Articles about Developer

It's not all that long since the launch of Android 8.0 Oreo -- not that many people have it on their phones -- but Google has already pushed out a developer preview of Oreo 8.1.

As this is an early beta, there are not a huge number of changes to see in Android Oreo 8.1 developer preview -- but under the hood, there's quite a lot going on. For now, compatibility is limited to the Nexus 5X, Nexus 6P, Pixel C, Pixel, Pixel XL, Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL, but for these handsets new features include a Neural Networks API to improve machine learning, improved autofill, and Android Go optimizations.

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If you've ever wondered what happens to the data Google collects via Chrome, today's announcement gives you something of an idea. The newly unveiled Chrome User Experience Report is a collection of data from users who have opted in to usage statistic reporting, the idea being that developers will be able to see how users experience the websites they visit.

Google launched the new tool at the Chrome Dev Summit 2017 in San Francisco, and at the same time also announced Trusted Web Activity. This is essentially a way to provide app-like behavior in Chrome to create a more cohesive experience.

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Ahead of a public beta launch, Apple has released new developer betas for iOS 11.1 and watch OS 4.1.

iOS 11.1 beta 15B92 and watchOS 4.1 beta 15R846 come just days after the third beta version were released, and only a month after iOS 11 itself was launched. Both are really bug-fixing releases, but iOS does see the return of a feature from an earlier beta.

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Developers who want to sell apps or offer in-app subscriptions on Google Play have to give 30 percent of the revenue up. It's the cost of doing business on Google's popular app store -- and the same goes for the App Store and Microsoft Store as well.

However, in a move that mirrors Apple's policy change last year, Google will soon take a lower cut from developers who retain subscribers for more than a year.

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As well as unveiling a new bug bounty program for select Android apps, Google has also announced a number of changes to its Play Store. The first is the introduction of Instant Apps to Google Play, giving users the chance to try out apps without even having to install them.

The idea is to give people the opportunity to test out apps almost immediately without having to wait for them to download -- ideal for anyone with limited data or a slow connection. Instant Apps are essentially streamed to devices meaning they can be running in seconds.

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Welcome to the exciting world of Progressive Web Apps. You're likely reading this because you've been converted to the PWA cause: a best-of-both-worlds fusion of website reliability and app functionality. Finally, we have a mobile friendly way to combine the speed and directness of websites (no downloads required) with the functionality of apps, like offline browsing, home screen installation and push notifications.

With brands from Twitter to the Washington Post and Lancôme (more on that later) embracing the possibilities of PWAs, the question is no longer "Should you have a PWA?" but "What are the implications for my business?"

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Stack Overflow has introduced a salary calculator to help developers get a better idea of how much money they should earn. The tool takes into account important information such as job location, years of experience and technologies used to reveal what it considers to be typical salaries.

Stack Overflow says that the results are based on the data collected in its yearly developer survey. The salary calculator currently supports five markets -- Canada, France, Germany, US and UK -- and seven major cities -- Toronto, Paris, Berlin, New York, San Francisco, Seattle and London.

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Companies of all sizes have started to recognize the value of big data collections and the need to take advantage of them. Development of software systems play a big role in big data analytics.

As companies proceed on their big data journey, they usually start by batch processing their big data assets. This can mean gathering and aggregating web log data, telemetry from IoT devices, user clicks from an app and more.

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VMware has called for greater links between itself and developers in a major show of support for open source software.

Speaking at the company’s VMworld Europe 2017 event in Barcelona, CTO Ray O’Farrell highlighted the "powerful" world of open source software.

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Today, we are in the world wherein mobile apps have dominated the market. A mobile app development software and mobile apps functions more like a bridge for forward-thinking organizations trying to create smarter devices that could boost each and every aspect of people’s lives. It could be said that mobile apps have created the foundation for the rise of the Internet of Things.

Developing a mobile application is not only a viable option for businesses to keep up with the rapid pace of competition but also provide convenience to people from all walks of life, wherever they may be located in the world. Already, the IoT has changed the face of developing mobile apps. In another decade, we could expect thousands of jobs in this space. However, to achieve the ultimate goal of making everyone’s lives easier, developers should first must go through the pains of creating infrastructure as well as platforms from the ground up.

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When people think of contributing to either a closed or open source project, they often imagine needing the knowledge of coding. Actually, there are many ways to contribute besides programming, such as moderating a community for the project, spreading awareness, or helping to write documentation to name a few.

The documentation aspect of any project is very important, as it can help people to both understand it and track changes. Unfortunately, many developers aren't very interested in documentation aspect, so it often gets neglected. Luckily, if you want to maintain proper documentation and stay organized, today, Google is releasing its internal developer documentation style guide. This can quite literally guide your documentation, giving you a great starting point and keeping things consistent.

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Okta has recently made three major announcements. First, it introduced new developer product toolkit capabilities, allowing developers to add Okta’s identity-driven security solution to their own applications with ease.

This has been announced during Oktane, its user event in Las Vegas. New features include easy and secure authentication, rapid customization and branding, out-of-the-box workflows, as well as securing APIs that are exposed to third-party developers.

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When you install Google Chrome Beta or Dev versions on your Windows computer, it overwrites and replaces the stable version. This keeps things fairly simple and neat, as home users won't have multiple versions of Chrome on their PC. The problem with that, however, is the Beta and Dev versions really aren't intended for home users -- even though some still use them. Those unstable versions are intended for testing, meaning having them run side-by-side, like with the Canary builds, would actually be preferable.

Thankfully, Google has now decided to change the default behavior on Windows so that Google Chrome stable can run side-by-side with both the Beta and Dev variants. This means a web developer, for instance, can easily test their page with all three builds at the same time. When you include Canary, that means you could have, in theory, four variants of Chrome at different development stages running at once. Unfortunately, macOS users are excluded from this side-by-side fun -- for now at least.

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The demand for business apps is escalating. Apps help management teams and employees run their operations more effectively, and better engage existing customers and help attract new ones. But developing quality and high functionality apps is often considered challenging, resource intensive and expensive. Additional challenges include getting apps to work across multiple device types and different operating systems and overcoming back-end integration issues.

Such challenges are slowing the rate of app development. Gartner recently reported that more than a quarter of enterprises globally have not built, customized or virtualized any mobile apps in the last 12 months. Here are some of the top challenges involved in business app development.

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There are many metrics by which to measure how good an app is, and Google is starting to use a few more when it ranks Android apps and games in the Play Store. The latest app-ranking algorithm now takes into account app stability, performance and battery usage.

As well as improving the relevance of listings for people downloading apps, Google is also using this change to push developers to improve their apps.

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