Google previews next version of Android, codenamed “L release”

Move over KitKat, a new version of Android is coming.

Read the whole story

 

[GodsMadClown]

I'm trying to think of candies that start with L.

Lolipop
Licorice
Laffy Taffy
Lemon Heads
Lifesavers

Any more?

 

[immunizer]

Just what we need: 5,000 new APIs.

 

[FreshAir]

Lemon Drop FTW!

 

[jdale]

GodsMadClown[/url]":4pzevnop]I'm trying to think of candies that start with L.

Lolipop
Licorice
Laffy Taffy
Lemon Heads
Lifesavers

Any more?

I assume it's "L" as in "we haven't found a sponsor for this version yet, but after making money on what we called K we are certainly going to keep trying."

 

[JGoat]

GodsMadClown[/url]":11ngeaav]I'm trying to think of candies that start with L.

Lolipop
Licorice
Laffy Taffy
Lemon Heads
Lifesavers

Any more?

Ladoo and Lassi have been suggested, they're both Indian treats. Though Lassi is a yogurt drink with herbs and sometimes fruit? Not sure that fits in the dessert lineup.

 

[kranchammer]

JGoat[/url]":3je852xu]

GodsMadClown[/url]":3je852xu]I'm trying to think of candies that start with L.

Lolipop
Licorice
Laffy Taffy
Lemon Heads
Lifesavers

Any more?

Ladoo and Lassi have been suggested, they're both Indian treats. Though Lassi is a yogurt drink with herbs and sometimes fruit? Not sure that fits in the dessert lineup.

Yogurt drinks are a sign of all that is evil and wrong in the world. Pure liquid evil. Like that black stuff that drips down peoples faces in The Fifth Element.

Edit: Sigh, Go-gurt fanbois, don't downvote me because of your wrongheaded obsession with semi-chunky pink goo.


I vote for "Lime Jello" or "Limoncello" for the codename.

 

[redleader]

Dalvik used JIT, or just-in-time compilation, meaning that an app was compiled every time it was run. ART switches to Ahead of Time (AOT) compilation, meaning the app is compiled once. Traditionally, JIT takes longer to start up but can be more aggressively optimized because it has information about the device it is running on. AOT will start up faster, but usually has less information about the hardware it is running on.

FWIW, in Dalvik JIT always happens after the program is running. It doesn't JIT all the code, just "hotspots". So it won't take longer to start up, it''ll just be slow and shitty.

 

[Mitlov]

jdale[/url]"mkkg67q]

GodsMadClown[/url]"mkkg67q]I'm trying to think of candies that start with L.

Lolipop
Licorice
Laffy Taffy
Lemon Heads
Lifesavers

Any more?

I assume it's "L" as in "we haven't found a sponsor for this version yet, but after making money on what we called K we are certainly going to keep trying."

They didn't actually make money on the KitKat deal. It was a cross-promotional deal where no money changed hands either way.

 

[dfjdejulio]

"Lay's Chips"?
"Lolly Gobble Bliss Bombs"?
"Life Savers"?

 

[DrinkDuffResponsibly2]

kranchammer[/url]":3gluspix]
Yogurt drinks are a sign of all that is evil and wrong in the world. Pure liquid evil. Like that black stuff that drips down peoples faces in The Fifth Element.

Edit: Sigh, Go-gurt fanbois, don't downvote me because of your wrongheaded obsession with semi-chunky pink goo.


I vote for "Lime Jello" or "Limoncello" for the codename.

Well it's the marketing of those drinks that's evil (because it's a complete lie), and the extremely wasteful way it's packaged.

Probiotics! For when you've wiped out your gut flora with antibiotics!

 

[Epitope]

The navigation icons are possibly the ugliest and non-intuitive icons I have ever seen. A circle now means home? A square represents multitasking?

 

[Old_Fogie_Late_Bloomer]

jdale[/url]":36ao3zty]

GodsMadClown[/url]":36ao3zty]I'm trying to think of candies that start with L.

Lolipop
Licorice
Laffy Taffy
Lemon Heads
Lifesavers

Any more?

I assume it's "L" as in "we haven't found a sponsor for this version yet, but after making money on what we called K we are certainly going to keep trying."

Well, no money changed hands with the KitKat licensing (according to Google, at least). That must have been interesting, since KitKat is owned by Hershey in the US and by Nestlé worldwide. If you look at Hershey's products, there's not a lot of good candidates for "L"...actually, the only one I see is "Lancaster Soft Crèmes", which seems fairly esoteric.

If you look at Nestlé, there's a few possible choices: Lion (Bar) (hmm...?), La Laitière (meh), Lean Cuisine (probably not lol), and (Gerber) Life Insurance Company (seems unlikely, but it certainly would make for some...unique...cross-promotional opportunities).

 

[Deleted member 330960]

It is incredible that for 6 years, despite project butter etc., Android has left all this performance on the table.

 

[academic.sam]

ART switches to Ahead of Time (AOT) compilation, meaning the app is compiled once.

Cool.
... Goes on to do some AOT with gcc

 

[excessivelime]

From the few bits we've seen I think it looks great... aside from the terrible navigation icons. Seriously, what was the need to change those? The triangle for the back button I can kind of understand, but the circle and the square just look wrong there.

 

[academic.sam]

I would really wish for some CLR (a la Microsoft) type approach which would support multiple languages. Just hate programming with Java and it is sapping my motivation to write some apps that are useful for me.

 

[S_T_R]

"The only downside is longer install times, and maybe a few incompatible apps from developers who didn't take advantage of the KitKat preview"

Looks at Citrix Receiver. Wishes it wasn't needed for work.

 

[DrinkDuffResponsibly2]

Epitope[/url]":1esrh4ty]The navigation icons are possibly the ugliest and non-intuitive icons I have ever seen. A circle now means home? A square represents multitasking?

1999 called. It wants its mystery meat navigation back.

 

[lewax00]

AOT compilation...also know as just compilation. Welcome to the Gentoo model?

 

[Deleted member 330960]

academic.sam[/url]":3e027w93]

ART switches to Ahead of Time (AOT) compilation, meaning the app is compiled once.

Cool.
... Goes on to do some AOT with gcc

Haha this is awesome, and I +1'd it but there is a difference between native and AOT that the wiki page details and I hadn't really thought about myself.

AOT in most cases produces machine optimized code, just like a 'standard' native compiler. The difference is that AOT transforms the bytecode of an existing virtual machine into machine code.

http://http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AOT_compiler

 

[Zarsus]

tayhimself[/url]":e6xs4dj3]It is incredible that for 6 years, despite project butter etc., Android has left all this performance on the table.

There are always more performance to be had in the tech world.

 

[Mitlov]

excessivelime[/url]":20tv08md]From the few bits we've seen I think it looks great... aside from the terrible navigation icons. Seriously, what was the need to change those? The triangle for the back button I can kind of understand, but the circle and the square just look wrong there.

Reminds me of...

Spoiler

In case image stops working, it's a Playstation controller

 

[lewax00]

Mitlov[/url]":3b15q3hv]

excessivelime[/url]":3b15q3hv]From the few bits we've seen I think it looks great... aside from the terrible navigation icons. Seriously, what was the need to change those? The triangle for the back button I can kind of understand, but the circle and the square just look wrong there.

Reminds me of...

Spoiler

I have never been able to get the hang of PlayStation controllers...and I've been a gamer my whole life (with only minimal exposure to PlayStations to be fair).

 

[excessivelime]

Mitlov[/url]":3ckmk57b]

Reminds me of...

Spoiler

Quick, somebody call the lawyers!

 

[Mitlov]

lewax00[/url]":3tfghu73]

Mitlov[/url]":3tfghu73]

excessivelime[/url]":3tfghu73]From the few bits we've seen I think it looks great... aside from the terrible navigation icons. Seriously, what was the need to change those? The triangle for the back button I can kind of understand, but the circle and the square just look wrong there.

Reminds me of...

Spoiler

I have never been able to get the hang of PlayStation controllers...and I've been a gamer my whole life (with only minimal exposure to PlayStations to be fair).

The characters on a Playstation controller make more sense when you think of them as numbers instead of abstract shapes. A circle has one side, an X has two, a triangle has three, and a square has four.

 

[lewax00]

tayhimself[/url]":iahky9mu]

academic.sam[/url]":iahky9mu]

ART switches to Ahead of Time (AOT) compilation, meaning the app is compiled once.

Cool.
... Goes on to do some AOT with gcc

Haha this is awesome, and I +1'd it but there is a difference between native and AOT that the wiki page details and I hadn't really thought about myself.

AOT in most cases produces machine optimized code, just like a 'standard' native compiler. The difference is that AOT transforms the bytecode of an existing virtual machine into machine code.

http://http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AOT_compiler

From my understanding, LLVM basically works this way too: generate VM code, then generate native code from that. So you just distribute the intermediate step instead of source code, and compile that per-user.

 

[mstark90]

academic.sam[/url]":2pmnsejt]I would really wish for some CLR (a la Microsoft) type approach which would support multiple languages. Just hate programming with Java and it is sapping my motivation to write some apps that are useful for me.

Look up Xamarin. Yeah, it's expensive, but it is what you are looking for.

Now if Android had this natively. However, Java doesn't sap my motivation though.

 

[qazwart]

Is ART open source? If I understand this correctly, this will replace the open source Dalvik interpreter. If ART isn't open source, it could be a way for Google to take control of Android away from various other parties who have forked the code (cough! ...Amazon... cough!).

 

[redleader]

qazwart[/url]":21a6sn81]Is ART open source?

Yes, you can download the source right now:

https://android-review.googlesource.com ... atform/art

 

[NickN]

ART, the Android RunTime, offering "twice the performance improvement" to all apps

Maybe I'm being pedantic, but I don't know what this means. Twice what performance improvement?

 

[Just_Some_Nobody]

academic.sam[/url]":30xqb0mz]I would really wish for some CLR (a la Microsoft) type approach which would support multiple languages. Just hate programming with Java and it is sapping my motivation to write some apps that are useful for me.

I would love to use Go.

I don't mind Java, but because it's rather verbose, it gets tiring during long sessions. Not only that, when one searches for anything Java (and forgets to filter by Android), one is reminded of just how much useless bloat is in enterprise software.

 

[sk3l]

lewax00[/url]":u42jg78c]AOT compilation...also know as just compilation. Welcome to the Gentoo model?

Yes, but Gentoo's major benefit is that it also offers the "aggressive hardware optimization" option that was touted as part of JIT, so it's a slightly different paradigm.

 

[gdinero]

It seems odd that they didn't decide on a code name before I/O. Not that it affects anything, just a head-scratcher.

 

[redleader]

lewax00[/url]":1s63tl93]

tayhimself[/url]":1s63tl93]

academic.sam[/url]":1s63tl93]

ART switches to Ahead of Time (AOT) compilation, meaning the app is compiled once.

Cool.
... Goes on to do some AOT with gcc

Haha this is awesome, and I +1'd it but there is a difference between native and AOT that the wiki page details and I hadn't really thought about myself.

AOT in most cases produces machine optimized code, just like a 'standard' native compiler. The difference is that AOT transforms the bytecode of an existing virtual machine into machine code.

http://http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AOT_compiler

From my understanding, LLVM basically works this way too: generate VM code, then generate native code from that. So you just distribute the intermediate step instead of source code, and compile that per-user.

FWIW, ART actually uses llvm.

 

[CrookedKnight]

So how many apps that are no longer being updated will be broken by the switch to ART? Looking at what's on my phone a decent amount of software that I still use weekly is dated 2013 or even 2012 in the Play store.

 

[Deleted member 192806]

excessivelime[/url]":yw5f66i9]From the few bits we've seen I think it looks great... aside from the terrible navigation icons. Seriously, what was the need to change those? The triangle for the back button I can kind of understand, but the circle and the square just look wrong there.

Makes one think of the buttons on a game controller.

 

[심돌산]

DrinkDuffResponsibly2[/url]":1uti2n5h]

kranchammer[/url]":1uti2n5h]
Yogurt drinks are a sign of all that is evil and wrong in the world. Pure liquid evil. Like that black stuff that drips down peoples faces in The Fifth Element.

Edit: Sigh, Go-gurt fanbois, don't downvote me because of your wrongheaded obsession with semi-chunky pink goo.


I vote for "Lime Jello" or "Limoncello" for the codename.

Well it's the marketing of those drinks that's evil (because it's a complete lie), and the extremely wasteful way it's packaged.

Probiotics! For when you've wiped out your gut flora with antibiotics!

Probiotics are nothing compared to a good, old-fashioned, fecal transplant.

(which, by the way, would be an awesome Android version name. Too bad 'F' is already gone.)

 

[lloeki]

academic.sam[/url]":5tmttv9j]I would really wish for some CLR (a la Microsoft) type approach which would support multiple languages. Just hate programming with Java and it is sapping my motivation to write some apps that are useful for me.

Fundamentally there's no difference, really. Java becomes byte code which then get exec/JIT'd/AOT'd. Replace Java with any other language (e.g JRuby, Scala, Clojure) and it works.

 

[심돌산]

tayhimself[/url]":27vpfbpi]

academic.sam[/url]":27vpfbpi]

ART switches to Ahead of Time (AOT) compilation, meaning the app is compiled once.

Cool.
... Goes on to do some AOT with gcc

Haha this is awesome, and I +1'd it but there is a difference between native and AOT that the wiki page details and I hadn't really thought about myself.

AOT in most cases produces machine optimized code, just like a 'standard' native compiler. The difference is that AOT transforms the bytecode of an existing virtual machine into machine code.

http://http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AOT_compiler

Source code of any programming language whatsoever is the "bytecode of an existing virtual machine", even if a virtual machine has not yet been written for a given source language.

Such virtual machines, however, have been written for many different source languages, including C.