Oxygen Updater in 2019

Looking forward to an exciting new year
Arjan Vlek

Hi folks,

It's almost 2019. Christmas is just around the corner, new year's eve is only a few days away.

With a new year being so close, I want to share an overview of the past year and an insight in how Oxygen Updater will be at your service in 2019.

Looking back at 2018

App usage & growth:

2018 was a year in which the Oxygen Updater app saw an immense growth in usage & popularity. In January, the app had around 30.000 active installs. That was already a large group of users, but during the year, the userbase grew to 100.000 active installs. Thank you all for using & enjoing my app!

The app is used a lot, almost every moment someone is opening or refreshing the app. The enormous popularity even caused some server issues when new updates became available, because so many of you were trying to update at the same time! (but these have been resolved)

OxygenOS devices & updates:

During 2018, numerous updates were released & made available in the app. Some of these include:

  • OnePlus 5 & 5T got Oreo in December 2017/January 2018
  • OnePlus 6 was released in May, and updated to Android P in September
  • OnePlus 6T was released in October, and supported in the beginning of December
  • OnePlus 3 / 3T received lots of Open Betas in the first half of 2018 (later, the beta program was finished)
  • OnePlus 5 / 5T received numerous Open Betas, the 5T beta program actually started around January of 2018

Issues at the end of the year

During the last part of the year, we had some tougher moments, as the app became unable to automatically import updates due to a change on OnePlus' side. For a short while, the future of the app seemed to be uncertain, but with the help of the community everything is going to be all right :)

Looking forward to 2019

The events of late 2018 caused some changes within the app and how it's going to be supported, but the first thing I'd to say is: Oxygen Updater is not dead, long live Oxygen Updater! 

In 2019, the focus will be more on the community. The current update client and server are almost feature complete, so expect not too many app updates from my side. As I have a job and am moving out of my parent's house, I don't have as much time for the app as I once did.

Nevertheless, some new things which you may look forward to are:

  • A possibility that community members can create or contribute to news posts and announcements, so these can be made available at a higher rate
  • A clearer instruction within the automatic update installation screen (root users only) on what to do if you get stuck at the TWRP recovery screen (a.k.a. see why the installation failed)
  • (Hopefully) a solution for the download errors which are still occurring too frequently
  • A select group of community members can now submit updates to the database of the app. During 2019, this group will be expanded

Some other tidbits:

  • The Oxygen Updater server, domain name & infrastructure will be paid / supported by me, throughout 2019 and beyond.
  • Cyanogen Update Tracker, the predecessor of this app which did the same for Cyanogen OS devices, may be shut down in July 2019. This depends on usage of its platform & website.
    • A shutdown of Cyanogen Update Tracker does not affect Oxygen Updater at all.
    • If you (or your friends) still use a Cyanogen OS device on an old OS version, (tell him or her to) use Cyanogen Update Tracker to update it NOW
    • Cyanogen devices include the OnePlus One, most Wileyfox'es, some YU's and some other older phones. See https://cyanogenupdatetracker.com for a complete list of supported devices.

Wrapping it up

I hope you've enjoyed using Oxygen Updater so far. I'm excited to see what 2019 will bring.

~Arjan