Two days ago, Huawei just pushed the update of the major version of Hongmeng 3.0 to P50 series users, but soon Hongmeng 4.0 will come. According to Huawei's official website, the fifth Huawei Developer Conference (HDC) will be held in Songshan Lake, Dongguan, from August 4 to August 6, and as in the past, the core of the HDC conference is still around HarmonyOS, that is, the ecosystem of the HarmonyOS operating system.
According to the conference agenda announced by Huawei, the keynote speech on the first day (August 4) was delivered by Yu Chengdong, CEO of Huawei Device BG, and the official website introduction page also mentioned "new version, new experience..." Not surprisingly, after two years, we will usher in a new upgrade of Harmony 4.0 at this conference.
Photo: Huawei
For four years, since the release of the HDC conference in 2019, Hongmeng has surrounded various controversies, including applauds and bearers. But in any case, it must be admitted that Huawei persevered, the number of Huawei devices equipped with the Harmony system exceeded 320 million (mobile phones accounted for the majority), the number of third-party devices exceeded 250 million, and attracted more than 2 million developers.
On the other hand, recent supply chain sources also revealed that Huawei raised its mobile phone shipment target for 2023 from 30 million units to 40 million units. Everything seems to be moving in a better direction, which also makes us expect more from Hongmeng 4.0.
From Hongmeng Kaitian, to Hongmeng 4.0
With the exit of Microsoft, Nokia and BlackBerry, mobile operating systems have been the domain of Android and iOS for a long time. However, in May 2019, after being sanctioned by the United States, Huawei suddenly encountered Google's ban and was banned from using Google's GMS services, almost nullifying Huawei's efforts and achievements in overseas markets in the past few years.
On August 9 of the same year, at the first HDC conference, in the face of unprecedented difficulties, Huawei officially released the HarmonyOS Hongmeng operating system. Hongmeng 1.0 was the first to be applied on Huawei's smart screen, and the feasibility of distributed technology was initially verified. However, because the first batch of equipment equipped with the Harmony system was very limited, doubts from all parties also came, and Harmony was named the "PPT system" for a while.
Photo: Huawei
The difficulty of developing an operating system is obviously not the same as the difficulty of developing a software program or app. But more importantly, although the operating system is difficult, as long as enough resources and money are invested in it can always be developed, the ecology is not a thing that can be done with money. In fact, in the field of consumer electronics, a successful ecosystem can be built around the operating system, and there are only a few companies such as Microsoft, Apple, and Google in the world.
Taking Apple's latest mixed reality headset Vision Pro as an example, the first batch of experiencers mentioned that Vision Pro did not see any third-party adaptation applications for the time being, in fact, this is the biggest reason why Vision Pro appeared at the WWDC developer conference, Apple needs to let global developers know Vision Pro and vision Pro in WWDC, and then attract developers to adapt and develop.
Therefore, Huawei chose to let the relatively simple smart screen with less dependence on the ecology be the first to carry Hongmeng, and the smart watches and bracelets behind it are actually the same.
At the second HDC conference in 2020, Huawei officially released Hongmeng 2.0, bringing distributed application framework, distributed soft bus, distributed data management and other technologies, and launched developer beta versions to smartphones, vehicle machines, and smart wearable products. At this time, Hongmeng has finally extended from the earliest smart screen to a wider range of devices, and the core and most controversial is of course Huawei mobile phones.
Whether Harmony is an Android shell or not, the question of whether it is an Android shell will set off a wide range of debates almost every time. Frankly speaking, it is indeed difficult to explain clearly, if you have to summarize in one sentence, it can be considered that in Huawei mobile phones, the Harmony system has both OpenHarmony (Huawei-led) parts and AOSP (Android Open Source Project) parts.
It is precisely because of the use of AOSP that Huawei phones equipped with the Harmony system are basically the same as the EMUI (Android Custom Operating System) developed based on AOSP before, and Android APK files can also be installed. In addition, in Huawei mobile phones, the Android System displayed by the running service, the Android Easter egg in the system version number, and the ADB (Android Debug Bridge) debugging in the developer options have proved the "Android background" of the Harmony system on Huawei mobile phones time and again.
Figure/bilibili screenshot
However, it may not be appropriate to crudely define HarmonyOS as an "Android case". In the final analysis, HarmonyOS is not an operating system designed for mobile phones from the beginning, but for the future of the Internet of Things and multi-terminal interconnection, which is accompanied by Huawei's "1+8+N" all-scenario strategy proposed in 2019.
Relying on distributed capabilities and atomic services, Harmony can be mounted on more smart terminals, such as smart phones, smart speakers, smart cars and watches, and even applied to many home appliances, realizing fast connection, mutual assistance and resource sharing between different terminal devices, bringing a smoother full-scene experience.
In 2021, Huawei continued to launch HarmonyOS 3.0 at the HDC Conference, announcing that a variety of terminals from smartphones to smart homes are fully equipped with the HarmonyOS operating system. At the same time, at the development level, Harmony has finally realized the same set of system capabilities and adapted to a variety of terminals. In addition to continuing to improve distributed capabilities and privacy security, HarmonyOS 3.1 also launched atomic services with the intention of breaking app boundaries to bring new traffic.
Atomized service, iOS users should be no stranger. Photo: Huawei
It is foreseeable that the upcoming Harmony 4.0 will also bring more improvements and deepening of distributed capabilities, and atomic services may also be an important development direction in the next few versions. In addition, there are some upgrades in Harmony 4.0 that may attract more attention.
Large models and car machines, but the core of Harmony 4.0 is still full scene
Before the official announcement of this HDC conference, many media mistakenly thought that HarmonyOS 4.0 would be released on July 7, but they did not notice that the Huawei Developer Conference (HDC.Cloud) on July 7 was held by HUAWEI CLOUD. But to some extent, Hongmeng 4.0 is likely to have a strong connection with this year's HDC.Cloud conference.
Previously, HUAWEI CLOUD has launched its own Pangu large model, although Huawei officially denied the launch of "Pangu Chat" (ChatGPT-like), but there is still news that Harmony 4.0 will be combined with the latest large model technology.
Photo: Microsoft
It can be said that if the upgrade of Harmony 4.0 involves generative AI and large models, we are not surprised at all, but feel that it is the meaning of the question. More questions may be how Huawei will combine at the operating system level, after Microsoft and Google have announced that they will introduce AI assistant and large model technology in Windows and Android respectively, but more specific functions and experiences will wait for the three companies to reveal one by one.
In addition, the intelligent cockpit will be the focus of the Hongmeng 4.0 upgrade, Yu Chengdong said earlier that the Hongmeng 4.0 intelligent cockpit system will be released this fall, which can realize the experience of multi-person multi-device, multi-screen and multi-sound zone. In addition, there are highlights such as eye position tracking and eye state recognition in the cabin, multi-screen and multi-channel two-way circulation, and multi-screen cross-device screen projection. From this point of view, the core is still the deepening of Hongmeng's distributed capabilities in the vehicle.
Photo: Huawei
However, as mentioned earlier, at present, Hongmeng users are still mainly Huawei mobile phone users, and they may be more concerned about the upgrade of Hongmeng 4.0 on the mobile phone. It is said that Harmony 4.0 will have major changes at the design level, and will also add more new features, including integrated intelligent AI image processing technology, bringing more accurate image recognition and stronger processing functions. In addition, He Gang, chief operating officer of Huawei Terminal BG, also revealed that the linkage experience between Huawei mobile phones and car machines under Hongmeng 4.0 will be smoother.
On the whole, I believe that the smooth experience of all scenarios will still be the core of Hongmeng 4.0 upgrade, as Wang Chenglu, the "father of Hongmeng", said in an interview, "Hongmeng is first of all an IoT-oriented operating system, and its primary goal is to use a system to meet various hardware devices of all sizes." The full-scenario experience is reflected in both the use of a single device and the experience of cross-device interconnection.
But four years later, the Hongmeng ecosystem has not been able to cross the life and death line of 16% (global active devices), and more than 2 million developers are far from Android or iOS. There is no doubt that the next Hongmeng 4.0 will become a key version of the Hongmeng ecosystem, and we hope that Huawei can continue to bring more innovation and better experience.