Notices by Mishaal Rahman (mishaalrahman@androiddev.social)

Breaking: the Judge in the Epic v Google case has just issued his final ruling, which states that Google must open up its Play Store catalog to 3P app stores and distribute those 3P app stores within Google Play.

The judge also ruled that Google can't require Google Play app billing, stop developers from telling users about other ways to pay, stop developers from linking to alternative distribution methods, and more.

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but Google's Dave Burke confirmed to me in an interview that the company's Ferrochrome project - which enables running Chrome OS in a virtual machine alongside Android - was just a tech demo.

More details here: https://www.androidauthority.com/chrome-os-on-android-proof-of-concept-3443722/

To improve accessibility, Android 15 is adding a new method to enable screen magnification: tapping the screen twice with two fingers.

More details plus a demo can be found in this article I wrote: https://www.androidauthority.com/android-15-screen-magnification-3440805/

Ahhhhhhhh!!! I saw the total solar eclipse!

Here are some photos from my Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra!

IT'S A FLAMING OREO!

@gianni this one runs Wear OS. The first gen ran a custom RTOS, which was one of its biggest issues.

The OnePlus Watch 2 is here, and it’s quickly become my favorite Wear OS smartwatch after only a few days of use! Its battery life has been STELLAR - it lasted me 75 hours during the first cycle! This is thanks to its huge battery (500mAh versus 306mAh in the Pixel Watch 2) and also Google’s new Wear OS hybrid OS interface.

I’ll share my full impressions on tomorrow’s episode of the Android Faithful podcast, but here’s a rundown of the key specs and features:

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@gianni Interesting, you tried it out?

The Tensor G3 is the first smartphone SoC to support hardware-accelerated AV1 encoding. It supports AV1 encoding at up to 4K60. No application (including the Pixel Camera app) takes advantage of this, though, likely due to a lack of platform support.

How to use your Samsung phone as a secondary monitor for your Windows PC

One UI has a feature called Second Screen that lets you mirror/extend your Windows PC's screen onto your Samsung device. However, this feature is officially only available on the Galaxy Tab S7, Tab S8, and Tab S9 series.

Fortunately, the feature is still there on Samsung phones and foldables like the Galaxy Z Fold 5, but you need to access its hidden settings page in order to use it. Here's how.

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Google is overhauling Android's logo and iconic robot mascot! The new visuals "draw inspiration from Material design to complement the Google brand palette, as well as be adaptable." The updated visuals will "appear on Android devices and in more places starting this year."

What do you think of the new logo and robot design?

Rant: Google Play's warning that users can't download certain apps because they're "made for an older version of Android" has issues.

While this is done to ensure that users only install apps that abide by the latest privacy & security features of Android, it has some unintended consequences.

Firefox for Android is getting desktop extensions support 🎉

Developers should prepare to get their extensions ready for Android. "Definite launch date" will be announced in "early September" but it's "safe to expect a roll-out before the year's end."

https://blog.mozilla.org/addons/2023/08/10/prepare-your-firefox-desktop-extension-for-the-upcoming-android-release/

The moderators of /r/Android, Reddit's largest community centered on the Android OS, have decided to extend their blackout until 20:00 EDT on June 20th, 2023. They will "continue to monitor the situation" and are ready to further extend the blackout if necessary and even join other subreddits in an "indefinite blackout".

Here's the full statement:

"r/Android will be extending our blackout, and will be private until June 21st, 2023 UTC / June 20th, 2023 20:00 EDT / June 20th, 2023 17:00 PDT...

Android 14 prepares to let you save an 'app pair' that launches side-by-side in split-screen mode!

In Beta 2, a new launcher flag has been added that, when enabled, surfaces a "save app pair" menu item in the context menu of split-screened apps in the recents overview.

Currently, tapping "save app pair" doesn't work, but when the feature is ready, I'm guessing this will let you add a shortcut to the home screen to launch two apps in split-screen mode.