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Why not? What if the apps are purchased seamlessly through the play store and can run on Android or in Chrome? I have a feeling they will add more and more An

Why not? What if the apps are purchased seamlessly through the play store and can run on Android or in Chrome? I have a feeling they will add more and more Android device APIs to whatever is coming, until it has just as many as the Java APIs. I've thought for the past year or so that there is no way the future of Android app development is Java/Dalvik.

RivieraKid 13y ago
That's possible today - there are apps, that are basically web apps. But they usually offer inferior user experience. It's cheaper, but for the price of being worse than a native app. It's possible they will add support for other languages besides Java. Android is stuck with Java 6, which sucks...
- alexbell 13y ago
  That language will be web, I suspect. Perhaps Google will offer prerolled components specifically for Android? I strongly suspect that Chrome is the platform Google wants to push for client development now, with Android essentially as a shell for it. While web may arguably be "worse" on Android now, Google has a very large, talented engineering team who could change that relatively fast. Java is a dead end at this point for them I think as far as pushing client development forward. My personal preference would be Android development via Go lang, but I don't think there's much of a chance of that. I am not a web developer BTW, I am primarily an iOS dev who has done ~6 months of Android work.
  - RivieraKid 13y ago
    Web is a platform, so they would need to rewrite half of Android, I don't think it would be worth it, I don't see real benefits of that for users or devs... I think that Java 8 is a great language, I like it a lot more than Javascript. Go would be great too.
    - eropple 13y ago
      In all seriousness, I just want a C API. I like different languages for different purposes, but C is still the lingua franca. You can have your Go, I can have my C++, the next guy can have his Python. As-is, native code on Android is a cluster, and even for games it's pretty uncomfortable and filled with Java shims. Kinda gross.
    - moystard 13y ago
      Why would you have Go on a mobile OS as a mobile application development framework?
      - weland 13y ago
        One guy calls the web a language, now someone calls Go a mobile application development framework. Come on, guys, we're programmers, let's call things by their right names. Go is a programming language, and technicalities like goroutines aside, you'd want it pretty much for the same reason why you'd want Java, Objective-C, JavaScript or, Heaven deliver us from the Symbian days, C++: some people think it's a nice language. Frankly, I'd trade Java for Go any day.
        moystard 13y ago
        My bad, meant programming language.
      - RivieraKid 13y ago
        I probably wouldn't switch from Java but lots of people want to use Go to make Android apps.
        sheldor 13y ago
        I'd trade Java for Go in a heartbeat
      - georgemcbay 13y ago
        I think of Go as being a language and runtime as opposed to a "development framework", but why wouldn't you have it as a mobile OS language, particularly when compared to Java? I'd love to see Go on Android. I doubt it will happen anytime soon though because it would require an entirely new runtime library environment to really be Go-like, just bridging Go to the existing Android Java APIs via Java<->JNI<->CGO<->Go would result in something very horrible.
  - crassus 13y ago
    Word on the street has it that Android and Chrome are two highly separate fiefdoms within Google which are somewhat antagonistic (fighting over company priority). There is unlikely to be a high level of cooperation between the two teams without significant internal restructuring. As far as I remember, chrome isn't even Android's default browser.
    - SEMW 13y ago
      > There is unlikely to be a high level of cooperation... without significant internal restructuring Internal restructuring like, say, Andy Rubin beyond deposed as head of Android and replaced by the guy in charge of Chrome (Sundar Pichai), who now oversees both Chrome and Android? Because that happened in March. (Chrome is the default browser in nexus devices. Whether it's the default in non-nexus devices is up to the manufacturer & carrier, who usually choose to use the AOSP browser - an unbranded front end of the system webkit - because they can control and customise it, which they obviously can't with chrome as a branded google app that's updated through the play store).

RivieraKid 13y ago

That's possible today - there are apps, that are basically web apps. But they usually offer inferior user experience. It's cheaper, but for the price of being worse than a native app. It's possible they will add support for other languages besides Java. Android is stuck with Java 6, which sucks...

alexbell 13y ago
That language will be web, I suspect. Perhaps Google will offer prerolled components specifically for Android? I strongly suspect that Chrome is the platform Google wants to push for client development now, with Android essentially as a shell for it. While web may arguably be "worse" on Android now, Google has a very large, talented engineering team who could change that relatively fast. Java is a dead end at this point for them I think as far as pushing client development forward. My personal preference would be Android development via Go lang, but I don't think there's much of a chance of that. I am not a web developer BTW, I am primarily an iOS dev who has done ~6 months of Android work.
- RivieraKid 13y ago
  Web is a platform, so they would need to rewrite half of Android, I don't think it would be worth it, I don't see real benefits of that for users or devs... I think that Java 8 is a great language, I like it a lot more than Javascript. Go would be great too.
  - eropple 13y ago
    In all seriousness, I just want a C API. I like different languages for different purposes, but C is still the lingua franca. You can have your Go, I can have my C++, the next guy can have his Python. As-is, native code on Android is a cluster, and even for games it's pretty uncomfortable and filled with Java shims. Kinda gross.
  - moystard 13y ago
    Why would you have Go on a mobile OS as a mobile application development framework?
    - weland 13y ago
      One guy calls the web a language, now someone calls Go a mobile application development framework. Come on, guys, we're programmers, let's call things by their right names. Go is a programming language, and technicalities like goroutines aside, you'd want it pretty much for the same reason why you'd want Java, Objective-C, JavaScript or, Heaven deliver us from the Symbian days, C++: some people think it's a nice language. Frankly, I'd trade Java for Go any day.
      - moystard 13y ago
        My bad, meant programming language.
    - RivieraKid 13y ago
      I probably wouldn't switch from Java but lots of people want to use Go to make Android apps.
      - sheldor 13y ago
        I'd trade Java for Go in a heartbeat
    - georgemcbay 13y ago
      I think of Go as being a language and runtime as opposed to a "development framework", but why wouldn't you have it as a mobile OS language, particularly when compared to Java? I'd love to see Go on Android. I doubt it will happen anytime soon though because it would require an entirely new runtime library environment to really be Go-like, just bridging Go to the existing Android Java APIs via Java<->JNI<->CGO<->Go would result in something very horrible.
- crassus 13y ago
  Word on the street has it that Android and Chrome are two highly separate fiefdoms within Google which are somewhat antagonistic (fighting over company priority). There is unlikely to be a high level of cooperation between the two teams without significant internal restructuring. As far as I remember, chrome isn't even Android's default browser.
  - SEMW 13y ago
    > There is unlikely to be a high level of cooperation... without significant internal restructuring Internal restructuring like, say, Andy Rubin beyond deposed as head of Android and replaced by the guy in charge of Chrome (Sundar Pichai), who now oversees both Chrome and Android? Because that happened in March. (Chrome is the default browser in nexus devices. Whether it's the default in non-nexus devices is up to the manufacturer & carrier, who usually choose to use the AOSP browser - an unbranded front end of the system webkit - because they can control and customise it, which they obviously can't with chrome as a branded google app that's updated through the play store).