Google had released Android O Preview for developers, so that they can test their applications on the new OS to get ready whenever this new version of Android becomes publicly available. The Android O has the following important features:
1. API changes
2. Notification channel
3. Picture-in-picture
4. Autofill
5. Adaptive icons and More Background limits, among others.
1. Background Limits: Android O brings in background limits to improve battery life and performance. They set new limits to implicit broadcasts, location updates and background. So the services running in the background are stopped after a few minutes. This OS enables Apps using such services to be placed on a temporary wait list for a future time by which time they can launch services without limitations. This is helpful when applications need to handle a task that is visible to the user, such as a high-priority message, when receiving a broadcast, or when executing a pending intent from a notification.
2. Regarding location updates, the apps in the background will set limits to receive updates only several times each hour. Applications can change this behavior by bringing the application to the foreground, using a foreground service, using the Geofencing API, or location listener.
3. Notification Channels: With this new feature Android O users will have more control over notifications by the introduction of channels. These channels can arrange messages from multiple applications, and it allows the user can enable/disable a channel, or effect one of its settings: Importance, Sound, Lights, Vibration, Visibility on the lock screen. Notifications can be accorded a priority. There are seven Importance levels of the channel determining how a notification is displayed and what noise, light or vibration is associated with it. Channels can be grouped across multiple user accounts. This is useful for managing channels on devices used both for work and personal use.
4. Picture-in-picture (PIP): This feature is already available on Android TV, PIP is brought now to Android enabling activities to be shown within other activities. PIP is a special case of multi-window introduced in Android N. It is especially useful to play video content in it.
5. Autofill framework: Android O is available with a framework that applications can use to autofill forms and save data in order to save users time and avoid repeating form-filling operations. Examples include working with login data or credit card information.
6. Multi-display: It enables developers to move activities from one display to another on devices with multiple displays.
7. Adaptive icons: Launchers on various devices will be able to show icons that have different shapes: round, square, squircle, or others. Android O builds launcher icons from two image layers, one for background and one for foreground, and a mask. These icons support visual effects.
8. Java. Android O includes java.time from OpenJDK 8 and java.nio.file and java.lang.invoke from OpenJDK 7. It speeds up the runtime performance by 2x on some benchmarks.
9. Other features in Android O include: font resources in XML, wide-gamut color for apps, high-quality Bluetooth audio codecs, WiFi Aware, keyboard navigation, WebView enhancements, etc..
This version of Android is a preview; it is not completely stable and subsequent versions will be issued over the following months. Android Studio 2.4 Canary is needed to develop a mobile app using Android O. The new version of Android can be tested in the emulator or several Nexus and Pixel devices.
We are yet to get a handle on one :(
1. API changes
2. Notification channel
3. Picture-in-picture
4. Autofill
5. Adaptive icons and More Background limits, among others.
Main features Android O:
1. Background Limits: Android O brings in background limits to improve battery life and performance. They set new limits to implicit broadcasts, location updates and background. So the services running in the background are stopped after a few minutes. This OS enables Apps using such services to be placed on a temporary wait list for a future time by which time they can launch services without limitations. This is helpful when applications need to handle a task that is visible to the user, such as a high-priority message, when receiving a broadcast, or when executing a pending intent from a notification.2. Regarding location updates, the apps in the background will set limits to receive updates only several times each hour. Applications can change this behavior by bringing the application to the foreground, using a foreground service, using the Geofencing API, or location listener.
3. Notification Channels: With this new feature Android O users will have more control over notifications by the introduction of channels. These channels can arrange messages from multiple applications, and it allows the user can enable/disable a channel, or effect one of its settings: Importance, Sound, Lights, Vibration, Visibility on the lock screen. Notifications can be accorded a priority. There are seven Importance levels of the channel determining how a notification is displayed and what noise, light or vibration is associated with it. Channels can be grouped across multiple user accounts. This is useful for managing channels on devices used both for work and personal use.
4. Picture-in-picture (PIP): This feature is already available on Android TV, PIP is brought now to Android enabling activities to be shown within other activities. PIP is a special case of multi-window introduced in Android N. It is especially useful to play video content in it.
5. Autofill framework: Android O is available with a framework that applications can use to autofill forms and save data in order to save users time and avoid repeating form-filling operations. Examples include working with login data or credit card information.
6. Multi-display: It enables developers to move activities from one display to another on devices with multiple displays.
7. Adaptive icons: Launchers on various devices will be able to show icons that have different shapes: round, square, squircle, or others. Android O builds launcher icons from two image layers, one for background and one for foreground, and a mask. These icons support visual effects.
8. Java. Android O includes java.time from OpenJDK 8 and java.nio.file and java.lang.invoke from OpenJDK 7. It speeds up the runtime performance by 2x on some benchmarks.
9. Other features in Android O include: font resources in XML, wide-gamut color for apps, high-quality Bluetooth audio codecs, WiFi Aware, keyboard navigation, WebView enhancements, etc..
This version of Android is a preview; it is not completely stable and subsequent versions will be issued over the following months. Android Studio 2.4 Canary is needed to develop a mobile app using Android O. The new version of Android can be tested in the emulator or several Nexus and Pixel devices.
We are yet to get a handle on one :(
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