Android 4.0 (Code Name: Ice Cream Sandwich) is a major platform release of Android Operating System that adds a variety of new features for users and app developers. Other then all the new features and APIs, Android 4.0 is an important platform release because it brings the extensive set of APIs and Holographic themes from Android 3.x to smaller screens.
If you are an app developer, you now have a single platform and unified API framework that enables you to develop and publish your application with a single APK that provides an optimized user experience for handsets, tablets, and more, when running the same version of Android - Android 4.0 (API level 14) or greater.
The Android 4.0 platform is now available for download as a component for the Android SDK so you can begin developing and testing your applications on Android 4.0 with the Android emulator. The downloadable platform includes an Android library and system image, as well as a set of emulator skins and more. The downloadable platform does not include any external libraries.
The system image included in the downloadable SDK platform provides 57 built-in locales.
Built-in Applications
The system image included in the downloadable platform provides these built-in applications:
- API Demos
- Browser
- Calculator
- Calendar
- Camera
- Clock
- Custom Locale
- Dev Tools
- Downloads
- Email
- Gallery
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- Gestures Builder
- Messaging
- Music
- People
- Phone
- Search
- Settings
- Speech Recorder
- Speech Recorder
- Widget Preview
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New APIs
- Social APIs in Contacts Provider
- Calendar Provider
- Voicemail Provider
- Multimedia
- Camera
- Android Beam (NDEF Push with NFC)
- Wi-Fi Direct
- Bluetooth Health Devices
- Accessibility
- Spell Checker Services
- Text-to-speech Engines
- Network Usage
- RenderScript
- Enterprise
- Device Sensors
- Action Bar
- User Interface and Views
- Input Framework
- Properties
- Hardware Acceleration
- JNI Changes
- WebKit
- Permissions
- Device Features
In addition to everything above, Android 4.0 naturally supports all APIs from previous releases. Because the Android 3.x platform is available only for large-screen devices, if you've been developing primarily for handsets, then you might not be aware of all the APIs added to Android in these recent releases including 3.0, 3.1 and 3.2.
Emulator Skins
The downloadable platform includes the following emulator skins:
- QVGA (240x320, low density, small screen)
- WQVGA400 (240x400, low density, normal screen)
- WQVGA432 (240x432, low density, normal screen)
- HVGA (320x480, medium density, normal screen)
- WVGA800 (480x800, high density, normal screen)
- WVGA854 (480x854 high density, normal screen)
- WXGA720 (1280x720, extra-high density, normal screen)
- WSVGA (1024x600, medium density, large screen)
- WXGA (1280x800, medium density, xlarge screen)
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