Google is seemingly making a lot of efforts to better the Android experience for lower-end smartphones, through its Android One project. Three Android One devices have been launched (this Monday) in India, and this will be followed by launches in similar markets - Indonesia, Philippines, South Asia and the likes. In order to make sure that apart from the operating system, the app ecosystem is also favorable for the Android One devices, Google has issued a few instructions for the Android app developers to help them ready their apps for these lower-end devices as well as for slow networks
The original post, by Android Developer Advocate Rich Hyndman, asks the developers to turn their WiFi off and switch to 2G and then test whether their app is able to perform its operations as required. The KitKat SDK has tools for analyzing memory use and new APIs that let the developer know whether a device is a low ram device. For the nerdy folks, isLowRamDevice() currently returns true for devices that have 512 MB or lower RAM with 480x800 or lesser screen. Another point raised by the post asks the devs to make sure that their apps do turn up with result eventually, in case of slow networks, instead of throwing timeout errors.
Rich Hyndman also asks the developers to concentrate further on app memory utilization using the tools mentioned earlier.
All in all, if the developers do heed to the messaged Google is conveying here, then the Android experience should vastly improve on low-cost Android devices belonging to the Android One lineup or otherwise. Obviously, this is a welcome move from Google to connect the rest of the world's population to arguably the best smartphone operating system out there. People who don't currently own a smartphone are unlikely to jump to the high-end smartphones bandwagon, like the Apple, thus making lower-end Android devices a more likelier choice.
The original post, by Android Developer Advocate Rich Hyndman, asks the developers to turn their WiFi off and switch to 2G and then test whether their app is able to perform its operations as required. The KitKat SDK has tools for analyzing memory use and new APIs that let the developer know whether a device is a low ram device. For the nerdy folks, isLowRamDevice() currently returns true for devices that have 512 MB or lower RAM with 480x800 or lesser screen. Another point raised by the post asks the devs to make sure that their apps do turn up with result eventually, in case of slow networks, instead of throwing timeout errors.
Rich Hyndman also asks the developers to concentrate further on app memory utilization using the tools mentioned earlier.
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| Source: Google |
All in all, if the developers do heed to the messaged Google is conveying here, then the Android experience should vastly improve on low-cost Android devices belonging to the Android One lineup or otherwise. Obviously, this is a welcome move from Google to connect the rest of the world's population to arguably the best smartphone operating system out there. People who don't currently own a smartphone are unlikely to jump to the high-end smartphones bandwagon, like the Apple, thus making lower-end Android devices a more likelier choice.
