Chapter 1. Setting Up the Development Environment
Android is the most popular mobile operating system and it has a market share of more than 80 percent. Over 1 million Android devices are shipped each day. Android can run on low-end hardware with 512 MB RAM as well as high-end hardware with 4 GB RAM. It is based on the open source Linux kernel. Due to its open source nature, OEMs prefer Android over other operating systems. The Google Play store now has over a million applications. This makes Android the favorite operating system for users and developers. Some of the unique features that differentiate Android from the others are:
- You can develop Android apps on any platform, whether it is Mac, Linux, or Windows
- Android has top-notch documentation, which makes it the most developer-friendly platform
- Android apps can be easily published in Google Play compared to the lengthy review process in the iOS app store
Development environment setup is the first and most important step in the software development process. Improper setup will lead to build errors.
In this chapter, we will cover the following topics:
- The importance of Android Google Maps
- Integrated Development Environment (IDE) to develop Android applications
- Setting up Android Studio
- Setting up Eclipse with the ADT plugin
- Setting up an Android Virtual Device (AVD) for testing
- Exploring Android Studio
- Additional helpful stuff
