Pro Android 2.pdf

Think. Code. Write. Rinse and repeat ad infinitum. This is the mantra of a technical writer. Technology changes so quickly that by the time an author has finished the last sentence, it is time to rewrite it. As a technical reader, you are probably well aware of this fact, and yet you have taken the time to purchase this book and read it. Not only that, but you are even taking the time to read this foreword. This means you are not just a fly-by-night coder, but somebody who wants to know the technology behind the technology. Well done, and congratulations on making this investment. Let me validate your decision to buy this book. This is the best book on the market for learning about Android. It has so many chapters crammed with Android goodness that you will thank yourself many times over for making the decision to buy it. I am the technical reviewer of this book and, frankly, I wish there had been more for me to edit—the authors did such a good job, I was left with hardly anything to correct. (I did, however, curse them several times for the volume of content they managed to fit in a single book, which increased my workload several times over, right up to the last minute.) But my loss is your gain: this book covers everything you could possibly need to know about Android. Just take a look at the table of contents. Tradition requires that I talk a little about Android itself, the subject of this book. Of course you probably already know something about Android—the operating system from Google that Google hopes will rival iPhone for market domination—which is why you are holding this book in your hands. Android, as a technology, has matured beyond its initial stab in the dark and now, with the recent announcement of NexusOne, the Android-based phone from Google, it is a force to contend with. The year 2010 will be the year of the dogfight between Google and Apple for mobile phone domination. There is room for both technologies to co-exist, but wit