothing's official until Google says it, but I would assume this means off-contract price since Nexus phones tend to be sold unlocked.
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That would fall right around my predictions:
16GB $329
32GB $379
Hope so!
If the rumored specs are real and the price is the same and comes with Android 4.4, I'll be buying one and selling my 3 month old S4.
And judging how I'm using my iPad less thanks to the bizarre, unprofessional, non-elegant look of iOS 7, A Nexus may go along with it.
And judging how I'm using my iPad less thanks to the bizarre, unprofessional, non-elegant look of iOS 7, A Nexus may go along with it.
You are failing to understand how the Back button works. It's as simple as that.
Do you know why you're not answering my questions in the examples I've given you? Because you can't. I don't mean you personally... I mean, literally, there is no answer because the way you want the Back button to work, would mean crippling the ability to move backwards within an app.
It's incredible you're having this much trouble understanding. I've given you a number of examples why your idea wouldn't work. I even broke it down for you step by step in this post: https://forums.macrumors.com/posts/18062175/.
You're just being stubborn. So be it.
I think that couch has done a very good job of explaining exactly how the back button functions. It may not make sense to you, straus, and that is why you think it isn't working right, but the logic to is actually done very well. Take some time to understand it and maybe you'll see the beauty of it.
Could not agree more. It has been written plain as day, and you still seem not get it. I think it is more of you don't want to get it because you would rather it work the way you want it to. Instead of admitting that is works for the most part just fine. You would rather argue. Just let it go.
If the Nexus 5 is going to be released at the end of the month, then invites should start going out this week for an event in two weeks. This is like Christmas for me. I've been using a flip phone since I sold my iPhone a month ago. My body is ready. 
According to phone arena it should be pretty kick ass.
http://www.phonearena.com/news/Nexu...t-on-a-phone-Lytro-like-functionality_id47900