When Google first unveiled Android, the mobile OS way back in November, something inside me told, “Hey, Wait this is not what Google would want, they will want to have a complete phone”. Interestingly the rumor mills are abuzz saying that Google might partner with Dell to launch a new handset that would come loaded with Android. Everyone seems to be touting the gPhone as the next iPhone and its chief competitor.

While Android is still under heavy development, and a final version is expected sometime this year. It makes complete sense for Google to make a phone to showcase all what Android can do, and going in with a partnership with Dell makes perfect sense. Dell has been in the PDA business before and it certainly has Know How on how mobile phones are built. Combine Dell’s Hardware expertise and Google’s Engineers and you have a winner at your hands.

Whether the GPhone if and when it is available can be iPhone competitor or not is a big question because so far we’ve never seen apps from Google with interfaces as friendly as Apple’s. So far Google has not shown the same kind of attention to its interfaces, that make Apple’s consumer electronics products a joy to use..

If the GPhone comes out with 3G and never before seen internet connectivity on its handset then it can be a winner, but beating Mobile Safari will be hard. And while there are reports that the Google phone would launch at next month’s 3GSM Telecom Conference in Barcelona, there has been no denial from either company that such a product is in the works.

So until then lets keep our fingers crossed. But incase Google does come out with its own handset, it surely is going to be a big stab in the back of Apple.

Android is a stripped down version of Linux, and it will be available under the very popular Apache Software Licence. By Being open source, I am sure Android will appeal to a large number of developers to develop applications for the Mobile OS.

The developers will have access to the SDK sometime next week, so that they can start building applications for Android. For me Android holds a lot of promise, and I feel this one of the better things Google has done in the recent past. We won’t be seeing any mobile handsets loaded with Android atleast until next year, so I can’t really tell if Android will take off. But if it does, it is a major victory for Linux and Opensource.

Did anyone notice, doesn’t the Android logo look weird. Sure Google could have come up with something better.