Must-Have Resources for Android app Development

If you’re a newcomer to app development, Android needs your apps. You don’t have to pay large sums of money for a college class. All the resources you need are available at your fingertips. Here are a few useful resources to put you on the road to developing Android apps.

The Android Developer Community

With Android in its fourth version, there is a large developer community all over the world. It is now much easier to get solutions to problems, and find like-minded developers to share app ideas and exchange experiences. 

Here are some developer communities/sites that you can turn to for help if you run into problems while working with Android :

( Stack Overflow ) — Stack Overflow is a collaboratively edited question and answer site for developers. If you have a question about Android, chances are someone at Stack Overflow is probably already discussing the same question and someone else had already provided the answer. Best of all, other developers can vote for the best answer so that you can know which are the answers that are trustworthy.

- Is another site to add to your favorites as you begin to learn Android development. 

- You’ll have questions about how to do specific things as you go and Stack Overflow can help you with those. Search other questions and answers or post your own.

Lynda.com —This site provides tutorials on a variety of software applications, many centering on software development. Lynda.com offers a section featuring Android app development, with its session, “Android App Development with Essential Java Training” lasting more than seven hours. Access to Lynda.com is not free—subscriptions start at $25 a month—but the courses are taught by top professionals in their area. So you’ll learn Android development from an Android development expert.

( Google Android Training  ) — Google has launched the Android Training site that contains a number of useful Classes grouped by topics. At the time of writing, the classes mostly contain useful code  snippets that are very useful to Android developers once they have started with the basics. 

Once you have learned the basics in this book, I strongly suggest you take a look at the classes.

Mobile Tuts+—If you’ve already learned Java for other programming languages and simply need to learn how Java applies to Android Development, Mobile Tuts+ can help. This online written tutorial is available completely free of charge, beginning with the tools you’ll need, a description of Java, and a description of object-oriented programming. Once you’ve gotten that background down, you’ll move on to learning how to work with arrays and the basics of string.

 (Android Discuss) — Android Discuss is a discussion group hosted by Google using the Google Groups service. Here, you Will be able to discuss the various aspects of Android programming. This group is monitored  Closely by the Android team at Google, and so this is a good place to clarify your doubts and  learn new tips and tricks.

TheNewBoston—This free YouTube video series on Android application development is free. For those who learn better through visual demonstration, watching someone walk you through the steps of installing the necessary software and using the various buttons and functions inside that software will likely be much more effective than book learning.

Android Developers Guide—If you’re a more advanced developer, this free resource guide at the Android Developers site includes detailed information about the Android framework. The site also includes how-to videos and forums filled with other Android developers who can help you with any questions you have.

Thanks to the wealth of information available on the web, you no longer have to invest in a college course to learn the basics of Android development. These resources allow you to learn at home, at your own pace, keeping the material to refer back to as you begin developing apps.

Samsung Owes Apple $1.04 billion for Patents

A federal jury in San Jose, Calif., has found Samsung guilty of infringing a number of Apple patents and said that the Korean electronics giant should pay more than $1 billion in damages

Samsung Owes Apple $1.04 billion for Patents

The jury’s verdict in the landmark case found Samsung products infringed on a number of Apple design and utility patents, though not for every phone and tablet that Apple had accused. The seven-man, two-woman jury also said that several Samsung phones diluted the value of the “trade dress,” or protected design, of Apple’s iPhone.

The verdict in the Apple-Samsung legal battle came in much sooner than expected and the news hasn't been good for Samsung. To pull out one of the most relevant details amid all the patents and trade dress claims, the jury has ordered Samsung to pay Apple $1,049,343,540.in damages. Yikes.

Apple was originally seeking an award of $2.45 billion from Samsung, but few thought it would get even remotely that much. However, even $1.05 billion is a very high number for damages. Many of Apple's patent and trade dress claims were found to be valid, and Samsung was ruled to have willfully infringed upon them in multiple cases.

With all of Apple's patents intact, and many Samsung phones apparently at fault, Samsung's legal team just had a really bad start to their weekend.

The verdict will no doubt send shockwaves through the smartphone community and raise question as to whether Apple will now go after other makers of other Android products as well. The company already has lawsuits in progress against HTC.

The jury spent only approximately 21 hours in deliberation before returning its verdict, an extremely fast turnaround for such a complicated case. The verdict form that the jury was required to slog through was more than 20 pages long, and included upwards of 700 very specific questions.

Professional Android Application Development book reviews

Professional Android 4 Application Development (Wrox Professional Guides) 

Author review 

Developers, build mobile Android apps using Android 4 

The fast-growing popularity of Android Smartphones and tablets creates a huge opportunities for developers. If you're an experienced developer, you can start creating robust mobile Android apps right away with this professional guide to Android 4 application development. Written by one of Google's lead Android developer advocates, this practical book walks you through a series of hands-on projects that illustrate the features of the Android SDK. That includes all the new APIs introduced in Android 3 and 4, including building for tablets, using the Action Bar, Wi-Fi Direct, NFC Beam, and more.

- Shows experienced developers how to create mobile applications for Android smartphones and tablets

- Revised and expanded to cover all the Android SDK releases including Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich), including all updated APIs, and the latest changes to the Android platform.

- Explains new and enhanced features such as drag and drop, fragments, the action bar, enhanced multitouch support, new environmental sensor support, major improvements to the animation framework, and a range of new communications techniques including NFC and Wi-Fi direct.

- Provides practical guidance on publishing and marketing your applications, best practices for user experience, and more

This book helps you learn to master the design, lifecycle, and UI of an Android app through practical exercises, which you can then use as a basis for developing your own Android apps.

 Professional Android 4 Application Development (Wrox Professional Guides)  Reviews 

Some Customer reviews  

No1: I come from a heavy background in web development, specifically PHP (call it a language or a mess, but it's my web programming language of choice). I've wanted to move into Android development for a while, but never really had an opportunity until recently (3 months ago) to produce something. Naturally, moving to Android development was rough at first for countless reasons, so I've bought books, read tutorials, blogs, watched countless Google I/O videos, and spent hours upon hours browsing the API. For the most part, I've found "here's how to do (insert random task here)." Rarely have tutorials come with the reason something is a best practice or why their way is better than another. Since this is the case for a lot of languages, I mostly accepted it and did my best to make sense of the content out there to build my first app.

A great reference and more:

In the two days that I've had the book, I think I have saved at least 5-6 hours that would have been spent looking for solutions to problems that I felt comfortable implementing in my software. Not only does Reto explain how something is done, but more often then not I feel like I understand why something is done a particular way.. Which, to most developers is crucial to get an understanding of a platform. I would be comfortable saying, there's enough information out there for ANYONE to produce an Android application, but for non-Java programmers there are few resources that really solidify a better understanding of the platform or don't recommend a life-long dedication to Java before picking up the material. I'd feel comfortable recommending the book to anyone with a solid understanding of software development who was looking to get into Android programming.

To be more specific than saying "a solid understanding of software development," I'd say it definitely helps to know some Java syntax, object-oriented programming and MVC practices going in.. Of course, the more the better. Without footing in those a lot of the information (not just in this book, but Android development in general) will be tough to grasp completely. After that, I'd say it's for just about anyone serious about Android Development who has more interest than just getting from A to B. Though it would certainly help anyone just looking to get from A to B.

No2: This is my second book on how to develop apps for Android. It's far more detailed than the other one I bought some months ago, and the extra detail (770 page book) makes it well worth the price. I have a long way to go, but every chapter covers the material in depth so I think this is 'the one'.

My only criticism of the book is that unlike the superlative series of books by Murach, this one has no exercises for you to try and write code as you go. However, code is supplied by the publishers website and it loads into Eclipse for you to play with, and figure it out.

It is updated to Android 4.0 (ICS) so is current at this time.

No3:  This is a decent book if you're an intermediate Android programmer. However, if you are completely new to Android this isn't the book for you.

The author depends too much on the downloaded code and does not give explanations on what is happening most of the time.

Overall, the book is very POWERFULL but I recommend it for advanced user (Not for beginners) , so if you beginners check this book Android for Programmers: Developer Seriesthen you can explore this book .

Level  : advanced .

For more detail Professional Android 4 Application Development (Wrox Professional Guides) Download pdf visit this link   

Android for Programmers: Developer Series book reviews

Android for Programmers: An App-Driven Approach (Deitel Developer Series) 

Author review 

The professional programmer’s Deitel® guide to Android™ smartphone and tablet app development and the Eclipse IDE with the Android Development Tools (ADT) plug-in

Billions of apps have been downloaded from Android Market! This book gives you everything you’ll need to start developing great Android apps quickly and getting them published on Android Market. The book uses an app-driven approach—each new technology is discussed in the context of 16 fully tested Android apps, complete with syntax coloring, code walk-throughs and sample outputs. Apps you’ll develop include:

- SpotOn Game

- Slideshow

- Flag Quiz

- Route Tracker

- Favorite Twitter® Searches

- Address Book

- Tip Calculator

- Doodlz

- Weather Viewer

- Cannon Game

- Voice Recorder

- Pizza Ordering 

Practical, example-rich coverage of:

- Smartphone and Tablet Apps, Android Development Tools (ADT) Plug-In for Eclipse

- Activities, Intents, Content Providers

- GUI Components, Menus, Toasts, Resource Files, Touch and Gesture Processing

- Tablet Apps, ActionBar and AppWidgets

- Tweened Animations, Property Animations

- Camera, Audio, Video, Graphics, OpenGL ES

- Gallery and Media Library Access

- SharedPreferences, Serialization, SQLite

- Handlers and Multithreading, Games

- Google Maps, GPS, Location Services, Sensors

- Internet-Enabled Apps, Web Services, Telephony, Bluetooth®

- Speech Synthesis and Recognition

- Android Market, Pricing, Monetization

Android for Programmers: An App-Driven Approach (Deitel Developer Series) Development Reviews 

Some Customer reviews  

No1: I initially selected this book due to the multiple authors, hoping it would be more error free than other book I have read from single authors. So far that has been true, the more eyes in the review process really help not only catch errors but organize the material. Little things like all code snippets having line numbers and being high-lighted to follow the text really help. There are a good number of screen shots that make it easy to follow along with Eclipse on a windows or mac machine. I read so many posts on the internet saying Android has no GUI builder to layout widgets, and was very surprised, it wasn't until this book, I found out they are wrong. Adroid being what it is with Google behind it needs all the help with documentation and organization it can get. Google has that tendency to just leave it as-is, while their phD's make more hard to follow videos. The 16 apps they use as examples cover a nice range of UI, Services and libraries. The only negative is I'd prefer to not use Eclipse and would rather use my editor and a make file, but this isn't the authors faults, Android seems to be married to the ADT visual layout editor plugin and the ant build system. This book is for the rest of us that are normal C++ or C# or Java folks and can talk layman terms in getting the job done. The authors are to be commended for that alone! 

No2: This book is well written and logically structured. It is not a book about Java programming, so you might want to look at other books if that is what you need. I found the app driven approach easier (and more interesting) than the standard online tutorials. The book also contains numerous links to helpful Android web sites. This is particularly useful for those who want to dig deeper into any topic.

No3:  I'm working my way through Android for Programmers (an App-Driven Approach) and it is by far the best (of the three I've purchased!) on Android development.The book presents the app/code and then goes through it allowing you to cut and paste more mundane tasks(variable declarations and GUI formatting) once you've mastered them and allows you to focus on the JAVA and techniques.

I don't have a ton of Java experience, but I found this extremely easy to pick up (if you know Ruby, C++, C# or other Object Oriented Languages, you can easily follow the Java).

One negative: The online chapters aren't done as of 3/17/2012; hopefully soon.

Overall, the book is very easy to follow with great examples but I recommend you to read this book first Beginning Android 4 Application Development Reviews  then this book .

Level  : intermediate level so you must read the previous book before to begin this book . 

For more detail Android for Programmers: An App-Driven Approach (Deitel Developer Series) Download pdf visit this link   

Beginning Android 4 Application Development book reviews

Beginning Android 4 Application Development Reviews 

In the last tutorial we know ho to Running Android virtual device and now its the time to explore some useful android book . 

Author review 

Understanding Android OS for both Smartphone and tablet programming 

This fast-paced introduction to the newest release of Android OS gives aspiring mobile app developers what they need to know to program for today's hottest Android Smartphones and tablets. Android 4 OS is, for the first time, a single solution for both Smartphones and tablets, so if you master the information in this helpful guide, you'll be well on your way to successful development for both devices. From using activities and intents and creating rich user interfaces to working with SMS, messaging APIs, and the Android SDK, what you need is here.

-  Provides clear instructions backed by real-world programming examples

- Begins with the basics and covers everything Android 4 developers need to know for both Smartphones and tablets

- Explains how to customize activities and intents, create rich user interfaces, and manage data

- Helps you work with SMS and messaging APIs, the Android SDK, and using location-based services

- Details how to package and publish your applications to the Android Market

- Beginning Android 4 Application Development pares down the most essential steps you need to know so you can start creating Android applications today.

Beginning Android 4 Application Development Reviews 

Some Customer reviews  

No1: I picked this book up after completing my intro to computer science class where we learned Java, and thought it'd be good to learn to program for Android. I've been working on a small app of mine, and it's great to go through the book and add new features. Awesome book for reference as well.

I've found this book very easy to read through on the Kindle version when viewed on the PC, however I would not suggest copying and pasting the code. You won't learn it as well, and the formatting will be a nightmare.

I recommend this book to anyone with prior knowledge of Java looking to get into Android.

No2: I have developed software for 18 years but I am new to Android. I think this book is a great tool for someone that is already a developer and wants to jump into the Android platform. The book contains a wide variety of very practical examples with very good explanations. I can tell this author really thought through the content of the book. The result has been a fine compendium of the most important facets of Android development.

No3: I just bought this book last week and start reading from chapter 1, 2, 3 and learned that this book is really easy to learn. I like the author's style that he provided the code first and explained how the code does step by step later. It is easy to follow. This book describes what the title says: Beginning Android 4. I am new to Android, but I am an experience java web developer, that helps me to focus android coding from this book and learn Android 4 very quickly. I love how the book layout with multi-color which makes the reader easy and enjoy reading.

If you a beginner, this book is for you. I will update more after finishing the book. 

My own review about Beginning Android 4 Application Development Reviews is:

 I recommend this book to anyone who has knowledge of Java and looking to get into Android and you can download sample chapters 

Beginning Android 4 Application Development Download pdf 

More details about this book Form amazon

Running Android virtual device - App Development Tutorial

Running Your App on Android virtual device

If you followed the previous tutorial Building your own Android App to create an Android project, you have created your first Hello World Android application source files that allow you to immediately run the app on the Android virtual device.

How you run your app depends on two things:

 Whether you have a real Android-powered device and whether you’re using Eclipse. This tutorial shows you how to install and run your app on a real device and on the Android emulator (Android virtual device), and in both cases with either Eclipse or the command line tools.

Before you run your app, note the various files that make up an Android project in the Package Explorer in Eclipse. 

Android project architecture 

android project architecture

The various folders and their files are as follows:

AndroidManifest.xml

The manifest file describes the fundamental characteristics of the app and defines each of its components.

For example all Activities and Services of the application must be declared in this file. It must also contain the required permissions for the application. For example if the application requires network access it must be specified.

src/

Directory for your app's main source files. By default, it includes an Activity class that runs when your app is launched using the app icon.

res/

Contains several sub-directories for app resources. res directory contains structured values which are known to the Android platform, the assets directory can be used to store any kind of data. You access this data via the AssetsManager which you can access the getAssets() method. AssetsManager allows to read an assets as InputStream with the open() method. 

drawable-hdpi/

Directory for drawable objects (such as bitmaps) that are designed for high-density (hdpi) screens. Other drawable directories contain assets designed for other screen densities.

layout/

Directory for files that define your app's user interface.

values/

Directory for other various XML files that contain a collection of resources, such as string and color definitions.

When you build and run the default Android app, the default Activity class starts and loads a layout file that says "Hello World." The result is nothing exciting, but it's important that you understand how to run your app before you start developing.

Run on the Android virtual device (Emulator)

You are now ready to test your application on the Android emulator. Right-click the project name in Eclipse and select Run As  ->  Android Application .

Run on the Android virtual device (Emulator)

If you have not made any mistakes in the project, you should now be able to see the application installed and running on the Android virtual device (emulator).

Run on a Real Android Device

If you have a real Android-powered device, here's how you can install and run your app . Visit this link from Google to know how to   Run on a Real Android Device

http://developer.android.com/training/basics/firstapp/running-app.html

Now you can explore some resources and book for increase your knowledge , you can begin with beginner book : Beginning Android 4 Application Development book reviews

Create an Android Project & import samples with Eclipse

Building your own Android App

Welcome to Android Development Tutorial!

This Tutorial teaches you how to build your own (first) Android app. You’ll learn how to create an Android project and how to import the Android app’s project into Eclipse.

Before you start this Tutorial, be sure you have your android development environment set up.

 You need to:

- Download the Android SDK.

- Install the ADT plugin for Eclipse (if you’ll use the Eclipse IDE (.

- Download the latest SDK tools and platforms using the SDK Manager.

We discuss these steps in previous tutorial Android SDK tools and Installing Android ADT Plugin For Eclipse, once you've finished the setup; you're ready to begin this tutorial.

This tutorial teaches you some fundamental concepts about Android development, so it's important that you follow each step.

Creating Your First Android Application

You’ve downloaded the SDK, installed Eclipse, and plugged in the plug-in. You are now ready to start programming for Android. Start by creating a new Android project and setting up your Eclipse run and debug configurations, as described in the following steps.

Creating a New Android Project

To create a new Android project using the Android New Project Wizard, do the following:

- Select File -> New -> Project.

- Select the Android Project application type from the Android folder, and click next.

- In the wizard that appears, enter the details for your new project. On the first page, the Project Name is the name of your project file. You can also select the location your project should be saved.

The next step lets you select the build target for your application. The build target is the version of the Android framework SDK that you plan to develop with. In addition to the open sourced Android SDK libraries available as part of each platform release, Google offers a set of proprietary APIs that offer additional libraries (such as Maps). If you want to use these Google-specific APIs, you must select the Google APIs package corresponding to the platform release you want to target.

The final step allows you to specify the application properties. The Application Name is the friendly name for your application; the Package Name specifies its Java package; the Create Activity option lets you specify the name of a class that will be your initial Activity; and setting the Minimum SDK lets you specify the minimum version of the SDK that your application will run on.

Creating a New Android Project

Creating a New Android Project

Creating a New Android Project

Creating a New Android Project

    

More details about android PROPERTIES

Project Name: Provide any name of your choice here; I named it ‘Hello World’.

Build Target: This field asks you which version of Android do you want your App to target on. Check any one of your choice. Along with Target Name you can see the API Level (marked in the box) which is numbers representing the level of the Android API. This would be used to specify Min SDK Version field, which we’ll know in few seconds.

Application Name: This is a name which you’d want to give to your final Application. This would be displayed in the phone’s menu and also on title bar of App. You may provide any name of your choice. It's not a mandatory field.

Package Name: This gives a package structure to your App. If you are familiar to java you probably already related it to java package, which is absolutely correct. You may name it anything like ‘android.firstApp’ or ‘com.apps.android.firstApp’. The dots in the package name just provide a hierarchical structure to app.  The package name must have at least two identifiers (dot separated). It's a required field.

Create Activity: We discuss Activities in this tutorial Android Application User Interface tutoril  , but for now I'd like you to know that every App’s function is treated as an activity in android, and you can give a name to your activity. You can have activities and sub-activities in your apps. Again, this is not a mandatory field. Note: It won't allow spaces in this field.

Min SDK Version: Do you remember, we came across this name while talking about ‘Build Target’. This field tells your app to put an extra check on the application that it is only focused on some minimum level of Build Target. This field takes in numeric value corresponding to the API Level of Build target. It would specify that if any target environment is below this Min SDK Version, then this application won't work. This ideally should be equal to the API Level value of the Build Target selected above by you. But this is not a Mandatory field, and so even if you give any other version, it would accept it with a warning message.

The Summary of android PROPERTIES

Project name: The name of the project

Application name: A user-friendly name for your application

Package name: The name of the package. You should use a reverse domain name for this.

Create Activity: The name of the first activity in your application

Min SDK Version: The minimum version of the SDK that your project is targeting

Import the app’s Android project into Eclipse

-  Opening  the Import  Dialog then  Select  File ->  Import…  to  open  the  Import  dialog

- Importing your app’s project (sample code).  In the Import dialog, expand the General node and select Existing Projects into Workspace, then click Next -> to proceed to the Import Projects step. Ensure that Select root directory is selected, and then click the Browse button. In the Browse for Folder dialog, locate the sample folder, select it and click OK. Click Finish to import the project into Eclipse. The project now appears in the Package Explorer window at the left side of the Eclipse window.

Import the app’s Android project into Eclipse

Import the app’s Android project into Eclipse