Google I/O, Until Next Year

Well Google I/O is a wrap everyone, and if you tuned in then hopefully you left with some cool takeaways.  If not then don’t worry, that’s what we’re here for.  When the conference first kicked off we wrote about day 1 and its highlights, but obviously the fun didn’t stop there.  The following is a crash course selection of (in my opinion) the most important and amazing takeaways for and android junky.

Flutter:

If you’re an android developer, then your undoubtedly familiar with Java and segueing in to Kotlin.  You might not have heard about Flutter before though.  It’s Google’s mobile app SDK for easily creating high quality apps on both Android and iOS devices.  Written in Dart (a language developed by Google as well), Flutter works with existing code and is used to develop at ridiculously high speeds.  Here’s a great video from Google I/O that goes more in depth on how to use Flutter to enhance your material design.

Duplex:

Now this one blows my mind, and I know I’m not alone here.  When you think of a sci-fi future it’s reasonable if computers playing our personal secretaries pops into your mind.  This seems to be the present now. 

I’m very interested to see how Duplex functions successfully in real world applications, but the Google 2018 keynote showed a quick performance of the Google Assistant booking a haircut appointment for Google’s CEO, Sundar Pichai.  From an outsider’s view the conversation was impossible to distinguish from an everyday conversation between two people, and when it was done the Google Assistant confirmed to Sundar that the appointment had been booked and added to his calendar.  It’s only a matter of time before this is both client and server side so that duplex will be having conversations with itself to schedule our days, and that’s pretty wild.

Android P Beta:

Yes, I know we discussed android P in the last blog on Google I/O.  But you’ll have to bear with me because it’s happening again! As of this week the Android P beta is available on Pixel devices as well as 7 other flagship devices.  Android P brings all kinds of cool new features to the table.  A lot of these revolve around predicting what you the user are about to do.  There’s an adaptive battery that adjusts your screen’s brightness and what apps are running in an effort to both improve your experience and conserve precious battery power.

My personal favorite feature of P is Wi-Fi RTT.  Round Trip Time takes our current location services capabilities and amplifies them.  Essentially by triangulating between multiple Wi-fi access points nearby, a user’s position can be calculated within about a meter.  Just use your imagination for what applications this could come in handy for!  For more on Android P you can read our past posts or watch some Google I/O talks.

There’s lots more to take away from Google I/O, and honestly I’m cutting myself off here because otherwise I’d end up writing a paragraph or two about every session that I watched from the entire conference.  It’s a great year to be an android developer or even just own an android device.

What interested you the most from the conference?  Let us know in the comments below!