While others are still struggling
to upgrade from jelly-bean to kit-kat and from kit-kat to lollipop, Google is
busy lunching new operating system. The next major generation of Android is
known only as M (Android M).
There are six major improvements that mostly focus on how apps work and interact with each other. Android's wireless payment system also got a big boost, in part thanks to unified fingerprint sensor support.
App permissions
Android M is moving to an
iOS-style permissions. You don't get asked about all permissions lumped
together at install time, instead the app will ask for each permission the
first time you use it.
You can go into the Settings
screen to view what permissions an app is using and revoke or allow them. You
can also view all apps that use a certain permission.
Custom Chrome tabs
So many apps today have a web
component that forces you to jump between a browser and the app or as web view
embedded into the app.
The Chrome team proposes a
different solution - style Chrome to look like a part of the app. The app can
launch a custom Chrome tab, style it and add buttons to make it feel almost
like a native part of the app.
App links
What if an app needs to interact
with something other than a browser? Android M adds a secure way for apps to
verify that when they send a request (e.g. open Twitter and show this tweet),
the receiving app that handles the request is legit. The OS will verify it
cryptographically with the web server, which will thwart malicious apps.
Android Pay
Google has been trying to make
mobile payments work for years now, Android Pay is the latest iteration. It
will leverage a phone's NFC hardware to stand between the store and your credit
card.
The store - or even apps that
sell things - will never see the details of your credit card as Pay keeps that
private. The service will work with major cards, US carriers (AT&T, T-Mo,
VZW) as well as a variety of stores: McDonald's, Subway, Best Buy, Coca Cola,
Pepsi, you name it.
Fingerprint sensors
Some vendors are already
leveraging fingerprint sensors to secure payments, now Google is making that
functionality an official part of Android.
Android M will abstract away the
different kinds of sensors, presenting apps with a consistent API, which is
bound to make life easier for developers.
Power & charging
Project Volta was the first step
and with M Google is pushing ahead with improving battery life with Doze.
Phones running the new OS will use their motion sensors to detect when the
phone is just laying around and doze off. Dozing makes apps check with servers
and run background activities less often. The longer the phone has been dozing,
the less often apps get to do stuff. Still, phones can quickly wake up when
needed. The result is that a Nexus 9 lasted twice as long running Android M
than it did on Lollipop.
Another part of battery life is
quick charging. Google is adopting the USB Type C standard for its new power
delivery modes, which can charge a phone much faster (3x to 5x). And since Type
C is bi-directional you can even make the phone send power down the cable -
imagine phones with huge batteries being used as battery packs.
Google Now on Tap
Google Now is also getting
smarter with the new "on tap" functionality. It has improved natural
language understanding, so you can ask it questions in a natural way -
"his", "it", "this", the system is smart enough
to figure out what you mean. The service is also aware of where you are in the
UI.
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