Google has previewed its new version of Android N with developer APIs and tools. .
Google made the move to release the preview earlier than planned in order to gather developer feedback, so any feedback alongside errors or bug fixes can be minimised after the final release.
Google, in its blog has highlighted certain features of Android N which include multi-window, direct reply notifications, bundled notifications, efficiency, and improved Java 8 language support.
The Multi-window feature enables an Android device to have more than one window running at a time. Users need to activate this feature to launch the split-screen mode on phones or tablets.
Users can also specify the minimum size of the split screen so that the main activity experience will not be affected.
The second feature that Google highlighted is direct reply notifications. This feature is generally found in Android wear, but now it is available for Android N powered phones and tablets.
With this feature, one can reply to messages from the notification area itself without opening the actual application.
Bundled notifications have also been introduced, which will allow Android users to get notifications from multiple contacts in a single application.
But, with the new feature, users can tap and look at each notification individually in the notification space itself.
Google has also improved the Doze feature which was introduced in Marshmallow by prioritising urgent notifications.
It also mentioned that it is working on Project Svelte, which aims to reduce the memory needs of Android and to make background work more efficient.
Android N also supports for Java 8 and, with Android’s Jack compiler, many of Java’s features such as lambdas, default and static methods, streams, and functional interfaces are now available and can be used for as far back as Gingerbread.
The N Developer Preview includes an updated SDK with system images for testing on the official Android emulator and on Nexus 6, Nexus 5X, Nexus 6P, Nexus Player, Nexus 9, and Pixel C devices.
