Android

Android Unit Testing Concepts

Testing is a key activity in any software development effort. Manual testing (e.g., with QA personnel) allows a lot of flexibility, but testing old features repeatedly can be mind-numbing and cause testers to miss things. Manual testing also usually involves a full end-to-end system, so it can be difficult to test edge cases and error conditions because they can be difficult or impossible to recreate on-demand in the real system.

What You Should Know About Android M

Google I/O’s 2015 keynote was full of information about Android M, Lollipop’s successor. The preview is available today to developers with a Nexus. The full release will be available later this year. Here’s what you can look forward to.

How to fix Ambiguous method call on getClass()" in Android Studio"

There is a bug in IntelliJ that will show an ambiguous method call error when using getClass() without an explicit cast. It looks like this:

Add Some Chrome to Your App With Google ARC and ARC Welder

Google has released a developer preview of ARC- App Runtime for Chrome. The project was launched last September and the latest developer preview gives a peek into the future of Android. Soon your Android app will be able to reach its users on desktop as well as mobile! ARC enables Android applications to run on Google’s browser, Chrome. Users won’t need a phone to use and enjoy your application, just a computer with a Chrome browser.

Slim: Stop Writing and Rewriting Boilerplate Code

Slim is an annotation library whose main purpose is to remove common boilerplate associated with Android development. You can find it here on GitHub.

New Tools for Android Game Developers

A new set of tools for gaming applications was introduced this week during Google’s Developer Day at the Game Developers Conference (GDC). They will help developers understand their users, increase in-app purchases, and target advertising.

A New Way to Get Your Android App Discovered

You’ve gone through all of the steps to make an awesome app that users will love and come back to time and again. Today is the day you release it to the Google Play Store. “Good luck little app,” you think as the developer hits publish. “Make me proud; you’ve only got about 1,400,000 other Android apps to compete with!” Getting your app discovered through the store is a growing concern for developers as the number of Android applications grows by the hundreds of thousands every year. Data collected from over the past few years* has shown that users primarily discover new applications through searching the app stores. While there are several other ways for your application to be found (word of mouth was second), app store visibility should not be overlooked. A user must know an application exists before they can download it. So, wat do?

Tech Reviews: Moto X

When the first generation of the Moto X was first released, it proved you could have a fast, solid, and smooth user experience without having the top of the line specs available. This year, Motorola upgraded the specs for its second generation and the result is a phone that is arguably one of the best phones on the market today. This is the second generation of the Moto X.

Tech Reviews: Android Wear Moto 360

Metova's resident gadget hound, Dane Hale, has been using the Moto 360 for about a month. Here's what he thought of it!

Android Auto

Along with the release of Android 5.0 comes Android Auto. Google created it to allow users to safely use Android applications while driving. The newly released Auto APIs will allow developers to create or extend current Android applications to interface with their cars.

Android 5.0 Lollipop

Android 5.0 Lollipop is finally here! This is Google’s biggest update to the Mobile OS since its release of Android 4.0, Ice Cream Sandwich. Lollipop brings new functionality, options for developers, and a new look that will set the standard for what a modern OS should feel like.

Keystore: Its Importance, Use, and Creation

Why Do I Need Keystore?