Tuesday 27 May 2014

Android Application Development


Android is a mobile device platform which is powered by Linux kernel. Android is world’s most popular operating system. Android powered device was first launched in 2007 by HTC.
Over 70% of mobile developers develop android apps. They develop applications for smart phones, tablets, camera’s, televisions etc.

What is Android Application development?
Developing software for Android OS powered devices is Android application development.
 Android Operating system comes with different API’s and pre installed native applications like phone manager, contacts manager, Calendar etc. Apart from these native applications mobile user needs more features in smart phones. So, user made application comes into play which utilizes resources of phone and computing capabilities to come up with a solution to reduce human effort and to get best out of a smart phone. User made application enhances the functionalities of smart phone.
Start learning android application development tutorial from KB4DEV.

List of Android Operating Systems
·         Cupcake (1.5).
·         Doughnut (1.6).
·         Eclair (2.0).
·         Froyo (2.2).
·         Gingerbread (2.3).
·         Honeycomb (3.0).
·         Ice Cream Sandwich (4.0).
·         Jelly Bean (4.1).
·         KitKat (4.4).

Why Android application development is popular?
Over 65% of smart phone users have Android Powered Device. Around 150 million devices are powered by Android OS. So there is huge need of android applications related to different categories.

From where to learn Android Application development tutorial
KB4DEV is a platform where you can read and edit notes written by different users. They have comprehensive android tutorial series which covers fundamentals of android as well as advance topics like interaction with remote server using android. As notes can be updated by anyone who has account on kb4dev so the study material remains authentic forever.

Basics to know before you develop android application

Android is an open source platform provided by Google which comprises of:
·          Mobile Operating System.
·         Application development framework (set of API’s).
·         Run time Environment.
·         Some application which are developed in android operating system.

Framework:
Set of classes and interfaces is known as API. Set of API’s is called framework.

Runtime environment:
Runtime environment contains resources needed to execute application.

Tools needed
You need IDE which stands for integrated development environment. You can use Android Studio or Eclipse as an IDE.

Programming Language
Java is the preferred language to develop android application. However if you are planning to develop native applications you can use C/C++. We use NDK which is native development kit to develop application which has lower level access to android architecture and system calls.

Some steps to follow when you start learning Android for first time
1.       Start by learning basics of android operating system. You will learn to know how android application works in an operating system.
2.      Then learn about the IDE. Play with Eclipse or Android studio and run simple hello world application.
3.       Learn about project structure and resources.
4.       Learn about Android manifest file.
5.       Learn to use Activity and Intents.
6.       Then proceed towards learning services and background threads.
7.       After that you need to learn about content providers in android.
After learning list of basic topics given above you can proceed towards advance topics like sensors, maps and Bluetooth etc.

You can also develop applications which store their data online by consuming web services.

Tuesday 20 May 2014

Allow sending different variables via the URL string to the new page (readable through PHP or Javascript).

PHP - JAVA
The version shown below uses PHP to read the variables back, but it's possible to use Javascript and some messy splitting to do the same


EXAMPLE:

Send variables via URL!
INSIDE "page1.php" or "page1.html"

    // Send the variables myNumber=1 and myFruit="orange" to the new PHP page...
    <a href="page2c.php?myNumber=1&myFruit=orange">Send variables via URL!</a>

   
INSIDE "page2c.php"

    <?php
        // Retrieve the URL variables (using PHP).
        $num = $_GET['myNumber'];
        $fruit = $_GET['myFruit'];
        echo "Number: ".$num."  Fruit: ".$fruit;
    ?>