14 DAY TRIAL // Google's Android operating system is getting ready for a new upgrade. According to the Android Developers Blog, the next flavor of the platform, which is known either as Android 1.6 or Donut, is set to make an appearance on mobile phones in early October. Prior to that, however, developers have the chance to take a look at it through the new Android 1.6 SDK that has just been unleashed from the Android labs.
“With support for CDMA and additional screen sizes, your apps can be deployed on even more mobile networks and devices. You will have access to new technologies, including framework-level support for additional screen resolutions, like QVGA and WVGA, new telephony APIs to support CDMA, gesture APIs, a text-to-speech engine, and the ability to integrate with Quick Search Box. What's new in Android 1.6 provides a more complete overview of this platform update,” is what a post on Android Developers Blog says.
The upcoming flavor of the OS should come to the market with a series of new features and technologies, the post notes, and the Android 1.6 SDK, Release 1 has been made available so that developers can test whether their applications written for the previous releases of the platform are compatible with the upcoming one as well. Those of you who would like to have a glimpse at what Android 1.6 is set to bring around should take a look at the video below to learn more.
Android 1.6 comes with new features aimed both at users and developers. When it comes to the former, we can count a quick search box for Android, updated camera, camcorder, gallery, a new Virtual Private Network (VPN) control panel, a new battery usage screen, new accessibility services or Android Market updates (Apps, Games, and Downloads on the homescreen; Top paid, Top free, and Just in categories; screenshots from developers).
Other new features of the platform also include a multi-lingual speech synthesis engine, a search framework that can deliver results from third-party applications too, a new gesture framework, a new accessibility framework, updated OpenCore 2 media engine, support for different display resolutions and densities so that applications are rendered properly on them, upgraded Linux kernel from 2.6.27 to 2.6.29, and a series of API changes.
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