Mobile Application

Development
with ANDROIDd
 Introduction

What is Android?
• A software platform and operating system for mobile devices

• Based on the Linux kernel

• Developed by Google and later the Open Handset Alliance (OHA)

• Allows writing managed code in the Java language

Unveiling of the Android platform was announced on 5 November 2007 with

the founding of OHA
 History of Android
• Google acquired the startup company Android Inc. in 2005 to
start the development of the Android Platform. The key players at
Android Inc. included Andy Rubin, Rich Miner, Nick Sears, and
Chris White.
• In late 2007, a group of industry leaders came together around the
Android Platform to form the Open Handset Alliance (
http://www.openhandsetalliance.com).
• The Android SDK was first issued as an “early look” release in
November 2007.
• In September 2008 T-Mobile announced the availability of the T-
Mobile G1, the first smartphone based on the Android Platform.
• A few days after that, Google announced the availability of
Android SDK Release Candidate 1.0.
• In October 2008, Google made the source code of the Android
Platform available under Apache’s open source license.
History of Android
 What is Open Handset Alliance?
• Quoting from www.OpenHandsetAlliance.com page
• “… Open Handset Alliance™, a group of 47
technology and mobile companies have come together
to accelerate innovation in mobile and offer
consumers a richer, less expensive, and better mobile
experience.
• Together we have developed Android™, the first
complete, open, and free mobile platform.
• We are committed to commercially deploy handsets and
services using the Android Platform. “
Introduction
What is the Open Handset Alliance (OHA)?

→ It's a consortium of several companies

Google Android
Open Handset Alliance Members
 Phones

HTC G1,
Droid, Motorola Droid (X)
Tattoo

Suno S880 Samsung Galaxy Sony Ericsson

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 Tablets

Velocity Micro Cruz Gome FlyTouch Acer beTouch

Toshiba Android Cisco Android Tablet

Dawa D7 SmartBook

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Platform
Hardware  

Android is not a single piece of hardware; it's a complete, end-to-

end software platform that can be adapted to work on any number
of hardware configurations. Everything is there, from the bootloader
all the way up to the applications.

Google Android
Android’s Context: Mobile Market Player$
Stakeholders:
• Mobile network operators want to
lock down their networks,
controlling and metering traffic.
• Device manufacturers want to
differentiate themselves with
features, reliability, and price
points.
• Software vendors want complete
access to the hardware to deliver
cutting-edge applications.
 The Maturing Mobile Experience

• Tomorrow?
The Maturing Mobile Experience
Android vs. Competitors
Platform - The Android Software Stack

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 Android S/W Stack - Application

• Android provides a set of core applications:

 Email Client
 SMS Program
 Calendar
 Maps
 Browser
 Contacts
 Etc
• All applications are written using the Java language.

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 Android S/W Stack – App Framework

• Most of the application framework accesses these

core libraries through the Dalvik VM, the
gateway to the Android Platform

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 Android S/W Stack –
App Framework (Cont)
Feature Role

View Used to build an application, including lists, grids, text

System boxes, buttons, and embedded web browser

Content Enabling applications to access data from other

Provider applications or to share their own data

Resource Providing access to non-code resources (localized string

Manager , graphics, and layout files)

Notification Enabling all applications to display customer alerts in the

Manager status bar

Activity Managing the lifecycle of applications and providing

Manager a common navigation backstack

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Location Manager
Notification Manager
 Notification Manager
• How background app interact with users

• Consistent notification presentation

View System
View System
 Android S/W Stack - Libraries

• Including a set of C/C++ libraries used by components

of the Android system
• Exposed to developers through the Android application
framework

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 Android S/W Stack - Libraries
• The media libraries are based on PacketVideo’s
(http://www.packetvideo.com/) OpenCORE. These libraries are
responsible for recording and playback of audio and video formats.
A library called Surface Manager controls access to the display system
and supports 2D and 3D.
• The WebKit library is responsible for browser support; it is the same
library that supports Google Chrome and Apple Inc.’s Safari.
The FreeType library is responsible for font support.
SQLite (http://www.sqlite.org/) is a relational database that is available
on the device itself. SQLite is also an independent open source effort
for relational databases and not directly tied to Android. You can
acquire and use tools meant for SQLite for Android databases as well.
 Android S/W Stack - Runtime

• Core Libraries
Providing most of the functionality available in the core libraries of the Java
language
APIs
Data Structures
Utilities
File Access
Network Access
Graphics
Etc

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The Dalvik runtime is optimised for
mobile applications

Run multiple VMs efficiently

Each app has its own VM

Minimal memory footprint

Bruce Scharlau, University of Aberdeen,
2010
 Android S/W Stack – Runtime
(Cont)
• Dalvik Virtual Machine (Cont)
Executing the Dalvik Executable (.dex) format
.dex format is optimized for minimal memory footprint.
Compilation

Relying on the Linux Kernel for:

Threading
Low-level memory management

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Android applications are compiled to
Dalvik bytecode
Write app in Java
Compiled in Java

Transformed to Dalvik bytecode

Loaded into Dalvik VM

Linux OS

Bruce Scharlau, University of Aberdeen,

2010
 Android S/W Stack – Linux Kernel

 Relying on Linux Kernel 2.6 for core system services

 Memory and Process Management
 Network Stack
 Driver Model
Security
• The supplied device drivers include Display, Camera, Keypad, WiFi,
Flash Memory, Audio, and IPC (interprocess communication).
 Providing an abstraction layer between the H/W and the rest of the
S/W stack
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Platform
Network Connectivity 

It supports wireless communications using:

 GSM mobile-phone technology

 3G

 Edge

 802.11 Wi-Fi networks

Google Android
Software development
Development requirements 

• Java

• Android SDK

 
 

Google Android
Software development
IDE and Tools
 
Android SDK
• Class Library
• Developer Tools
• Emulator and System Images
• Documentation and Sample Code

Eclipse IDE + ADT (Android Development Tools)

• Reduces Development and Testing Time
• Makes User Interface-Creation easier
• Makes Application Description Easier

Google Android
 Advantages

Here are a few other advantages Android offers you as a developer:

• The Android SDK is available for Windows, Mac and Linux, so you don’t need to
pay for new hardware to start writing applications.
• An SDK built on Java. If you’re familiar with the Java programming language,
you’re already halfway there.
• By distributing your application on Android Market, it’s available to hundreds of
thousands of users instantly. You’re not just limited to one store, because there are
alternatives, too. For instance, you can release your application on your own blog.
Amazon have recently been rumoured to be preparing their own Android app store
also.
• As well as the technical SDK documentation, new resources are being
published for Android developers as the platform gains popularity among both
users and developers. 

Google Android
Application Building Blocks

• Activity
• IntentReceiver
• Service
• ContentProvider
 Activities

• Typically correspond to one UI screen

• But, they can:
– Be faceless
– Be in a floating window
– Return a value
 IntentReceivers
• Components that respond to broadcast ‘Intents’
• Way to respond to external notification or alarms
• Apps can invent and broadcast their own Intent
 Intents
• Think of Intents as a verb and object; a
description of what you want done
– E.g. VIEW, CALL, PLAY etc..
• System matches Intent with Activity that can
best provide the service
• Activities and IntentReceivers describe what
Intents they can service
 Intents Photo
Gallery
Home

Picasa

Contacts

“Pick photo”
GMail

Chat

Blogger
Blogger
 Services
• Faceless components that run in the background
– E.g. music player, network download etc…
 ContentProviders
• Enables sharing of data across applications
– E.g. address book, photo gallery
• Provides uniform APIs for:
– querying
– delete, update and insert.
• Content is represented by URI and MIME type