App Developer for Android

We keep abreast of changes to the Android operating system!

Project Strobe
In early 2018 the Android team at Google started "Project Strobe", a review of how much access Android app developers should have to an Android device's data and Google accounts. As UK-based Android app developers who develop complex custom Android apps for our clients, this on-going project has an impact on how we code our bespoke Android apps going forward.

For example, previously Android users were asked to accept certain permissions (e.g. access to camera, microphone, storage, location, etc.) when they first installed the app our Android app development team had developed for them. Following the Project Strobe review these permissions are no longer requested when installing the app but are instead requested on the screens requiring the access (by means of popup dialog windows) so we need to code the relevant screens to check that their permission is still granted and if not request it again and, for each permission required, users could say deny permission e.g. not allow our Android app to access their location or camera.

If the bespoke Android app we have developed is for say a client's field engineers and they need us to say super-impose the current longitude and latitude on any photos taken through our app then we need to code to deal with the engineer refusing that permission. Having insufficient permission errors can potentially lead to unexpected app errors which of course is a bad user experience, i.e. something to strongly avoid. Our Android app development team will code (and test) our bespoke Android apps to deal with such eventualities.

A new version of Android (Android Q) will be released in late 2019 (as of April 2019 it is still in beta) and this new Android operating system will give users more control over when apps can get their location. As usual, the Android apps we develop can only get the user's location if the user has granted permission, however, with Android Q users can give our Android apps permission to see their location either never, only when the app is in use (running), or all the time (when in the background). As many of the historic Android apps we developed allowed management to get an idea of where their field engineers were currently, these new permissions will again have to be dealt with in code (e.g. restricting use if say they have not granted permission to location all the time if management need to have that data).

Foldable Android smartphones and tablets
In early 2019 the world's largest Android device manufacturers (e.g. Samsung and Huawei) unveiled their first Android devices with foldable screens.

As low-cost UK Android app developers we are keeping a close eye on this new device format as it offers us opportunities when developing custom Android apps for our clients because multitasking on an Android phone or tablet can become much easier due to an expandable screen area.

For example, you can be looking at an installation manual on one side of the screen whilst updating one of our bespoke Android apps with installation updates on the other, making your field engineers much more productive.

Our UK Android app developers could develop a cutting-edge Android app optimised for foldable tablets which can fold easily fit into your field engineers' pockets.