While most of us aren’t surprised by this move, I’m certainly not, Google has dropped official support for the CDMA (Verizon) Galaxy Nexus as a developer device. They did the same for the LTE Xoom and Nexus S 4G as well. At first folks thought was in regards to Google Wallet not being officially supported by Verizon however it was for a more in depth reason. It was first discovered by Droid-Life earlier this afternoon and while everyone was in a buzz and crying foul about the change, what we needed to do was wait. After many tech blogs reached out for comment, Dan Morril, an Android engineer had this to say:
Hello! This is a quick clarification about support for CDMA devices.
For various technical reasons, recent CDMA Android devices implement core telephony functionality in .apk files provided in binary form by the carriers. To function correctly, these .apk files must be signed by the so-called “platform” key. However, when an individual creates a custom build from the AOSP source code, they don’t use the same signing key as these CDMA flies were signed with.
The result is that these files don’t work properly, and pure AOSP builds running on these devices can’t place calls, access mobile data, and so on. Because we aim to make sure that we are as clear as possible about the degree of support that devices have, we updated the docs over at source.android.com to reflect this reality.We will still make available as many as possible of the closed-source binaries for these devices, and Nexus devices will continue to have unlockable bootloaders. And, of course, GSM/HSPA+ devices are still supported, as are any other devices we’re able to support. We’ve simply updated the documentation to be clearer about the current extent of CDMA support.We are of course always working to improve support, and we’ll keep everyone updated as we make improvements. Thanks as always for your interest in AOSP!- Dan
So yes, because CDMA isn’t the majority, and that apk files use a different signing key than that of true AOSP software Google is officially dropping CDMA support to an extent. For most people this won’t be an issue as you will still be able get updates quickly as Google has mentioned that devices will still receive them in a timely fashion. However, if one were to compile a true AOSP build of Android it wouldn’t be signed correctly and functionality could very well be hindered on a CDMA device. The reason for this hindering is that Signing keys can run a muck if not worked out and matched properly.
As Google has no control over CDMA files they can not officially give them support because they cannot manipulate the files themselves as they are carrier held. Google does not want to be responsible for your phone or tablet not working correctly. To prevent the headache that can be caused if things are mismatched, they’ve dropped official support in some capacities.
At the core, these devices are still Nexus devices. They still have bootloaders that are easily unlocked. The Android source will still be made available. The only difference is that the ways that the binaries are redistributed have changed. It just means that developers for the Verizon Galaxy Nexus, LTE Xoom and Nexus S 4G will have to make changes in how they build software for these devices. Trust me, there is a reason why the development community is so awesome and if anyone can find a way, it would be those folk.
source: Google Groups