Android Version Updates - are they Monumental or Common?

[Stosh Isarockin]

How common is the 4.4.4 upgrade in Cell phone history? Is it a big deal or not? How monumental is Lollipop? Or is it common? I bought my first smartphone ever, Gs5 and within a month 4.4.4 is announced and a few weeks later lollipop is announced. a lil update release and android version history lesson for the noob please.

 

[B. Diddy]

4.4.4 was more of a maintenance update from 4.4.3. I think one of the main issues was an SSL vulnerability patch.

5.0 is a big update. In general, any time you go up a full number, it's big (although Jellybean to KitKat was 4.3 to 4.4).

This article will tell you all you want to know about the history: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_version_history

 

[BrainSmashR]

That "rule of thumb" holds true for virtually all software updates.
Numbers preceding the decimal are major updates (Windows 8), numbers after the decimal are minor updates (Windows 8.1).