T
he mobile development community is at a tipping point. Mobile users demand more
choice, more opportunities to customize their phones, and more functionality. Mobile
operators want to provide value-added content to their subscribers in a manageable and
lucrative way. Mobile developers want the freedom to develop the powerful mobile
applications users demand with minimal roadblocks to success. Finally, handset manufacturers
want a stable, secure, and affordable platform to power their devices. Upuntil now
single mobile platform has adequately addressed the needs of all the parties.
Enter Android, which is a potential game-changer for the mobile development community.
An innovative and open platform,Android is well positioned to address the
growing needs of the mobile marketplace.
This chapter explains what Android is, how and why it was developed, and where the
platform fits in to the established mobile marketplace.
Way Back When
Remember way back when a phone was just a phone? When we relied on fixed landlines?
When we ran for the phone instead of pulling it out of our pocket? When we lost
our friends at a crowded ballgame and waited around for hours hoping to reunite? When
we forgot the grocery list (Figure 1.1) and had to find a payphone or drive back home
again?
Those days are long gone.Today, commonplace problems like these are easily solved
with a one-button speed dial or a simple text message like “WRU?” or “20?” or “Milk
and?”
Our mobile phones keep us safe and connected. Nowadays, we roam around freely,
relying on our phones not only to keep in touch with friends, family, and coworkers, but
also to tell us where to go, what to do, and how to do it. Even the most domestic of
events seem to revolve around my mobile phone.
Consider the following true, but slightly enhanced for effect, story:
Once upon a time, on a warm summer evening, I was happily minding my own business cooking
dinner in my new house in rural New Hampshire when a bat swooped over my head, scaring
me to death.
The first thing I did—while ducking—was pull out my cell and send a text message to my
husband, who was across the country at the time: “There’s a bat in the house!”
My husband did not immediately respond (a divorce-worthy incident, I thought at the time), so
I called my Dad and asked him for suggestions on how to get rid of the bat.
He just laughed.
Annoyed, I snapped a picture of the bat with my phone and sent it to my husband and my
blog, simultaneously guilt-tripping him and informing the world of my treacherous domestic
wildlife encounter.
Finally, I Googled “get rid of a bat” and followed the helpful do-it-yourself instructions provided
on the Web for people in my situation. I also learned that late August is when baby bats often
leave the roost for the first time and learn to fly. Newly aware that I had a baby bat on my
hands, I calmly got a broom and managed to herd the bat out of the house.
Problem solved—and I did it all with the help of my trusty cell phone, the old LG VX9800.
My point here? Mobile phones can solve just about
anything—and we rely on them for
everything
these days.
10
Chapter 1 Introducing Android
You notice that I used half a dozen different mobile applications over the course of
this story. Each application was developed by a different company and had a different
user interface. Some were well designed; others not so much. I paid for some of the
applications, and others came on my phone.
As a user, I found the experience functional, but not terribly inspiring. As a mobile
developer, I wished for an opportunity to create a more seamless and powerful application
that could handle all I’d done and more. I wanted to build a better bat trap, if you
will.
Before Android, mobile developers faced many roadblocks when it came to writing
applications. Building the better application, the unique application, the competing application,
the hybrid application, and incorporating many common tasks such as messaging
and calling in a familiar way were often unrealistic goals.
To understand why, let’s take a brief look at the history of mobile software development.
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