Things to notice in new Android P Preview - for Users

Things to notice in new Android P Preview - for Users

Here's a look at some of the cool features in this first preview of Android P that we want you to try and give feedback on.

Indoor positioning with Wi-Fi RTT

Accurate indoor positioning has been a long-standing challenge that opens new opportunities for location-based services. Android P adds platform support for the IEEE 802.11mc WiFi protocol -- also known as WiFi Round-Trip-Time (RTT) -- to let you take advantage of indoor positioning in your apps.

On Android P devices with hardware support, location permission, and location enabled, your apps can use RTT APIs to measure the distance to nearby WiFi Access Points (APs). The device doesn't need to connect to the APs to use RTT, and to maintain privacy, only the phone is able to determine the distance, not the APs.

Knowing the distance to 3 or more APs, you can calculate the device position with an accuracy of 1 to 2 meters. With this accuracy, you can build new experiences like in-building navigation; fine-grained location-based services such as disambiguated voice control (e.g.,'Turn on this light'); and location-based information (e.g., 'Are there special offers for this product?').

Display cutout support

Now apps can take full advantage of the latest device screens with fullscreen content. We've added display cutout into the platform, along with APIs that you can use to manage how your content is displayed.

Cutout support works seamlessly for apps, with the system managing status bar height to separate your content from the cutout. If you have critical, immersive content, you can also use new APIs to check the cutout shape and request full-screen layout around it. You can check whether the current device has a cutout by calling getDisplayCutout(), and then determine the location and shape of the cutout area using DisplayCutout. A new window layout attribute, layoutInDisplayCutoutMode, lets you tell the system how and when lay out your content relative to the cutout area. Details are here.

To make it easier to build and test cutout support in your app, we've added a Developer Option that simulates a cutout on any device. We recommend testing your existing apps with display cutout enabled to ensure that your content displays properly.

Apps with immersive content can display content fullscreen on devices with a display cutout.

Improved messaging notifications

In Android P we've put a priority on improving visibility and function in notifications. Try the new MessagingStyle notification style -- it highlights who is messaging and how you can reply. You can show conversations, attach photos and stickers, and even suggest smart replies. See the details here.

In MessagingStyle notifications you can now show conversations and smart replies [left] and even attach images and stickers [right].

Content Source :  https://android-developers.googleblog.com