Tag Archives: Android Things

Android Things Developer Preview 4.1

Posted by Wayne Piekarski, Developer Advocate for IoT

Today, we're releasing a new Developer Preview 4.1 (DP4.1) of Android Things, with updates for new supported hardware and bug fixes to the platform. Android Things is Google's platform to enable Android Developers to create Internet of Things (IoT) devices, and seamlessly scale from prototype to production.

New hardware

A new Pico i.MX6UL revision B board has been released, which supports many common external peripherals from partners such as Adafruit and Pimoroni. There were some prototype Pico i.MX6UL boards made available to some early beta testers, and these are not compatible with DP4.1.

Improvements

DP4.1 also includes some performance improvements since DP4, such as boot time optimizations that improve the startup time of i.MX7D based hardware. This Developer Preview also includes a version of Google Play Services, specifically optimized for IoT devices. This new IoT variant is a lot smaller and optimized for use with Android Things, and requires the use of play-services 11.0.0 or later in your build.gradle. For more information about the supported features in the IoT variant of Google Play Services, see the information page.

Google I/O

Android Things had a large presence at Google I/O this year, with 6 talks covering different aspects of Android Things for developers, and these are available as videos in a playlist for those who could not attend:

What’s New In Google’s IoT Platform? Ubiquitous Computing at Google
Bringing Device Production to Everyone With Android Things
From Prototype to Production Devices with Android Things
Developing for Android Things Using Android Studio
Using Google Cloud and TensorFlow on Android Things
Building for Enterprise IoT Using Android Things and Google Cloud Platform

Google I/O also had a codelab area, where attendees could sit down and test out Android Things development with some simple guided training guides. These codelabs are available for anyone to try at https://codelabs.developers.google.com/?cat=IoT

Feedback

Thank you to all the developers who submitted feedback for the previous developer previews. Please continue sending us your feedback by filing bug reports and feature requests, and asking any questions on stackoverflow. To download images for DP4.1, visit the Android Things download page and find the changes in the release notes. You can also join Google's IoT Developers Community on Google+, a great resource to get updates and discuss ideas, with over 5,600 members.

Welcome to your New Home on Android TV

Posted by Paul Saxman, Android Devices and Media Developer Relations Lead

Android TV brings rich app experiences and entertainment to the biggest screen in your house, and with Android O, we’re making it even easier for users to access content from their favorite apps. We’ve built a new, content-centric home screen experience for Android TV, and we're bringing the Google Assistant to the platform as well. These features put content that users want to access a few clicks, or spoken words, away.

The New Android TV Home Screen

The new Android TV home screen organizes video content into channels and programs in a way that’s familiar to TV viewers. Each Android TV app can publish multiple channels, which are represented as rows of programs on the home screen. Apps add relevant programs on each channel, and update these programs and channels as users access content or when new content is available. To help engage users, programs can include a video preview, which is automatically played when a user focuses on a program. Users can configure which channels they wish to see on the home screen, and the ordering of channels, so the themes and shows they’re interested in are quick and easy to access.

In addition to channels for you app, the top of the new Android TV home screen includes a quick launch bar for users' favorite apps, and a special Watch Next channel. This channel contains programs based on the viewing habits of the user.

The APIs for creating and maintaining channels and programs are part of the TvProvider APIs, which are distributed as an Android Support Library module with Android O. To get started using these APIs, visit the Android O Developer Preview site for an overview, and try out the Android TV Channels and Programs codelab for a first-hand experience building an Android TV app for Android O.

Later this year, Nexus Players will receive the new Android TV home experience as an OTA update. If you wish build and test apps for the new interface today, however, you can use the Android TV emulator or Nexus Player device images that are part of the latest Android O Developer Preview.

The Google Assistant on Android TV

The Google Assistant on Android TV, coming later this year, will allow users to quickly find and access content using their voice. Because the Assistant is context-aware, it can help users narrow down what content to play. Users will also be able access the Assistant to control playback, even while a video or music is playing. And since the Assistant can control compatible smart home devices, a simple voice request can dim the lights to create an ideal movie viewing environment. When the Google Assistant comes to Android TV, it will launch in the US on Android devices running M, N, and O.

We're looking forward to seeing how developers take advantage of the new Android TV home screen. We welcome feedback, so please visit the Android TV Developer Community on G+ to share you thoughts and ideas!

Android Things Developer Preview 4

Posted by Wayne Piekarski, Developer Advocate for IoT

Today, we are releasing the next Developer Preview 4 (DP4) of Android Things, bringing new supported hardware, features, and bug fixes to the platform. The goal of Android Things is to enable Android Developers to quickly build smart devices, and seamlessly scale from prototype to production using a Board Support Package (BSP) provided by Google.
AIY Projects and Google Assistant SDK
Earlier this month, we announced a partnership with AIY Projects, enabling Android Things support for the Raspberry Pi-based Voice Kit. And now with DP4, the necessary drivers are provided to support the Google Assistant SDK on all Android Things certified development boards. Learn more from the instructions in the sample.
New hardware and driver support
We are now adding a new Board Support Package for the NXP i.MX7D, which supports higher performance than the i.MX6UL while still using a low power System on Module (SoM) design. Support for Inter-IC Sound Bus (I2S) has been added to the Peripheral I/O API, now enabling audio drivers to be written in user space for sound hardware connected via an I2S bus. The AIY Voice Kit sample demonstrates how to use I2S support for audio. We have also provided the ability for developers to enable/disable Bluetooth profiles at run time.
NXP i.MX7D System on Module
Production hardware sample
Android Things is very focused on helping developers build production-ready devices that they can bring to market. This means building custom hardware, in addition to the software running on the Android Things system-on-module (SoM). As a part of this effort, we have released Edison Candle, the first in a series of production samples showcasing hardware and software designed to work together. The code is hosted on GitHub and the hardware design files are on CircuitHub, and can be easily fabricated by many 3rd party companies.
Edison Candle sample with source and schematics
Thank you to all the developers who submitted feedback for the previous developer previews. Please continue sending us your feedback by filing bug reports and feature requests, and asking any questions on stackoverflow. To download images for DP4, visit the Android Things download page and find the changes in the release notes. You can also join Google's IoT Developers Community on Google+, a great resource to get updates and discuss ideas, with over 4,900 members. We also have a number of great talks about Android Things and IoT at Google I/O, which you can view via live stream or as a recording later.




Running Android Things on the AIY Voice Kit

Posted by Ryan Bae, Android Things

A major benefit of using Android Things is the ability to prototype connected devices and quickly scale to full commercial products. To further that goal, the Android Things team is partnering with AIY Projects, a new initiative to bring do-it-yourself artificial intelligence to makers. Today, the AIY Projects team launched their first open source reference project: a Raspberry Pi-based Voice Kit with instructions to build a Voice User Interface (VUI) that can use cloud services (like the new Google Assistant SDK or Cloud Speech API) or run completely on-device with TensorFlow. We are releasing a special Android Things Developer Preview 3.1 build for Raspberry Pi 3 to support the Voice Kit. Developers can run Android Things on the Voice Kit with full functionality, including integration with the Google Assistant SDK. To get started, visit the AIY website, download the latest Android Things Developer Preview, and follow the instructions.

The Voice Kit ships out to all MagPi Magazine subscribers on May 4, 2017, and the parts list, assembly instructions, source code, as well as suggested extensions are available on AIY Projects website. The complete kit is also for sale at over 500 Barnes & Noble stores nationwide, as well as UK retailers WH Smith, Tesco, Sainsburys, and Asda.

We are excited to see what you build with the Voice Kit on Android Things. We also encourage you to join Google's IoT Developers Community and Google Assistant SDK Developers on Google+, a great resource to keep up to date and discuss ideas with other developers.

AIY Projects: Do-it-yourself AI for Makers

Posted by Billy Rutledge, Director of AIY Projects
Our teams are continually inspired by how Makers use Google technology to do crazy, cool new things. Things we would've never imagined doing ourselves, things that solve real world problems. After talking to Maker community members, we learned that many were interested in using artificial intelligence in projects, but didn't know where to begin. To address this gap, we're launching AIY Projects: do-it-yourself artificial intelligence for Makers.
With AIY Projects, Makers can use artificial intelligence to make human-to-machine interaction more like human-to-human interactions. We'll be releasing a series of reference kits, starting with voice recognition. The speech recognition capability in our first project could be used to:
  • Replace physical buttons and digital displays (those are so 90's) on household appliances and consumer electronics (imagine a coffee machine with no buttons or screen -- just talk to it)
  • Replace smartphone apps to control devices (those are so 2000's) on connected devices (imagine a connected light bulb or thermostat -- just talk to them)
  • Add voice recognition to assistive robotics (e.g. for accessibility) -- just talk to the robot as a simplified programming interface, e.g. "tell me what's in this room or "tell me when you see the mail-carrier come to the door"
Fully assembled Voice Kit.
The first open source reference project is the Voice Kit: instructions to build a Voice User Interface (VUI) that can use cloud services (like the new Google Assistant SDK or Cloud Speech API) or run completely on-device. This project extends the functionality of the most popular single board computer used for digital making - the Raspberry Pi.
Everything that comes in the Voice Kit.

The included Voice Hardware Accessory on Top (HAT) contains hardware for audio capture and playback: easy-to-use connectors for the dual mic daughter board and speaker, GPIO pins to connect low-voltage components like micro-servos and sensors, and an optional barrel connector for dedicated power supply. It was designed and tested with the Raspberry Pi 3 Model B.
Alternately, Developers can run Android Things on the Voice Kit with full functionality - making it easy to prototype Internet-of-Things devices and scale to full commercial products with several turnkey hardware solutions available (including Intel Edison, NXP Pico, and Raspberry Pi 3). Download the latest Android Things developer preview to get started.
Close up of the Voice HAT accessory board.


Making with the Google Assistant SDK
The Google Assistant SDK developer preview was released last week. It's enabled by default, and brings the Google Assistant to your Voice Kit: including voice control, natural language understanding, Google's smarts, and more.
In combination with the rest of the Voice Kit, we think the Google Assistant SDK will provide you many creative opportunities to build fun and engaging projects. Makers have already started experimenting with the SDK - including building a mocktail maker.


The Voice Kit ships out to all MagPi Magazine subscribers on May 4, 2017, and we've published a parts list, assembly instructions, source code and suggested extensions to our website: aiyprojects.withgoogle.com. The complete kit is also for sale at over 500 Barnes & Noble stores nationwide, as well as UK retailers WH Smith, Tesco, Sainsburys, and Asda.
This is just the first AIY Project. There are more in the works, but we need to know how you'd like to incorporate AI into your own projects. Visit hackster.io to share your experiences and discuss future projects. Use #AIYprojects on social media to help us find your inventions. And if you happen to be at the San Mateo Maker Faire on May 19-21, 2017, stop by the Google pavilion to give us feedback.


Android Things Developer Preview 3

Posted by Wayne Piekarski, Developer Advocate for IoT

Today, we are releasing the Developer Preview 3 (DP3) of Android Things, bringing new features and bug fixes to the platform. This preview is part of our commitment to provide regular updates to developers who are building Internet of Things (IoT) products with our platform. Android developers can quickly build smart devices using Android APIs and Google services, while staying secure with updates directly from Google. The System-on-Module (SoM) architecture supports prototyping with development boards, and then scaling them to large production runs while using the same Board Support Package (BSP) from Google.

Android Bluetooth APIs


DP3 now includes support for all Android Bluetooth APIs in android.bluetooth and android.bluetooth.le, across all Android Things supported hardware. You can now write code that interacts with both Bluetooth classic and low energy (LE) devices just like a regular Android phone. Existing samples such as Bluetooth LE advertisements and scanning and Bluetooth LE GATT can be used unmodified on Android Things. We have also provided two new samples, Bluetooth LE GATT server and Bluetooth audio sink.

USB Host support


Android version 3.1 and later supports USB Host, which allows a regular user space application to communicate with USB devices without root privileges or support needed from the Linux kernel. This functionality is now supported in Android Things, to enable interfacing with custom USB devices. Any existing code supporting USB Host will work on Android Things, and an extra sample USB Enumerator is available that demonstrates how to iterate over and print the interfaces and endpoints for each USB device.

Feedback


Once again, thank you to all the developers who submitted feedback for the previous developer previews. Please continue to send us your feedback by filing bug reports and feature requests, and ask any questions on stackoverflow. To download images for Developer Preview 3, visit the Android Things download page, and find the changes in the release notes. You can also join Google's IoT Developers Community on Google+, a great resource to keep up to date and discuss ideas, with over 4100 new members.

Announcing updates to Google’s Internet of Things platform: Android Things and Weave

Originally posted on Android Developer Blog

Posted by Wayne Piekarski, Developer Advocate for IoT

The Internet of Things (IoT) will bring computing to a whole new range of devices. Today we're announcing two important updates to our IoT developer platform to make it faster and easier for you to create these smart, connected products.

We're releasing a Developer Preview of Android Things, a comprehensive way to build IoT products with the power of Android, one of the world's most supported operating systems. Now any Android developer can quickly build a smart device using Android APIs and Google services, while staying highly secure with updates direct from Google. We incorporated the feedback from Project Brillo to include familiar tools such as Android Studio, the Android Software Development Kit (SDK), Google Play Services, and Google Cloud Platform. And in the coming months, we will provide Developer Preview updates to bring you the infrastructure for securely pushing regular OS patches, security fixes, and your own updates, as well as built-in Weave connectivity and more.

There are several turnkey hardware solutions available for you to get started building real products with Android Things today, including Intel Edison, NXP Pico, and Raspberry Pi 3. You can easily scale to large production runs with custom designs of these solutions, while continuing to use the same Board Support Package (BSP) from Google.

We are also updating the Weave platform to make it easier for all types of devices to connect to the cloud and interact with services like the Google Assistant. Device makers like Philips Hue and Samsung SmartThings already use Weave, and several others like Belkin WeMo, LiFX, Honeywell, Wink, TP-Link, and First Alert are implementing it. Weave provides all the cloud infrastructure, so that developers can focus on building their products without investing in cloud services. Weave also includes a Device SDK for supported microcontrollers and a management console. The Weave Device SDK currently supports schemas for light bulbs, smart plugs and switches, and thermostats. In the coming months we will be adding support for additional device types, custom schemas/traits, and a mobile application API for Android and iOS. Finally, we're also working towards merging Weave and Nest Weave to enable all classes of devices to connect with each other in a secure and reliable way. So whether you started with Google Weave or Nest Weave, there is a path forward in the ecosystem.

This is just the beginning of the IoT ecosystem we want to build with you. To get started, check out Google's IoT developer site, or go directly to the Android Things, Weave, and Google Cloud Platform sites for documentation and code samples. You can also join Google's IoT Developers Community on Google+ to get the latest updates and share and discuss ideas with other developers.