{"id":104827,"date":"2014-06-25T19:25:42","date_gmt":"2014-06-25T17:25:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=104827"},"modified":"2014-06-25T20:40:18","modified_gmt":"2014-06-25T18:40:18","slug":"new-android-l-features-previewed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/software\/104827-new-android-l-features-previewed.html","title":{"rendered":"New Android L features previewed"},"content":{"rendered":"

Google has announced the new version of its mobile operating system, which it is calling Android \u201cL release\u201d for now.<\/p>\n

Among the new features revealed for the operating system include a new visual design, improved notification handling, context-aware authentication, performance improvements to the runtime and graphics, and better battery life.<\/p>\n

Design<\/h3>\n

Matias Duarte, vice president of design at Google unveiled \u201cMaterial design\u201d, saying that they drew inspiration from paper and ink to bring depth to the Android user experience.<\/p>\n

Showing off some of the design changes on the cards for Android, the \u201cL release\u201d looks an awful lot like Windows Phone\u2019s colourful, card-based interface with more square than rounded corners.<\/p>\n

New animations are reminiscent of Apple\u2019s iOS.<\/p>\n

This is not to say that Google is \u201cstealing\u201d from Apple or Microsoft (iOS and Windows Phone have \u201cborrowed\u201d features from Android as well), but does offer those familiar with the other operating systems a basis for comparison.<\/p>\n

\"Android<\/a>

Android L material design old Gmail vs new Gmail<\/p><\/div>\n

Notifications & lock screen authentication<\/h3>\n

Dave Burke, Android engineering director, showed off the improvements to notifications and lock screen in Android \u201cL release\u201d.<\/p>\n

According to Burke, you will be given instant access to notifications on the lock screen, which will also be ordered according to priority.<\/p>\n

Priority will be determined based on the user\u2019s behaviour, such as which notifications you tend to react to and which you ignore for longer periods.<\/p>\n

To minimise the amount of time spent unlocking your phone to respond to notifications, Android L will also has a \u201cpersonal unlocking\u201d feature.<\/p>\n

Burke said that Android will determine whether you are in a trusted environment, by determining whether it is in its user\u2019s hand or next to their bed.<\/p>\n

Should it determine it is with its owner, it won\u2019t request a lock code.<\/p>\n

To demonstrate the feature, Burke removed his smart watch. After the phone could no longer \u201csee\u201d his watch, it requested that an unlock pattern be entered before unlocking.<\/p>\n

\"Android<\/a>

Android L release new notifications<\/p><\/div>\n

Performance & battery improvements<\/h3>\n

Burke also announced that the Android L release will offer a number of performance improvements.<\/p>\n

The Dalvik runtime will be replaced with the new Android Runtime (ART), which Burke said will be more memory efficient, be fully 64-bit compatible, and let apps execute faster.<\/p>\n

He added that graphics performance will also be improved and that mobile graphics was catching up to console, and even PC graphics.<\/p>\n

The Android L release also introduced \u201cProject Volta\u201d which Burke said will optimise how the phone subsystems that use a lot of energy use the battery.<\/p>\n

Availability<\/h3>\n

Android L is expected to launch to users \u201cthis fall\u201d (September – November 2014), while developers can download a preview of Android L later today.<\/p>\n

Related smartphone news<\/h3>\n

Apple iPhones with larger screens going into production<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Amazon Fire smartphone announced<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

BlackBerry 10 getting Amazon Appstore<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Sony Xperia T3 unveiled, 7mm thick phablet<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

iOS 8 boasts new features, better graphics<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The next version of Android was previewed at Google I\/O<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":97745,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[397,25587,25585,167,35,25579],"class_list":["post-104827","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-software","tag-android","tag-android-l","tag-dave-burke","tag-google","tag-headline","tag-project-volta"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104827"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=104827"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104827\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":104835,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104827\/revisions\/104835"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/97745"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=104827"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=104827"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=104827"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}