Time to update your app for Android 8.0 Oreo.
After Google’s announcement of the new Android 8.0 Oreo in August, all the developers and Android app owners got the new headache.
NEW YORK, UNITED STATES, September 27, 2017 /EINPresswire.com/ -- After Google’s announcement of the new Android 8.0 Oreo1 in August, all the developers and Android app owners got the new headache. Undoubtedly, the operating system got the new handy features, some of them are focused on augmentation of the battery working time while others are going to absolutely change the familiar users interaction habits. But in some cases, implementing the se features requires apps modifications. We, in GBKSOFT2 decided to share the most crucial changes with you to understand how they will affect the existing apps.
What’s new in Android 8.0 Oreo for the developers?
In the new 8.0 Oreo version Android introduced not only the new features and capabilities, but also the system and API behavior changes. All the developers should take these changes into consideration and modify their apps in order to work properly on the new Android Oreo. Pay attention that most of the new changes affect all existing apps and some of them only the apps, targeting Android 8.0 Oreo.
Background execution limits - This significant change is aimed to improve the battery work time. Now, any app that is running in the background has strict limits on accessing the background services. Also, apps can no longer use their manifests for registering the broadcasts, not targeted particularly at the app.
Moreover, when the app is in a cached state, without any active components, the system enables all the wake locks of an app.
Though the mentioned restrictions apply to apps, targeting the Android 8.0, users still can enable them for any app in the Settings menu.
Background location limits - The next feature, that will save your battery and the system health in general, is the new limitation for location updates. Now apps can only receive the location updates several times an hour if they are used on Android 8.0 device. Google developers also consider this limitation to improve the user experience.
Picture-in-Picture - This feature was one of the most awaited in new Android Oreo. Lot’s of users enjoyed this feature in Android TV and now can use it on any devices. Using picture-in-picture mode, the user can turn an app into a small floating window and open the second app, so that both of them work at the same time. It’s very handy feature for video call apps.
When the app runs in a PIP mode, it has to continue showing content even being in the paused state.
Notifications - The next big change in Android 8.0 is new functional notifications, improving user experience. This feature has been present in iOS long time ago and now Android users can also take advantage of new notifications without installing third-party launchers.
To make this feature in your app, you need to implement the following changes: notification channels, notification badges, snoozing, notification timeouts, settings, dismissal, background colors and messaging style.
Autofill framework - The majority of apps require the user to fill some forms and that can be rather frustrating to fill the same information in different apps. Such tasks as filling the credit card number, login or any other fields take lots of time and users often make some mistakes that leads to the repetition.
With the introduction of Autofill Framework filling the standard forms will become easier. If you want your app to support this feature you have to optimize it using this guide https://developer.android.com/guide/topics/text/autofill.html.
Downloadable fonts - New Android 8.0 allows to minimize the APK weight because you don’t have to bundle fonts into it or let it download fonts. Now the app can request fonts from a provider application. This helps not only to reduce the APK size but also allow several apps to share the same font. That means the user can save the phone memory, cellular data consuming and the disk space.
Conclusion: With the release of the new Android 8.0 Oreo, you should consider all the changes and think of updating your app3 to target on the new audience and be the first who implement all the new features. Such companies as GBKSOFT are always aware of all the current changes as they may affect the app's behavior when running on Android Oreo. Stay tuned!
Alexandra Rostovtseva, Co-Founder
GBKSOFT App Developers
+38 (063) 764 5845
email us here
1 https://www.android.com/versions/oreo-8-0/
2 http://gbksoft.com/android-development
3 http://gbksoft.com/blog/how-often-should-you-update-your-app/