Update: Here's the Market changelog, which brings a few more tweaks in the update to light:

  1. Swipe shortcut
  2. Improved scrolling and network performance
  3. Improved support for devices running Ice Cream Sandwich devices
  4. Confirmation dialog for Find Friends
  5. Security improvements
  6. New languages: Filipino, Simplified Chinese
  7. Many other bug fixes, improvements, and polish

The official Twitter for Android app just received a substantial update, and you can download it from the web Market now, or wait until it's available on the device Market in the next hour. Twitter posted a changelog on its blog, but here are the excerpts you'll be interested in:

  • Swipe shortcut: Swipe a Tweet in your home timeline to reply to, retweet, favorite or share it, or view the Twitter user’s profile, without leaving your timeline.
  • “Find friends”: We’ve added a confirmation alert when you select “Find friends”. This notification more clearly and explicitly messages the fact that when you upload your contacts’ email addresses and phone numbers, you can quickly find which of your friends are on Twitter (that is, if they’ve chosen to be discoverable by email or phone number).
  • New devices: Twitter for Android is now optimized to run on Android devices running Ice Cream Sandwich, as well as on the Kindle Fire (available today through the Amazon Appstore) and the Barnes & Noble NOOK Color and NOOK Tablet (available February 23 though the Barnes & Noble NOOK Store).

Basically, global changes include a minor gesture feature, plus a disclosure that Twitter will be uploading your contacts to their servers if you use the "Find friends" option.

But if you're on Android 4.0, something much more important has changed: hardware acceleration. Oh yes indeed - if you're on Ice Cream Sandwich, you'll notice the Twitter app is now buttery smooth, just as it always should have been. In addition, Robot font support has been added, so it's a whole lot more readable now.

Kindle Fire owners can now use the official Twitter app as well, downloadable via the Amazon Appstore.

Twitter Blog