Other than fragmentation, one of Android’s biggest problems has always revolved around poor Bluetooth performance. While we already know that Google is focusing on improving this with Android O, the company snuck an in-band ringing feature for connected Bluetooth devices in one of the latest Developer Previews…
As Android O nears its official launch for phones and tablets, other Android-based platforms are beginning to transition over. For Android Things, the jump to 8.0 will introduce new features and begins with Developer Preview 5.
With Android 8.0, Google is implementing something called Adaptive Icons, which allow the end-user to decide the uniform shape they want all of their installed app icons to look like. Unfortunately, with this change, apps that have uniquely-designed icons like the old Slack app and Adsense will have to be changed to work with the new system.
Do you prefer the new round and uniform or old unique and personalized application icons?
Smart text selection in Android O uses on-device machine learning to recognize phone numbers and addresses, as well as improve the copy-and-paste experience. New in Developer Preview 4 is the ability to paste copied items that have formatting as plain text.
While Android O doesn’t introduce much new to the user interface, there are a lot of new tools for developers to use that make notifications much better. On top of this, the upcoming OS also comes with new system-level features that give users better control over what notifications they see and where they see them.
Which of Android 8.0’s new notification features are you most excited for?
Android O features a huge redesign of notifications for both end users and developers. Google wants the latter group to add notification channels to give users more control in apps, as well as a centralized location for quicker access. In Android 8.0, Chrome will extend notification channels to all websites.
The fourth and final Developer Preview of Android O finally dropped for Pixel and Nexus device yesterday, and several small graphical changes came with it. The latest change to be found is the system apps icon which has finally received a fresh coat of paint…
After dropping the third O Developer Preview back in early June, Google today pushed out the final Developer Preview build before the official release of Android 8.0 later this summer. While Google has tweaked some of the designs within the OS, DP4 is mainly a close to finished build of Android O which means better performance and finalized APIs for developers.
Have you already installed it or do you plan to install Android O’s fourth Developer Preview?
Typing on TVs is something that pretty much everyone hates. Clicking half a dozen times between letter is infuriating, and it’s only made worse when you have a poor keyboard layout. When Google debuted Android TV, input was one of the key things that it fixed. It did that by pushing voice, but that doesn’t always work. Some apps need keyboard input, and Android TV’s keyboard always worked well. Now, though, Google is changing things up…
While developer preview 3 of Android O brought up quite a few new goodies, developer preview 4 hasn’t held quite as many little gems. In digging through the update, though, a few more tweaks have popped up, including some on the lockscreen and notification panel.
Android O has been floating around for a while in the form of developer previews. Through its first three developer previews, Google hasn’t done much with regards to easter eggs outside of adding the orange O. However, in Android O Developer Preview 4, Google has just added a new easter egg, and it’s an octopus, for some reason.
With today’s launch of the last developer preview, Android O nears its official summer launch. DP4 features “near-final system images” and should be fairly similar to the initial public version. Till then, we’re compiling a list of all the changes and new features.
The Android Engineering team has just wrapped up an O-focussed AMA on Reddit this afternoon. 23 Googlers ranging from directors, product managers, and many others took part in the session and there are a number of interesting tidbits.
The Google Pixel and Pixel XL do not take full advantage of their AMOLED panels. While there is an Ambient Display, other devices like the LG G6 and Samsung Galaxy S8 have long offered always on modes. Fortunately, Google appears to be working on such a feature for the Pixel according to code in the Android O Developer Preview.
OnePlus held a Reddit AMA (ask me anything) yesterday as a way to answer questions from Android enthusiasts about its newest flagship: the OnePlus 5. While many inquired about the phone, others asked questions about when older devices would get upgraded. In response, a OnePlus representative has promised that the 3 and 3T will be updated to Android O “within this year.”
One of the highlight features coming to Android 8.0 is support for picture-in-picture. Although Android O is still being beta tested and isn’t expected to be fully released until later this year, it hasn’t stopped developers from building the functionality into their apps. The latest app to get updated with PiP is Google’s very own Chrome web browser…
Version 7.9 of Google Play Music is beginning to rollout with support for notification channels in Android O. Meanwhile, all devices will benefit from the addition of a new way to quickly view search history.
When Android O’s third Developer Preview started rolling out earlier this week, we found a decent amount of user-facing changes made to the operating system including some minor UI tweaks to the Google Camera app, as well as a pretty useful new feature.
About a week earlier than we had expected, Google today announced that it would begin pushing out the third Android O Developer Preview. After spending most of the day digging through it, we found a bunch of small yet noticeable user-facing changes. Which of these changes is your favorite?
The latest developer preview for Android O doesn’t change a lot at first glance, but it does have a handful of user-facing changes that are actually pretty nice. One that I’ve noticed as trying out DP3 on is a constant notification telling me which background apps are running at any given time.
After entering beta at I/O 2017 a few weeks ago, Google today released Developer Preview 3 of Android O. Bringing several changes to the UI and introducing the final API level coming to the official build later this summer, it’s a pretty significant update.
Best of all, Developer Preview 3 finally confirms that yes, Android O will be version 8.0.
With the second Android O Developer Preview, we saw some small changes to the design of notifications. While these looked decent enough, with the third beta build, the notifications that display media art received an update that makes it look gorgeous…
Android Developer Preview 3 started rolling out today, and while there aren’t that many user-facing changes, the latest beta version of Android O did confirm that this upcoming version will be number 8.0.0…
