Android 2.2 and developers goodies.

Today at Google I/O we announced that Android 2.2 is right around the corner. This is our seventh platform release since we launched Android 1.0 in September 2008. We wanted to highlight five areas in particular:

Performance & speed: The new Dalvik JIT compiler in Android 2.2 delivers between a 2-5X performance improvement in CPU-bound code vs. Android 2.1 according to various benchmarks.

New enterprise capabilities: We’ve added Exchange capabilities such as account auto-discovery and calendar sync. Device policy management APIs allow developers to write applications that can control security features of the device such as the remote wipe, minimum password, lockscreen timeout etc.

Faster, more powerful browser: We have brought the V8 JavaScript engine to the Android browser as part of 2.2. This has resulted in a 2-3X improvement in JavaScript performance vs. 2.1.

Rich set of new APIs and services: New data backup APIs enable apps to participate in data backup and restore, allowing an application's last data to be restored when installed on a new or a reset device. Apps can utilize Android Cloud to Device Messaging to enable mobile alert, send to phone, and two-way push sync functionality. Developers can now declare whether their app should be installed on internal memory or an SD card. They can also let the system automatically determine the install location. On the native side, a new API now gives access to Skia bitmaps.

Additions to Android Market: Android Market provides Android Application Error Reports, a new bug reporting feature, giving developers access to crash and freeze reports from users. Developers will be able to access these reports via their account on the Android Market publisher website.

For a complete list of everything we’ve included in Android 2.2, please see the platform highlights.

Developers can now download the Android 2.2 SDK and Android NDK, Revision 4 from the Android developer site.

Tools update

We are releasing new version of the Android SDK Tools, Revision 6, Eclipse plug-in ADT 0.9.7 and Android NDK, Revision 4.

Android SDK Tools, Revision 6, Eclipse plug-in 0.9.7

These new versions include support for library projects that will help you share code and resources across several Android projects.

Android NDK, Revision 4

Workflow improvements
The new NDK brings a host of workflow improvement, from compilation, to debugging. Starting with 2.2, the NDK enables debugging native code on production devices.

ARMv7 instruction set support
This release enables the generation of machine code for the ARMv7-A instruction set. Benefits include higher performance, as well as full use of the hardware FPU for devices that support it.

ARM Advanced SIMD (a.k.a. NEON) instruction support
The NEON instruction set extension can be used to perform scalar computations on integers and floating points. However, it is an optional CPU feature and will not be supported by all Android ARMv7-A based devices. The NDK includes a tiny library named "cpufeatures" that can be used by native code to test at runtime the features supported by the device's target CPU.

For more information, please see the releases notes for the SDK Tools, ADT, and NDK.

As I said at the beginning, Android 2.2 will be here soon, and some devices will get the update in the coming weeks. I invite application developers to download the new SDK and tools and test your applications today.

Check out the video below to learn more about Android 2.2.

Setelah Facebook, Pakistan Blokir Youtube

Islamabad- Setelah situs jejaring sosial Facebook diblokir, kini giliran situs video Youtube diblokir di Pakistan. Dewan Telekomunikasi Pakistan menilai video asusila di Youtube tumbuh subur. Mereka telah memerintahkan seluruh penyedia jasa internet menutup Facebook dan Youtube.

Sebelumnya, terhitung hari ini, Dewan Telekomunikasi Pakistan memerintahkan penyedia layanan jasa internet untuk memblokir sistus jejaring sosial Facebook terkait kompetisi menggambar Nabi Muhammad. Perintah Dewan ini mengtaati putusan Pengadilan Tinggi Lahore yang melarang Facebook hingga 31 Mei.

"Pemblokiran ini karena kompetisi yang menghina Nabi Muhammad," kata Azhar Siddique, perwakilwan dari Forum Pengacara Islam yang mengajukan gugatan ke pengadilan tinggi. Selain perintah blokir, pengadilan juga menugaskan menteri luar negeri Pakistan untuk menginvestigasi kompetisi tersebut.

The Google TV Story

Vincent Dureau, who’s in charge of Google TV, is a lean, bony-faced man with a strong French accent; not too far off my own age, I’d say. With the announcement imminent, he’s been too busy to write; I'm reporting on my talk with him to give a feel for the thinking behind the project. You’ll notice an absence of quotation marks; Vincent’s half of the conversation is reconstructed from the combination of my memory and notes. I think it’s accurate in essence, but certainly not in detail; among other things I can’t write with a French accent.

On why Google TV is needed:

Even two years ago you would have said that telephones are mostly for making calls, maybe for email and texting. Today, we know that phones can actually do a whole lot more. In the same way, people say that TV is just for watching TV. But, like the phone can be used for more than making calls, we believe that TV can be used for more than just video. Also, there’s not enough shelf space for the stuff on TV; not even with online channel guides and your PVR access and your racks full of disks. The shelf space should be as big as the web.

On why developers should care:

They’ve always had access to the desktop. With mobile devices, they managed to get into your pocket. Google TV brings them into the living room, which is where people live.

On what’s going to be in the SDK:

First, we have to make sure that most mobile apps work on your TV, too. Second, we should offer TV-specific features, like being smart about screen sizes, changing channels, embedding video streams, mashing up live TV and what’s on the PVR and what’s on the Web.

On the Google TV project:

The project started 2½ years ago, with a vision of a walled garden of TV-optimized web services. But the landscape keeps shifting, particularly in the capabilities of mobile devices. The only solution big enough for the problem is to bring the whole web to your TV.

On which apps will come with the initial release of Google TV:

First of all, we run Chrome so we can ship both Android and web apps. Some will be pre-loaded; this is a moving target but we expect that Listen, Netflix, and Amazon Video On Demand will be on board.

On what truly great Google-TV apps he imagines:

That’s irrelevant; the reason we’re building the SDK is to enable all those smart people out there that don’t work for Google to do cool stuff with TV.

On how it works if there isn’t a partnership between Google TV and your TV provider:

It should be pretty good; the device comes with an IR blaster and knows the IR interfaces for the popular satellite and cable boxes. You really should be able to get an integrated experience.

On himself:

He’s the guy who pitched the project to Google’s executive team. He has been at Google for four years, and was hired to work on TV, originally ads. Working on TV is pretty much the only thing he’s ever done. Prior to Google, he worked on compression and DIRECTV.

On which TV he watches:

He doesn’t watch TV, he tests it. His popular test materials are Battlestar Galactica, Life on Discovery, Democracynow.org, Al-Jazeera’s newscasts (they have reporters more places than any other network); and, these days, the NBA playoffs. He does a lot more on his TV than watch TV; he uses it to run Pandora and Last.fm to hear the music through the nice speakers. Whenever he hears a tune he likes, he buys it right there & then from Amazon, which can get a little expensive.

On how to get involved:

You can begin building optimized web apps today. If you’re interested in building Android apps, visit our Google TV homepage to sign up for updates on when the SDK add-on will be available. And if you’re interested in helping out in a broader scope, check out our Google jobs site and apply for an engineering position.

Latitude API Launch

Over at the Google Code Blog, there's a pretty significant announcement, about the release of APIs for Latitude. the idea, as you might expect, is that the best way to get good location-based applications is to put the tools for building them into everyone's hands.

A glance at the online documentation reveals an essentially-RESTFul API with JSON payloads, which should be easy to use from an Android app. It seems likely that a device which knows its location is a really good platform for building location-sensitive apps.

Stand By...

I'm posting this from Moscone West, the site of Google I/O 2010. Some things that it may be useful to know:

• The official hash tag is #io2010




• The keynotes will be live-blogged all over the place (thus, not here) and also live-streamed on YouTube.




• If you're mad because you couldn't get a ticket, we're sorry, but you're not alone. We have filled Moscone West to the very absolute splitting-at-the-seams max. There are a ton of Googlers who couldn't get in.

Things have already started; above is our own Roman Nurik giving the first Android session at the pre-IO Bootcamp.

Above are the signs over the Android part of the main gathering area. There are many tantalizing display cases and tabletops; gleaming and empty now, but not for long.

Meta-Blogging

Thursday is the big Android day at Google I/O. There will be announcements. We're going to try to use this blog to deliver more depth and perspective than you can expect from an executive on a stage in a keynote. So we've lined up a whole lot of blog posts; more than any human could be expected to read in a day.

The plan is to have a couple of posts on Thursday summarizing and highlighting what we think are probably the big-news stories. Then we'll have more detailed technical pieces every other day or so for the next couple of weeks, filling in the details behind the announcements. It's heart-warming how eager the engineers are to tell the world about what they've been building, and it makes me happy to facilitate the process.

There are other Google blogs that are going to be working hard too, telling the other stories coming out of this gathering. We'll post some links to things that seem particularly newsworthy, either to the world in general or to the Android comunity in particular.

Stay tuned!

World's Best Relationship Tips

If you're in a relationship, sometimes you probably feel like you're fighting a caged death-match with an invisible spider monkey. And the monkey is rabid. And you don't have any legs. And then a buffalo jumps in there and starts head-butting everything and your face catches on fire and there is a general atmosphere of chaos.

It doesn't have to be this way!  Using science, human history and my own experience, I have put together a comprehensive guide for the modern couple on how to be the best at relationships.

It is well known that one of the secrets to a long-lasting relationship is continually fending off boredom. To keep things interesting, why not buy your significant other a Kong toy? Stuff some bacon in there and let the fun begin!

Another problem in many relationships is that women feel like they have to do all the boring chores and the men just get to go out and ride around on dirt bikes and throw pies at each other.  The truth is that chores are lame and there is rarely anything fun about them.  Help your special lady out by making her daily housework into a fun challenge!  Dress up as a ninja and make her battle you to get her work done.  Hide in the closet and ambush her violently when she goes to get the vacuum.  Does she need to fold laundry?  Not before deflecting a crane kick to the face!   

Another way to make her everyday life more exciting is to dress up as a large predator and stalk her throughout the day. Women love surprises!  

The only thing women love more than surprises is feeling special.  Show the world that you are proud of your lady by wearing bright colors, making loud noises and flailing when you're walking in public with her.  She will be reassured that you do not mind calling attention to her and will greatly appreciate the gesture. 

Jealousy is an issue that creeps up inside many solid relationships and renders them useless, much like a discarded cow carcass.  Probably the best way to combat jealousy is with macaroni art.  Everyone loves macaroni art.  It is a symbol for good intentions, thoughtfulness and love.  And if you use enough glitter, she'll forget she ever felt anything less than unadulterated adoration for you.  Just make sure to only give the macaroni art to your significant other and NOT to the object of jealousy.  

On that note, when trying to impress a woman, it is often helpful to call upon her ancient instincts.  To show that you are a strong provider, sometimes it is necessary to kill things.  Contrary to popular belief, this is real reason why women like flowers.  

Although she may not know it or openly acknowledge it, watching you use your powerful muscles to slay a living thing stimulates an ancient part of her brain associated with admiration and affection.  She may appear to be horrified by your actions, but underneath that, there's a deep and growing respect for you.  After all, it takes a lot more effort to kill an animal than it does to kill a stupid flower;  Flowers don't run away and bleed all over the place while you're trying to kill them.  

One more way to appeal to your lady's inborn desires is to light things on fire.  Back in cave man days, fire was more popular than Justin Bieber.  Being able to start a fire would have been the modern day equivalent of being an extreme BMX biker who owns all the drugs in the world and walks around with a pet pegasus on a leash made of diamonds.  It is a scientific fact that women love fire.  It's in their genes.  

There are really very few problems that fire cannot resolve.  

And finally, if you ever get into an argument, imagine that your partner is a baby animal with three legs and terminal brain cancer.  I promise you won't ever be mad again.  

P.S.  Because the question has come up again and again:  

You guys, this doesn't have to be gender or orientation - specific.  I don't care if you're a man with a woman, a woman with a man, a woman with a woman, a man with a man or a cat with three legs and terminal brain cancer -- Kong toys and ninja-sniper attacks can improve your relationship.  

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