Android Developers Blog

Posted by Jolanda Verhoef , Developer Relations Engineer We introduced Tiles in 2019 , and since then, Tiles have become one of the most helpful and useful features on Wear OS by Google smartwatches. They are fast to access, convenient, and designed to provide users with swipeable access to the things they need to know and get done right from their wrist. This also gives users control over what information and actions they want to see. Today, we're excited to announce that the Jetpack Tiles library is in alpha. This library enables developers to create custom Tiles on Wear OS smartwatches. These custom Tiles will become available to users later this Spring when we roll out the corresponding Wear OS platform update. Tiles can be designed for many use cases, like tracking the user’s daily activity progress, quick-starting a workout, starting a recently played song, or sending a message to a favorite contact. While apps can be immersive, Tiles are fast-loading and focus on the user...

Posted by Haining Chen, Vishwath Mohan, Kevin Chyn and Liz Louis, Android Security Team As phones become faster and smarter, they play increasingly important roles in our lives, functioning as our extended memory, our connection to the world at large, and often the primary interface for communication with friends, family, and wider communities. It is only natural that as part of this evolution, we’ve come to entrust our phones with our most private information, and in many ways treat them as extensions of our digital and physical identities. This trust is paramount to the Android Security team. The team focuses on ensuring that Android devices respect the privacy and sensitivity of user data. A fundamental aspect of this work centers around the lockscreen, which acts as the proverbial front door to our devices. After all, the lockscreen ensures that only the intended user(s) of a device can access their private data. This blog post outlines recent improvements around how users inte...

Posted by Isai Damier, Android Developer Platform Engineering (@isaidamier) Kevin Chyn, Android Framework Curtis Belmonte, Android Framework With the launch of Android 10 ( API level 29 ), developers can now use the Biometric API, part of the AndroidX Biometric Library , for all their on-device user authentication needs. The Android Framework and Security team has added a number of significant features to the AndroidX Biometric Library , which makes all of the biometric behavior from Android 10 available to all devices that run Android 6.0 (API level 23) or higher. In addition to supporting multiple biometric authentication form factors, the API has made it much easier for developers to check whether a given device has biometric sensors. And if there are no biometric sensors present, the API allows developers to specify whether they want to use device credentials in their apps. The features do not just benefit developers. Device manufacturers and OEMs have a lot to celebrate as well...

Posted by Doug Stevenson, Developer Advocate Later this year, the Google Play services and Firebase SDKs will migrate from the Android Support libraries to androidx-packaged library artifacts. We are targeting this change for June/July of 2019 . This will not only make our SDKs better, but make it easier for you to use the latest Jetpack features in your app. If your app depends on any com.google.android.gms or com.google.firebase libraries, you should prepare for this migration. To quickly test your build with androidx -packaged library artifacts, add the following two lines to your gradle.properties file: android.useAndroidX=true android.enableJetifier=true If your build still works, then you're done! You will be ready to use the new Google Play services and Firebase SDKs when they arrive. If you experience any new build issues or want more information on this migration, visit the official Jetpack migration guide . We will communicate when the androidx migration ...