This may be a noob question as i am new to Android development.
So i downloaded ADT and when i started SDK Manager it threw me a long list of Android APIs; i installed the latest API but i got confused as i don't know if i only install API 20 will i get full Android API or specific to that version/release?
For example: I downloaded API for KitKat so i get the full API with all the classes and interfaces? or only the new ones that are introduced in KitKat?
If you download API 20, you will get all the API's that are available to the level 20. It means you will get the new features, AND all the apis that are required to develop for devices running level 20.
It does not mean that you will only get the updates
Some features might be deprecated in a newer version. That means if a particular function has been changed, you will get updated version in the respective level.
It will give you a latest API, but if any feature are been diprecated, they won't be included in them. But for startup purpose its no stuffs to worry about having only one API installed.
refer the below link:-
Android API References
Related
I'm building my first android app and slightly confused when choosing the right API. I've noticed that some functions are available starting from API 21. But then, why in the world would anyone use API 21 or higher if it's only supported by 40.5% of android devices??? Only 4 out of 10 sounds ridiculous to me. Or, is there something I'm missing?
Thanks.
Well it actually depends on you as a developer to know your target audience, and choose the right API target. Nevertheless, all these new features and functionalities that you think are only available for new APIs all have support through the use of Android Support Library. You can still have access to all the newer APIs through support libraries officially provided by android.
Android Support Library
At the end of the day you would want to target as many devices as possible to get a wider audience for your app.
now google research on the android "O". so its very soon new android application development API coming but you are say that you create your first android application so you need to fist familiar with all api so for you batter is you use minimum 16 and maximum 23 or 24 what ever you chose.if you chose latest api's so that u have latest android studio version.
for you all name and api details
I was reading this tutorial http://www.androidhive.info/2015/02/android-location-api-using-google-play-services/ and I find it amazing that this one and many others never state what versions they support.
There must be a simple list which contains what libraries are for what api versions, not just Google Play library but for everything else, from reading file paths to camera api. An example would be just the camera api 2, which is for api version 21 and above. A nice list listing all of this would be very helpful!
It's extremely time consuming tracking down all of this information.
I would say that there is one - in packages documentation you can easily filter by API number.
Official Android APIs have their API number define on official Android documentation like #sebap123 said.
Google Play Services isn't part of Android itself. It's a complimentary add-on. Google Play Services runs on Android 2.3 or higher. All new GPS APIs included in GPS will run on all these devices that have GPS(Android 2.3 or higher). Unlike new Android APIs that only run on new version of Android.
I'm pretty new to Android dev, not so new to Java. Anyhow I'm in the planning stage of my application which will rely heavily on Google map api.
I wanted to jump in to the code today but came across this dilemma. I won't be using any special UI components or anything so new that I would need to set my targeted version to higher than 2.2.
First thing I would like to display a map via Google map api. Anyhow the problem I have is when visiting https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/android/v1/ To learn more about the API and how to use it I found out that it's no longer supported and has been replaced with V2. What bugged me was the statement that they are no longer releasing api keys for Google maps V1. And the V2 requires minimal Android API to be 17 which puts my app targeted at phones running Android 4.3+ which does not really cover that much devices.
Does this mean my application is a no-go and I have to deal with it being targeted for Android 4.3+ or can I still use V1 and target my app for Android 2.2+
Thanks in advance
The minSdkVersion of apps using the Google Maps V2 API for Android is not 17, but 8.
What you mean is probably the targetSdkVersion which should always be the highest available.
So you're good to go there.
I need to use the Google Map API for my android application, but as we are now aware that API versoin 1 is deprecated, I can not use MAP API v2.0 for the lower versions of Android.
So can you please give me any suggestions what alternative can be used to show google map to the lower versions of Android?
Thanks,
Shubhangi.
The Maps API are bundled with Google Play services and are compatible with Android 2.2 and higher. All devices with Android 8 API level support OpenGL 2.0, so devices with Android 2.1 version can't support Google Maps v2. You can check in the Documentation
Note: Note, though, that not all Android 2.2/2.3 devices have the ability to get the Play Services Framework, particularly those devices that never received the Play Store and are stuck with the old Android Market. Android 3.0+ should be fine
I am new to android. In my application I tried to call a SOAP web service, but when I run the project it says: Required API is 9,but Device API is 8.
What can I do for that.
This means that a method or class you have used in your code wasn't added to Android until API revision 9 (Gingerbread, see this list).
If you want your app to run on a lower API version, you'll have to either remove that call, or use reflection (described here if you need it) to check for it's availability. Either way you'll have to find another way to do what you're wanting on lower API versions.