Now that regular Android fans know what Gingerbread has in store for them, it’ll probably do some good to find out what developers can hope to offer end-users with the new SDK for Android 2.3 that Google introduced recently. The updated version of this mobile OS has even upgraded a number of its platform technologies apart from incorporating the said developer changes.
A glimpse at the platform highlights reveals added support for AAC and AMR wideband encoding, VP8 open video compression format and the WebM open container format upgrades and Dalvik runtime. There’s also a media framework that replaces OpenCore entirely, a Linux kernel which has been updated to 2.6.35 and several networking improvements.
Developers have a lot of enhancements to watch out for with this new Android OS version. The multimedia possibilities have been loaded with mixable audio effects, a Camera API for developer access to multiple cameras on a handset, embedded support for the VP8 open video compression format and the WebM open container format.
Google’s also expanding the various forms of communication that an Android user could hope to avail of with SIP-based internet telephony support. Then there’s the NFC API which allows for user interaction with tags incorporated in stickers, smart posters or similar devices. Game developers seem to have received the most thought in this update with the Dalvik VM concurrent garbage collector, faster event distribution and upgraded third-party video drivers.
Other additions include API support for sensors like gyroscope, rotation vector and barometer sensors, software implementation of Khronos OpenSL ES and native graphics management. Native access to storage, assets, Activity lifecycle, window management and a healthy native development environment with the r5 or higher Android NDK are stated among the new developer features of this OS too.
Google also gave those who’ve been convinced of Samsung’s plans to release a Gingerbread handset some closure by announcing the upcoming availability of the Nexus S this month.