Android P: Our complete guide Google releases Android P Beta 2 with inclusive emojis. Android P Beta Hands-On at Google IO 2018
Google I/O is that magical time of year where we get the first glimpse of new Google products. This year, Google is giving us a sneak peek at its latest smartphone OS, called Android P. And while we don’t know what the P stands for just yet, we do know all about the new features.
Here are all the new features in the new version, and you can read more in our Android P hands-on.
NEW FEATURES
Inclusive Emojis
Along with some minor design changes and developer APIs, the second Android P beta introduces more than a hundred new emojis. As part of the Unicode 11 update, Android P now features more inclusive emojis. You’ll find a number of genderless emojis, as well as emojis with multiple skin tones and hair colors (or no hair at all). If you want to see all the new emojis that will make their way to your phone in the near future, you can get a glimpse at Emojipedia.
Navigation Bar Changes
If you decide to use the updated Navigation Bar with home button gestures, you’ll notice the Overview icon will no longer appear. You may also notice the Clear all icon is missing in the new navigation setting as well, but not to worry, it will be making a comeback. According to a tweet by David Burke, VP of Engineering for Android, the feature will make a comeback in a future beta update.
You’ll also see more customizations for the Navigation Bar in Android P. With Navbar Apps, you can easily change the color and background of the navigation bar. In the future, you’ll also be able to add custom widgets to the Navigation Bar.
Dashboard
The dashboard is a new feature that helps track the amount of time you spend on your device. With Dashboard, you can see how long you’re using your phone to send messages, stream content, surf the internet, or even make calls.
With certain apps like YouTube, you can even receive recommendations to take a screen break. You’ll also be able to set up screen time limits for specific apps.
Wind Down Mode
Wind Down Mode is a new feature that is also meant to improve digital well-being. With Wind Down Mode, you tell Google Assistant when you would like to go to bed, and it will automatically put your phone on Do Not Disturb mode and switch your screen to grayscale.
Adaptive Brightness
Adaptive Brightness uses A.I. to determine your preferred brightness settings. Once it understands your preferences, it can then make the necessary adjustments depending on your lighting conditions.
Improved Notifications
One of the biggest changes to affect most users will come in the form of improved notifications. Specifically, Google wants to make notifications a little more useful — meaning you’ll be able to do more without having to open a full app. Now, from notifications, Google will suggest smart replies, allow you to attach photos and stickers, and type your own replies. It all comes about because of Google’s new “MessagingStyle” notification style, and we can’t say it’s a surprising change — especially given the fact that the company recently launched an initiative called “Reply,” which allows notifications for messaging apps to show smart replies.
Slices
App Actions
A New Way to Prevent Accidental Screen Rotations
New Gestures
Android P also brings a host of new gestures. New gestures include holding the Power and Volume Up buttons to prevent ringing and swiping up on the Home button to see your recent apps. The option to silence your phone by turning it over, once only available on a handful of Android devices, is now baked into Android P.
Multi-Camera Support
Google Maps is Coming To The Indoors
Google Maps is the most loved and most used navigation app, but to date, it has largely only worked for driving or walking outside — not for large indoor places like malls. That, however, is about to change. A new feature basically includes added support for “Wi-Fi Round Trip Time,” or RTT, which allows for more specific positioning through Wi-Fi. All that is to say, indoor positioning, in places like malls, is about to get a whole lot more precise.
Performance And Stability Updates
Improved Battery Life
One significant change in Android P is one you’ll never notice: Android P will feature some major Android Runtime (ART) enhancements. The ART enhancements allow apps to rewrite their own execution files on the device, meaning they’ll launch faster and use less memory.
- Android Runtime enhancements
- Cutout support
- Better security
While Google typically adds new security features in each new iteration of Android, this year it’s really upping the ante. Android P features a number of new options to make your phone more secure.
Perhaps the most exciting security update has to do with encryption. Android P will now perform client-side encryption. Any data encryption or decryption that takes place will now happen on your phone and will require authentication from your phone (password, PIN, pattern). Since Google backs up all of your information to the cloud, this change will make it much more difficult for hackers or other prying eyes to access your information from a computer.
Each time you access a network, your device shares its unique MAC address with that network. Android P offers a new feature that will allow you to create randomized MAC addresses for each network you access. While Android P will create a random MAC address for each network, the address will not continue to change each time you access the network.
There are several other security features that are coming to Android P, including a unified UI for fingerprint authentication, encrypted network traffic on third-party apps, and user notifications that appear whenever a third-party app is using an old API.
What Will Android P Be Called?
Google names its major Android versions after some kind of sweet or dessert. The most recent is Oreo, and we’ve had everything from Marshmallow to Cupcake in the past. What will the P stand for? It’s apparently being called Pistachio Ice Cream internally, but that’s not an indication of its final name — Google has changed its mind at the last minute in the past. What do you think it should be called? Remember, it has to be something sweet, and start with the letter P.
On top of that, we also have our first look at the Android P logo, which looks kind of like an upside-down Beats logo. In the Developer Preview, the Easter egg showing off the logo opens up to a red backdrop — though if you scroll up or down, you’ll get a look at different-colored backgrounds. Google also released several new Android wallpapers on Instagram Stories in April and a Popsicle-themed wallpaper was in the mix. This seems to support the theory from The Verge suggesting the colors are reminiscent of a Popsicle — but we’ll have to wait and see if that turns out to be the name of the new operating system.
Updated on June 6: Google releases Android P Beta 2 with inclusive emojis.
Sources Reference: https://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/google-android-p-news/
Jignesh Vagasiya
Jignesh Vaghasiya is CEO at Universal Stream Solution LLC. USS LLC provides the best Mobile App Development and Web Development Service.