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Dec

Google Updates In-App Purchasing APIs, Makes Them Faster, Better, Harder, Stronger And Less Likely To Lose Transactions

Posted by Eric Ravenscraft in Google, News

Sure, "in-app purchases" becomes a bit of a dirty phrase when we're talking about games that abuse the privilege, but they're a critical element of any profitable app ecosystem, and today Google's making a bunch of IAP features easier and smoother for developers and, by extension, you. Here are some of the new improvements.

Easier Purchasing Implementation

Previously, if you bought an item in an app, the purchase was handled via an "asynchronous notification through a background service." This meant that the app would call out to Google to announce a purchase, but then have to talk to a separate service in order to find out how it went.

Dec

Tasker's Developer Is Working On A UI Overhaul Too, Plus A Bunch Of Other Updates

Posted by Eric Ravenscraft in Applications, News

Last Updated: December 9th, 2012

A few days ago, we were treated to a lovely look at what Tasker, the highly-customizable Android automation app, could look like if it got a nice facelift. Unfortunately, this was done by the Android team and was not representative of any real work being done by the developer. As it turns out, though, the developer behind said application is working on a holo conversion. There are quite a few obstacles to deal with in the meantime:

I started working on a holo conversion about a week ago coincidentally, with half the goal being use of the holo conventions and half replacing under-the-hood deprecated APIs for dialogs etc.

Nov

Samsung Announces S Pen SDK 2.2.5 Update With Multi Window APIs, Bug Fixes

Posted by Liam Spradlin in Android OS, Development, News, Samsung

In a continued quest to bring their handy functionality of the Note line's S Pen, Samsung has again updated the stylus' SDK, this time to 2.2.5 (a 0.0.5 bump over the previous update).

The update, which Samsung announced through its developer blog early this morning, brings one major feature – Multi Window and its related APIs. For those who haven't been keeping up with the Note line, Multi Window is a feature by which apps can share the screen by splitting it in half horizontally or vertically, sharing data through the clipboard or – in some cases – with simple drag-and-drop.

Sep

Google Play Services Can Now Be Installed Manually From The Play Store

Posted by Liam Spradlin in Android OS, Applications, Google, News

Just after initially unveiling Google Play Services, Google has made the APK installable directly from the Play Store.

For those who missed the announcement, Google Play Services is an APK rolling out automatically to devices running Android 2.2+ that will allow Android apps to easily integrate with Google services like Google+. At present, the app (which is in version 1.0 "Asiago") includes components and relevant client APIs for OAuth 2.0 authentication, Google+ sign-in, and Google+ +1 buttons. Google assures users that "we anticipate more Google services to be continuously added, so be on the lookout for these updates."

The Google Play Services app began rolling out through the Play Store automatically, primarily in order to keep updates to the service independent of carrier or OEM updates.

Sep

Chameleon Beta Updated To Version 0.9.0 - The Widget API Is Here!

Posted by Cameron Summerson in Applications, News

Since the Chameleon beta first became available, the most requested feature has been for more widgets. The initial build only offered a handful of choices, and while they were all useful, they didn't showcase the launcher's usefulness. More recently, the team updated the application to offer even more widgets, adding a bit more value to the launcher.

Now, however, the launcher has received what I think is its biggest and most important update thus far: the launcher just hit version 0.9.0, which brings the first version of the widget API. Why is this a big deal, you ask? Because developers can now start working on their own widgets just for Chameleon!

Sep

Hootsuite Acquires Seesmic, Has Big Plans For Business Customers

Posted by Eric Ravenscraft in Applications, News

In the mad scramble to keep up with all the major social networks, a number of third-party clients have popped up over the years to help you manage everything. Not that Twitter takes too kindly to these sorts of shenanigans. Still, services like Seesmic tried to replicate the native Twitter experience while augmenting it with Facebook integration in one app. When Twitter gutted third-party APIs for consumer-facing apps, Seesmic likely faced some trouble. What's a struggling independent developer to do? Team up with an even bigger one!

HootSuite is another popular social network management app, though it seems to have a more broad range of services, including integration with Google+ pages.

Aug

Now You Can Add Your Discover Card To Google Wallet Straight From Discover's Site

Posted by Eric Ravenscraft in Google, News

When Google announced that it would support all major credit and debit cards, it was big news. What may have slipped under the radar, however, is that Mountain View also sent an open invitation to card issuers to sign up for tighter integration into the service. Today, Google is announcing that you can add your Discover card to Google Wallet directly from your account on Discover's website. You even get fancy card graphics now, too!

The process is stupid simple to set up:

To save your Discover Card to Google Wallet, just follow these short steps:

Visit discover.com/googlewallet and sign into your Discover account

Click “Add Your Card”

Sign into your Google Account

And that’s it!

Aug

Khronos Announces OpenGL ES 3.0 Spec - Get Ready For Faster, Better-Looking, More Desktop-Like Games

Posted by Eric Ravenscraft in Apps/Games, News

Speaking at SIGGRAPH 2012, a yearly computer graphics convention featuring some of the most prominent names in the business, Khronos unveiled updates for several key OpenGL properties including the specs for Open GL ES 3.0. OpenGL ES is the primary graphics API for mobile device platforms, including Android and iOS. As you would expect, the updates are rather technical, but here's an overview of what we can expect in the future.

Much Better Texture Compression

Perhaps the biggest noticeable change in this iteration is that texture compression has been improved, and the spec now has required support for the ETC texture compression format.

Jun

Google+ Developer Platform Announced: Soon We'll Have Share Plugins, +1 Buttons, And The Ability Sign Into Apps With Google+

Posted by Jaroslav Stekl in Android OS, Applications, Development, News

As Google+ continues to get better, it's only inevitable that it'll start showing up in more and more places. And Google intends for that to happen as soon as possible, from the looks of it - Mountain View just announced its Google+ Developer Platform.

The Google+ SDK, which should be available "in the coming weeks," will allow Android app developers to integrate G+ into their products more seamlessly. Features will include:

A "sign in with Google+ button" - once incorporated into apps, this will allow users to sign in using Google+ instead of creating an account specific to the app.