Android app split-screen multitasking

Split-screen multitasking and improved notification controls are among the new features being added to the Android operating system (OS).

An early build of the new OS, known as Android N, was released on Thursday for app developers to test.
Google said it had released the beta software earlier than usual so that device manufacturers could get the finished version sooner.
At the moment, fewer than 3% of Android phones run the latest OS, Marshmallow.

"Early release"

On Monday, Google published statistics that showed an older version of Android, Lollipop, was still more widely used than the latest variant.
About 36% of Android devices run Lollipop, with fewer than 3% running the newer Marshmallow.
But a range of new smartphones running Marshmallow, from manufacturers such as Samsung and LG, are due to be released.

New features

Android N will introduce split-screen multitasking that allows people to use two apps at the same time.
Information can be copied across from one app to the other.
A similar feature is already available on some iOS and Windows 10 devices, and Samsung has already added the feature to some of its Android smartphones.
The new software also introduces some cosmetic changes to settings and notifications, and aims to improve battery life.
Google has traditionally named new versions of the operating system after sweet treats, as was the case with Lollipop and Marshmallow.
The newest version has not yet been named but it has been suggested that Android N will be named after a popular chocolate and hazelnut breakfast spread.

New Android Keyboard app

We used to call ginormous phones “phablets,” and they were novelties. Now they’re just phones. And as big as they are—the Nexus 6 may have been too big—everyone’s making devices with ever bigger screens, and people are buying them.
This makes sense. After all, everyone’s spending more time on mobile devices and less time on computers. As phones increasingly replace desktops and laptops, the need for a larger screen for typing, reading, surfing, streaming, and gaming becomes really important. A bigger phone can also accommodate a bigger battery, and obscure less of the screen beneath your fat thumbs as you’re typing and swiping.
But even the biggest smartphone screen is more cramped than a flight on Spirit Air, making things that would be multi-window tasks on a computer very tedious. To share a link, a contact, or a chunk of text, you’ve got to hop, skip, and jump between apps, poking and dragging to make a selection, revisit the messaging app, and paste your info there.

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The problem, says Steve Won, a senior designer at Microsoft Office, is everything is siloed. “On a small screen, there isn’t a scalable way to run apps side by side. The interesting UX challenge for the small screen is breaking down these silos and having what the user needs readily available,” he says.
Microsoft has a slick solution to this problem: the Microsoft Hub Keyboard, a software keyboard that eliminates a lot of that app-hopping. And what’s really interesting is Microsoft created it for Android devices, not its own Windows 10 Mobile devices.
The Hub Keyboard, which is free at the Google Play Store, offers handy shortcuts and tunnels into other apps without being overly complex. Above the keys, which can be long-pressed to bring up punctuation and numbers, lies a strip of options akin to the Microsoft Office Ribbon. It offers five choices: View your clipboard archive for easy pasting, search your OneDrive documents for easy linking, type in the name of a contact for easy sharing, translate your text to a different language, or disable those features to enter autocorrect mode.
Instead of jumping between your browser and your contact list and Google Translate, you access data within other apps through the keyboard. This keyboard follows you from app to app, so there’s far less finagling involved to share a contact or a link. (Other perks: Through its inline translation feature, I discovered that the Slovak word for pepperoni is “feferónky,” which is now my new favorite word.)
The Hub Keyboard is still a work in progress, but it’s off to a great start. At the moment, the keyboard’s functionality is limited. You can’t use it as a swipe keyboard, you must disable its unique menu to enable autocorrect, and it still needs support for third-party apps (Dropbox and Google Drive in addition to OneDrive, for example) to reach its full potential. But there’s plenty of room for it to grow into an essential part of the mobile experience.
Before it can become truly essential, though, Hub Keyboard must work on other mobile platforms. Microsoft wouldn’t say whether that’s in the pipeline—it won’t even say if it will become the default keyboard for Windows Mobile 10—but Redmond wants to use the next month or so as one hell of a suggestion box. “In the coming weeks, a number of new features will be introduced,” Won says. “We are very excited to hear feedback and evolve the product.”
Hub Keyboard is yet another example of a growing trend in the mobile space. In the past year or so, Apple and Google have been razing the walls between apps, surfacing information within them in core OS services. Increasingly, you don’t have to open an app to see what’s in it; you can use system search tools and voice assistants to access that data.
But what makes the Hub Keyboard so unique and promising is that it helps us use our phones more like we use our computers: crazily, quickly, and with plenty of shortcuts. It’s the direction we’ve been headed for years, without the interface or input device to do it right. That may be about to change, or at least take a big step in the right direction.

Best music player app for Android

The Walkman and the iPod are as good as dead, because our smartphones have taken over as powerful music players. While the default music apps on your Android device probably do a fine job, if you want to crank up the bass or other aspects of your music, you'll need something more.
One of the best music player apps for Android is Poweramp. It’s a great way to enjoy your favorite music, with a ton of options and support for almost any type of file. You can’t go wrong with Poweramp.

Best Android file manager app

ES File Explorer has been our go-to file explorer for years. If you're having trouble tracking down documents or pictures in your internal storage or microSD card, this is the app for your.
ES just works. It offers myriad extra features, but the reason it's so widely used it because it has nailed the basic sorting of files. You can find all of your music, images, videos and more without having to dive through layers and layers of subfolders: the most common types of files are all accessible with simple shortcuts on the main screen.
The subtle animations are great, it rarely bothers you with notifications and it provides a one-touch way to clear out old and unused files to free up space. In short, ES File Explorer is the best way to keep your data organized on Android.

ES File Explorer File Manager download from google play

top 10 andriod apps

Apps

BBC Music (Free)
Currently a UK-only app, this brings together live performances and interviews with musicians from the BBC’s TV and radio output, as well as playlists curated by its DJs. The app learns your tastes as you use it to refine its recommendations, with songs available as 30-second clips or – via Spotify or Deezer – in full.

Glow Baby: Feeding Tracker (Free)
Glow’s previous apps have focused on helping women track their periods and pregnancies, so it makes sense to follow them with one for babies. This isn’t just about tracking breast or bottle feeds: you can also use it to log sleep, nappy changes, weight and other milestones.

BuzzFeed Video (Free)
There’s already a good app for watching BuzzFeed’s fast-growing video output: YouTube. But now the news site has launched a standalone app for its video division, including alerts when shows you’ve subscribed to have a new episode, and a trending feed to spot popular videos.

Reuters TV: Video News (Free)
More mobile video courtesy of news service Reuters, with the inventive idea of creating a news bulletin tuned to your interests. You tell the app how long you want to watch for – between five and 30 minutes – and it draws together video reports from its correspondents around the world.

TapTapSee (Free + IAP)
This is a truly intriguing use of smartphones for blind and visually-impaired people: using their device’s camera to take pictures of objects in the real world, and identify what they are. The app uses Android’s TalkBack feature to read out the details, with photos snapped by double-tapping the screen.

Peach (Free)
When it launched for iPhone in January, social app Peach surfed a wave of hype from tech sites that has since died down. Can its Android release revive the buzz? Peach is certainly fun: a quick way to post photos, doodles, gifs, songs and other stuff to your network. Inventive, but it relies on your friends being on it.

Sleepfulness (Free + IAP)
With a Google Play blurb like “Better sleep. Better days. Powered by mindfulness” this app will raise your hackles if you’re sceptical about the mindfulness boom. If you’re curious, though, Sleepfulness is worth a look: made by the developer of popular app Buddhify, it promises soundtracks to help you get better shut-eye.

Everalbum: Organise Photos (Free + IAP)
This app has a firm fanbase on iOS, so its appearance on Android is welcome news for non-iPhone mobile photographers. It backs up your photos (and videos); can import from Facebook and Instagram among other sources; and most usefully helps you free up space for more stuff on your device.

MyShake (Free)
If you’re in the UK, hopefully MyShake will never be an app you need: designed, as it is, to measure the tremors before and during earthquakes. But this is a really interesting idea for people who do live in quake-affected parts of the world: an app from Berkeley Seismological Laboratory that aims to “create a dense network that could one day provide warnings prior to shaking”.

VHS Camcorder (£2.47)
Any self-respecting hipster wanting to share videos on social networks that look like they’re filmed with a 1980s VHS camcorder will, of course, go out and buy a 1980s VHS camcorder. But this is an app shortcut to creating retro videos. And yes, if there’s a demand for this it’s probably as an Instagram filter, but the app is well put together with good attention to period details.
There’s already a good app for watching BuzzFeed’s fast-growing video output: YouTube. But now the news site has launched a standalone app for its video division, including alerts when shows you’ve subscribed to have a new episode, and a trending feed to spot popular videos.