The developer judges the advantages and disadvantages of the Android 3.0 SDK

A few weeks ago, developers received a preview of the next version of Honeycomb, Android 3.0) on the Android platform. About a month later, the final version of Android 3.0 SDK was released, then the first Android 3.0 device: Motorola Xoom tablet appeared. We have spent some time learning about new sdks, tools, and devices. The following is the first impression of updates and changes to this platform. We will discuss the content of users and developers, but always comment from the developer's perspective.

Features and APIs exciting for Android 3.0

Android 3.0 provides various new features and APIs, and we are particularly excited that it adds supported application types.

Android Fragment

The Fragment API makes it easier for developers to dynamically create user interfaces and make more effective use of the screen. Although it was initially intended to be used as a tablet API, the Fragment API can be used for all user interfaces, simplify the design, share more code and layout between different directions and screen sizes, and make it an API necessary for different device types.

Android Loader

One problem that developers often deal with is to download and display data in an Activity, and then manage the data collection process when the configuration changes. Honeycomb introduces the concept of Loader to solve this problem, asynchronous processing of data extraction and automatic reconnection avoid repeated queries. The Loader API improves the performance of data displayed on the screen.

Android activity bar

Google introduced the Action Bar in the activity Bar at last year's Google I/O 2010 Conference. Multiple first-class Android applications contain the concept of the activity Bar, this new user interface is provided for demonstration. Now, the concept of the activity bar has been built into the platform and multiple new features have been added, including drop-down menus and instant access to option menu items, tag management aims to create more consistency and simpler navigation functions for applications. Extended reading: Google will focus on Android 2011 at the Google I/O 3.0 conference)

RenderScript

RenderScript is a system committed to providing C-language encoding that can be executed on a CPU or GPU. It is compatible with a variety of CPU and GPU types. It reminds me of OpenCL and CUDA in a high-performance computing environment, GPU acceleration is often more effective than CPU. Although GPU is often used in image and game programming, its computing capabilities can also shine in other fields.

Android 3.0 tool update

With the release of Android 3.0, many tools have been updated, and the graphic Layout designer Graphical Layout has been greatly improved. Now it can be displayed more accurately on a variety of Android devices, you can preview the layout of multiple screens and multiple SDK versions without re-editing XML to implement precise Widget drag and drop. Of course, it is still not perfect, we found that we still need to adjust the XML to better control the user interface.

The simulator introduces the snapshot function, which allows the simulator to save the status at a certain time point, so that it can be reloaded later, saving the start time.

Backward compatible static library

Maybe you are thinking about the question: these updates are really tempting, but can existing devices run the Beehive? Yes. Don't worry about this problem! The Android team has released a static library that includes the most popular honeycomb features, which can be used from Android 1.6 to Android 2.3.3, the two most important features in this library are included in the Fragment API and Loader API. Personally, I want the Action Bar to be included from the very beginning.

Honeycomb's regret

Although honeycomb is already cool, it is not flawless. Some changes in this version are not what we want to see. I have been wondering why Google is doing this.

Android 3.0 SDK simulator performance

The performance of the Android simulator has been criticized for a long time. The most unpleasant thing is that the simulator resolution has been improved, and the preset simulator resolution in the Android 3.0 SDK has increased to 1280x800, the result is that even if we develop a computer quickly, we can barely see the program when running the application in the simulator, but it also requires patience, let alone the interactive experience. We are developers, and we have no patience to wait for a tool to execute slowly. So far, most of the time we have been directly debugging applications on Android devices. The Android team was aware of the problem and said they were working hard to solve the problem. We hope they can solve the simulator performance problems as soon as possible.

Abandoned dedicated button

Over the years, developers and users have become accustomed to the four main dedicated buttons on Android devices: backend, context menu, search, and homepage. Now these dedicated buttons disappear, the back and home pages are replaced by virtual buttons on the screen, and the context menu is replaced by the activity menu, but the context menu is displayed at the bottom of the application, and the Search button is gone, the search is now arranged in the activity bar. From the perspective of user interface design, the changes are too great for developers and users.

However, in the long run, these changes are still positive. The button is now in the same position, and there is no need to consider the difference between the device and the screen resolution, these changes force developers and users to cultivate their habits, and developers must make sure that all old devices have these dedicated buttons at the same time) and new devices require a long transition.

Features and applications missing from Android 3.0

Although the Android development team promised on the blog, we never expected perfect forward compatibility. However, this time we were a little disappointed that some features were missing. For example, the Android Market has changed, no longer provide application comments, and developers cannot get user feedback, which is really unreasonable.

Some platform-level user features have also changed. For example, users cannot create folders to organize applications. This is unacceptable from the perspective of users and developers.

Android growth troubles

Even Google's own applications are affected by the honeycomb upgrade. For example, Google Voice cannot work and the devices upgraded to the honeycomb cannot see Google Voice in the Android Market, some geeks try to install the program independently and find that the program will crash when it runs. If Google's own program cannot work without modification, can it be 100% forward compatible? Do common developers still have the confidence that their programs will be compatible with each other?

The instability of the platform is not a good thing for users or developers, and the media prefers to report negative news. We can't help but ask: "honeycomb and Xoom) are you eager to enter the market to seize the lead? You should understand what you are talking about )"

Summary

In general, honeycomb has brought many exciting new features and improved the Android platform in many aspects. These improvements have also brought about some changes, the habits of developers and users take some time to adjust and adapt. Not everyone will like or appreciate these changes. However, in the long run, these changes will help Android to succeed in the future and continue to eat away its market share, other competing platforms are forced to pay more attention. Only competition can promote technological progress and ultimately benefit a large number of users.

Source

Original article name: Android 3.0 Honeycomb SDK: The Good, the Bad and the Missing

Author: Shane Conder

BKJIA translations are not permitted to be reprinted. For reposted by the media partners, please indicate the source, author, and BKJIA translator !]