An open source ,Google’s backing, the app ecosystem are some of the important factors which have made the Android OS by Google to reach its current dominant position in the mobile OS market. Recently, Google come with new features in android lollipop with considerable changes with design after Android 4.4 KitKat version. Android 5.0 Lollipop has an aesthetic design that’s similar to iOS 8,but unique.
Best new features in android lollipop
1.Material Design
Google has used its new design philosophy i.e Material Design for the Android 5.0 Lollipop. It provides a much needed attention to detail in the entire user interface.Material Design is all about animating pretty much everything which happens on the display, so that nothing randomly appears out of nowhere, everything is animated.Android platform use custom skins to make alter looks and feel of Android.Objects on the screen are presented to the user without breaking the continuity of the user experience.
It adds a casual look and feel which is more dynamic, responds to touch better, animations are improved and also, the color palette is better with rich and bright colors.
2.Notifications
Lollipop sticks to the basics, though notifications are added to lock screen as cards, and “heads up” notifications can also be displayed as large banners across the top of the screen, along with their respective action buttons. This has made it more handy, as we don’t have to unlock our phone when the notifications are not really important. We can also restrict or totally disable this feature for added security, so that strangers cannot see your notifications.
Apart from these functional changes, the notification panel now has a layered design, with a fully transparent background, and tiles layered on top.
3.Project Volta
Project Volta is primarily concerned about improving your device’s battery usage. The two major parts under Project Volta is a Battery Saver mode, and a Battery Historian.Battery Saver mode which reduces CPU usage by reducing backlight brightness, vibration, etc. Google claims that if turned on at 15% battery life, it could potentially increase usage time by as much as 90 minutes.
4.Android Runtime
Android 5.0 Lollipo uses Android Runtime,or ART in short as new app runtime.Before this Android’s old Dalvik Runtime was a Just in Time or JIT Compiler design.In the old runtime activities were compiled when the user or the system requests for it. This led to a significant time spent in compiling activities every time, which meant more CPU usage and battery usage.
The new Android Runtime is an Ahead of Time or AOT Compiler design, in which apps and activities are compiled either during the install process or during the first launch.As a result it leads to a smoother, faster, efficient user experience and also a significant boost to the battery life.
5.Security
Lollipop has a new feature called Smart Lock which offers a different way to unlock your phone.It helps in unlocking our phones when we aren’t even near it as it works with any compatible Bluetooth device.There are some other features are also included related to security such as Kill Switch in which Google has made sure that a locked device cannot even be factory reset in software or through recovery or even flashed via fastboot .
Also,Google added Trusted Devices and Trusted Faces feature in Android. This allows users to add face recognition based unlock for specific users, and device recognition.There is also support for App Pinning, which allows users to lock the phone to a certain app.
Conclusion
The largest change in Android 5.0 is to the overall design philosophy of the Operating System, and accompanying that is several under the hood changes for better performance, stability and battery life.It has made the Design more cohesive.
