[jchung]

Is Android inextricably coupled with the Google App store? For thought experiment's sake: could Microsoft fork Android and then host their own app store that supports the same apps that a dev would submit to Google's App store, thus making it possible for devs to get their android apps listed in both stores merely by submitting the app twice?

(Serious question. I know nothing about app stores and/or mobile operating systems)

[Jyaif]

Yes it's possible. It's exactly what Amazon is (was?) trying to pull off.

[nunez]

Not really. While MS could create their own store and distribute their own distribution of Android based on the Open Source builds, they won’t get access to Play Services which is a big part of the Android experience. MS tried to rectify this by partnering with Cyanogen who had deep experience in customizing Android. That fell through, however. There is also a project that is trying to reverse engineer Play Services itself into an Open Source model, but it isn’t as good and updates take longer.

[spilk]

I think this is roughly how Amazon's FireOS fork works.

[scarface74]

It's not just the app store. It's Google Play Services. Google provides some services that Android developers rely on (like notifications). There is a non-zero amount of work to decouple apps from Google Play Services and use the equivalent Amazon services.