Posted Wednesday, June 27, 2012 by Dave Thornton in Android General

Android 4.1 Jelly Bean SDK Available for Download

With Google I/O 2012 now off and running and Android 4.1 Jelly Bean unveiled, Google have already released the SDK pack for Android 4.1 During this morning’s keynote address, it was announced Android 4.1 would be rolling out mid-July while the SDK would be made available to developers from today. The update has gone live now and is available for download to those who can make use of it. Some of the highlights to look forward to:

	Faster, Smoother, More Responsive, Android 4.1 is optimized to deliver Android’s best performance and lowest touch latency, in an effortless, intuitive UI.
Enhanced Accessibility, New APIs for accessibility services let you handle gestures and manage accessibilityfocus as the user moves through the on-screen elements and navigation buttons using accessibility gestures, accessories, and other input. The Talkback system and explore-by-touch are redesigned to use accessibility focus for easier use and offer a complete set of APIs for developers.
	Support For International Users, Android 4.1 helps you to reach more users through support for bidirectional text in TextView and EditText elements. Apps can display text or handle text editing in left-to-right or right-to-left scripts. Apps can make use of new Arabic and Hebrew locales and associated fonts.
Expandable Notifications, Android 4.1 brings a major update to the Android notifications framework. Apps can now display larger, richer notifications to users that can be expanded and collapsed with a pinch. Notifications support new types of content, including photos, have configurable priority, and can even include multiple actions.
	*Resizeable* app widgets, Android 4.1 introduces improved App Widgets that can automatically resize, based on where the user drops them on the home screen, the size to which the user expands them, and the amount of room available on the home screen. New App Widget APIs let you take advantage of this to optimize your app widget content as the size of widgets changes.

If you’re a developer, you’ll want to be digging into this latest release as soon as possible and working on getting your apps updated with the latest Google has to offer.

Download: Android 4.1 SDK

Download the Android SDK Starter Package

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Dave Thornton

Many yrs ago Dave was MSDN trained, a web designer and computer shop owner. Loves walking his dogs, Lab & Welsh border collie. Golden Retriever. Plenty of fields around where he lives in Dundee, Scotland and is 2 miles from the beach.