Android Development
Google unveils new APIs to help developers use location services effectively
Apart from all the consumer-centric services and products, Google has also unveiled quite a few developer specific features at the on-going Google I/O 2013. We have already told you about Google Play games services and Google Play for Education and now it is the turn of new location-related APIs. Google is aiming to help app developers in building better apps and still not eat up all of user’s smartphone battery life with these APIs.
Google has announced three location related APIs – Fused Location Provider, Activity recognition and Geofencing. Let us look a little deeper:
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Android 4.3, White Nexus 4 launching on June 10: Report
Android 4.3 might not have made an appearance at Google I/O, but that doesn’t mean we will have to wait for it a long time. A report at Android and Me suggests that Google is planning to announce Android 4.3 on June 10.
Although the date is yet to be officially confirmed, it looks possible that we will see Android 4.3 in less than a month. As per Android and Me sources, Google intentionally booted Android 4.3 from Google I/O 2013as it wanted to showcase their ability to release new services and APIs without updating the Android versions, which they did.
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Android to get built-in Bluetooth Smart Ready support this year
Bluetooth SIG has announced that Google will include the native support for Bluetooth Smart and Smart Ready in the next Android version. Although, the report does not reveal the exact Android version details, however does mention that it will appear in the “coming months.”
This is not new for Android as manufacturers have been implementing the support for Bluetooth Smart Ready for years on their own, but native support is certainly a positive for the platform. Android smartphones like Samsung Galaxy S III already support Bluetooth Smart and Smart ready.
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Google Play game services official, aims to bring social & cloud features to games
As Sundar Pichai had hinted in his Wired interview, the major part of Google I/O keynote was devoted to developers. During one of the dev-focussed parts of keynote, Google announced the new Play game services – a suite of gaming services for game developers, which make it easy to include social features in mobile games.
Google Play game services are however not just limited to integration of social features, they also provide support for storing game saves and settings in the cloud and it is all done on Google’s servers.
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Android 4.3 confirmed ahead of Google I/O
With Google I/O 2013 keynote just 80 minutes away, we have a confirmation on Android 4.3. Looks like, this Android version is indeed going to be announced at the event.
The references to Android 4.3 were spotted in search results from Android developer website just now (first reported by The Verge). The Android version is still a big mystery but we now know that the mystery will be solved in just over an hour.
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Android might get app data sync soon: Report
There might be a flood of Android app data back-up solutions available in Google Play; Android users are still waiting for something that will let them sync app data across devices. This wait might finally be over soon.
The tear-down of an unreleased Google Play Services APK file, which had earlier revealed the existence of Google Play Games, has revealed the impending arrival of app data syncing in Android.
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CyanogenMod 10.1 RC release rolling out now for 40 devices
CyanogenMod team has announced that it has started pushing the first release candidate build for CM 10.1. Based on Android 4.2.2, CM 10.1 is now just one or two or milestones away from the stable release.
“We haven’t used the ‘Release Candidate’ nomenclature since the ICS days, but we feel the 10.1 branch is quickly approaching the point where a ‘final’ build is due. To prepare for that eventuality, RC1 builds for CyanogenMod 10.1.0 are now landing on our servers,” CM team noted in a blog post.
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Voice-activated, time-delayed capture modes coming to CyanogenMod
Looks like the camera app in CyanogenMod 10.1 is going to get a cool new feature. CM dev Ricardo Cerqueira, who mainly tweaks LG devices, is currently working on integrating voice-activated and time-delayed capture to CyanogenMod.
From the video and images shared by him, the development for the feature seems to be going good. Currently, the feature allows only one picture once the mode is activated, but Ricardo is working to make it persistent so that users can take as many as pictures they want by just saying the trigger words.
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Sony adds AOSP project for Xperia Z
Sony has always been a developer friendly smartphone manufacturer and after the interest generated by the Android Open Source Project for Xperia S phone, the company has decided to create an AOSP project for Xperia Z as well. Sony Xperia Z is the company’s latest flagship smartphone and the AOSP project will allow better Android development around the device and one day if it becomes stable enough, it would also turn out to be an alternative to consumers, who would like to put stock Android on their Xperia Z smartphone.
“Remember our Android Open Source Project for Xperia S? Because of the great interest we saw in that project, we’ve now decided to create an AOSP project for Xperia Z as well. This means that the software will be open for you as a developer to use and contribute to,” Sony noted in a blog post.
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HTC and Samsung release kernel sources for HTC One, Galaxy S 4
Now, that is some good news for the Android developers especially those who have already started or planning to tinker with two of the best Android smartphones in the world right now. HTC and Samsung have released kernel sources for some variants of HTC One and Galaxy S 4 smartphones respectively.
HTC has released kernel sources for international version of HTC One, HTC One developer edition and Canadian telco variants (Rogers, Bell and Telus). The sources for HTC One kernel version 3.4.10 can be downloaded from HTCDev.com.
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