Android P Beta 3 (Developer Preview 4) Released: Here's What's New
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| image Android |
Google has just announced the release of Beta 3 of Android P
and with it come a host of bug fixes and stability tweaks. According to report,
the android P Beta 3 comes a month after Beta 2 and this is said to be the last
major beta update the company I sending out till the stable version of the operating system is due out for the rest
of the world later this year. It’s that fateful time of year when Google and
Apple preview upcoming versions of their operating systems, and we’re all faced
with the choice of tempting fate and installing them on our phones, or
impatiently waiting for the final release.
Google on Monday afternoon dropped the third public beta of
Android P, which is supposed to be a close-to-final version of Android 9.0 that
will be released at some point this summer. If you’re already on Android P,
either on a Pixel device or on a handset from the other OEMs that partnered
with Google for the beta, you can seamlessly upgrade to the new beta. It’s just
like a regular software update.
The major updates with Beta 3 are finalised APIs which allow
developers to start testing and building apps for Android P. It’s not clear
that this beta includes any new features — Burke only lists bug fixes and
optimizations. The bigger deal here is really for developers, since system
behaviors and APIs are supposed to be in a close to final state, so they can
start to test apps and rely on how they’ll work. Android P’s primary new features include a
digital wellbeing suite for monitoring screen time and promoting healthy usage
habits (like Apple has done with iOS 12), App Slices and Actions that use
machine learning to suggest functions pertaining to specific apps, new gestural
navigation controls and adaptive battery intelligence that limits energy
consumption for certain apps, based on when and how often you use them. The
system tools comes with multi camera support, enhanced notifications, display
cut- outs and Image Decoder. And while installing a beta doesn’t violate your
warranty in most cases, it can open you up to a whole host of issues, including
a non-functional device, third-party apps not working as intended and loss of
data. These are risks you assume responsibility for by enrolling in the beta,
regardless of the havoc it could wreak.
| image Google |
With the Beta 3 system images and updated build tools,
you've got everything you need to test your apps or extend them with Android P
features like multi-camera support, display cutout, enhanced notifications,
ImageDecoder, TextClassifier, and many others. In your testing, make sure to
account for App standby buckets, privacy restrictions, and restrictions on
non-SDK interfaces.
It is expected that all the Pixel devices will receive the
next major Android update sometime in October. Meanwhile, you can install the
fresh Android P beta on your device.
Android P beta runs on a number of phones, not just ones
built by Google. Previous Android betas were restricted to Nexus and Pixel
phones, but for P, Google extended support to several third-party devices
including the OnePlus 6, Essential Phone or Sony Xperia XZ2. There are also a
handful of phones not sold in the U.S. that are beta-approved, including the
Xiaomi Mi Mix 2S, Nokia 7 Plus and Oppo R15 Pro. Right now, Beta 3 is only
available on Pixel and Pixel 2 devices. The report goes on to state that the
update is available for developers with access to a pixel phone. Thse who are
already on Beta 2 will get the update automatically.
