What's new in Android 4.3 • Hacker News Board

Re: What's new in Android 4.3

#111

Post by Ologn » Thu, Jul 25, 2013, 1:12 AM UTC

nileshtrivedi wrote: post #56

So 4.3 fixes neither the ad-hoc WiFi issue #82 nor the audio latency issue #3434. I will continue to pass as those are the deal breakers for me. It’s amazing – these two have been pending for more than 4 years. Google hasn’t cared to even comment on the former while thousands of users beg them to: https://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=82

Yes. I'm still watching issue #7147 aka #20814 ( http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=7147 ). The programmer who created Dalvik was working on a fix to this prior to his leaving Google in 2011, but apparently no one there picked up the ball ( http://bit.ly/12kk0l4 ).

I'm happy they have improved some things over the past year, allowing for staged rollouts and so forth. I do hope they work on fixing things like this, as opposed to just including things like more APIs for DRM to plug into.

Re: What's new in Android 4.3

#112

Post by arpit » Thu, Jul 25, 2013, 1:16 AM UTC

randallu wrote: post #80

notatoad wrote: post #73

>You can access notifications through new APIs that let you register a notification listener service and with permission of the user, receive notifications as they are displayed in the status bar...You'll be able to launch any intents attached to the notification or its actions, as well as dismiss it from the system, allowing your app to provide a complete user interface to notifications. wow. that should have some i…

Hello smartwatches!

And Google Glass

Re: What's new in Android 4.3

#113

Post by abirkill » Thu, Jul 25, 2013, 1:36 AM UTC

archivator wrote: post #83

notatoad wrote: post #73

>You can access notifications through new APIs that let you register a notification listener service and with permission of the user, receive notifications as they are displayed in the status bar...You'll be able to launch any intents attached to the notification or its actions, as well as dismiss it from the system, allowing your app to provide a complete user interface to notifications. wow. that should have some i…

This can be done on older versions as well but the app has to declare itself as an Accessibility Service, which is a massive hack. Google are fixing that by mirroring that specific use case in a separate service.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think that the Accessibility Service hack only allows apps to read notifications?

One of the other advantages of this new API functionality seems to be that it will also allow apps to dismiss notifications, or detect when the user has dismissed a notification. This will allow notifications to be kept in sync between the system and an app (or on a linked device like a smartwatch), which is a very nice addition.

Re: What's new in Android 4.3

#114

Post by slacka » Thu, Jul 25, 2013, 1:43 AM UTC

king_jester wrote: post #9

znowi wrote: post #6

As an owner of Nexus 4, the only feature I'm looking for is a reduced battery usage :) They provide optimizations for the location API, but I suspect that the more prominent performance features will end up draining battery even faster :)

Some of the performance changes for handling graphics should help with battery life since they will be more efficient in using the CPU and GPU. Some of the Android engineers covered this at I/O 2013: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQZFaec9NpA

I too have been waiting impatiently for Google to fix the audio latency. Great to see behind the scenes of how the Android engineers are tackling this issue. Surprised this is primarily a Linux scheduling issue and of course priority inversion. Between "fast path" and matching buffers/sample rate, looks like we're almost there. Great watch! Thanks for posting that link.

Any android developers working on audio should check out: https://code.google.com/p/high-performance-audio/

Re: What's new in Android 4.3

#115

Post by sologoub » Thu, Jul 25, 2013, 4:36 AM UTC

mtgx wrote: post #22

sologoub wrote: post #20

There seems to be a significant push for more video/entertainment/proprietary content related stuff. Anyone familiar with this? "Modular DRM framework To meet the needs of the next generation of media services, Android 4.3 introduces a modular DRM framework that enables media application developers to more easily integrate DRM into their own streaming protocols, such as MPEG DASH (Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP…

If Amazon supports it, I don't see why not.

Because of their Kindle Fire line.

Re: What's new in Android 4.3

#116

Post by vegasbrianc » Thu, Jul 25, 2013, 6:01 AM UTC

One more reason to have a Nexus device is to take advantage of these updates right away.

Re: What's new in Android 4.3

#117

Post by Kiro » Thu, Jul 25, 2013, 11:17 AM UTC

napoleoncomplex wrote: post #50

This is more developer related, but one of the biggest news is a backwards compatible ActionBar in the official support library. All that's left to say is a big, enormous thank you to Jake Wharton for keeping us all sane until now. Edit: The video about the ActionBarCompat is available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TGgYqfJnyc#at=20 Seems largely identical to ABS in its implementation, which makes sense.

When do you use the Action Bar? Never seen an app with it.

Re: What's new in Android 4.3

#118

Post by ed209 » Thu, Jul 25, 2013, 11:30 AM UTC

Kiro wrote: post #117

napoleoncomplex wrote: post #50

This is more developer related, but one of the biggest news is a backwards compatible ActionBar in the official support library. All that's left to say is a big, enormous thank you to Jake Wharton for keeping us all sane until now. Edit: The video about the ActionBarCompat is available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TGgYqfJnyc#at=20 Seems largely identical to ABS in its implementation, which makes sense.

When do you use the Action Bar? Never seen an app with it.

I think you might be confusing it with something else. It's pretty much in every app http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/ui/actionbar.html

Re: What's new in Android 4.3

#119

Post by Achshar » Thu, Jul 25, 2013, 12:06 PM UTC

aray wrote: post #94

Achshar wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lol, Funny how we have very different standards for stuck. I would not consider 4.1.1 "stuck" any time soon. I have gingerbread on 800mhz, 420x840. I would LOVE to be "stuck" on 4.1.1. Google chrome and Google Now seem like such neat things.

With a device like that surely you must be eligible for a carrier-provided upgrade device. What device is it, and do you just like it more than anything more recent?

I am not on a carrier plan, we don't have subsidised phones in my country. We pay the full value. And I can't afford to buy a new one ATM.

Re: What's new in Android 4.3

#120

Post by keeperofdakeys » Thu, Jul 25, 2013, 12:15 PM UTC

darxius wrote: post #76

I'm new to the Android world and this is the first update I've seen. When should I expect an update pushed to my phone? What does it depend on? I have the Galaxy S4 so I assume Samsung has to make some modifications to the version to support some stuff?

The image is modified heavily by Samsung. Besides their custom UI, they need to write/integrate custom drivers for the hardware in the phone. As for time, it could be a few months before it's updated.

This is the advantage of Nexus phones, as Google ensures that the manufacturer has a release ready, and that previous phones are updated (within reason).