What Android studio 4.0 means for android developers?

Google released a new and better version of Android Studio 4.0, which is in the news lately. But what does it hold for the android developers? Stay with us, because we will quickly let you walk through the recent development.

If you ever wanted to build an android app and never knew how? Well, now you can turn your idea into an app with just the right amount of tools, creativity, and assistance.

To save your time of going through a long and technical manual, we did some effort to bring an overview of the latest update in Android studio 4.0. The newest release is becoming extremely popular because of its additional features like a new motion editor, build analyzer, CPU profiler, and layout inspector.

What’s new in Android Studio 4.0 for Android developers?

These latest updated features have a high functionality level with amazing capabilities to lessen your workload and give better results.

 Motion Editor

Android developers can now easily use the Motionlayout API, manage complicated motion and animations in the apps. Motion editor saves your time by generating XML files for you, and it is a powerful interface to create, edit and preview Motionlayout animations. Now, you can see the code created by the editor with just one click. With the help of IDE, you can easily convert Constraintlayout to Motionlayout with Android 4.0.

Build Intuitive and powerful profile designs with Android Studio 4.0

CPU Profiler and Upgrades for UI

This CPU profiler is created to make the UI more intuitive and powerful. You can now easily analyze data through recording stored in separate places and navigate the information for better understanding. The main profiler timeline has groups that allow you to store items in the relevant group and add your custom settings.

Now, you can view all the Thread activity on the timeline including methods, functions, and events for better navigation of data. System Trace UI empowers you to get a better and colored visual of the threads and see the selected threads.

After this, it is noticed that there are lesser reports of user-reported errors.  This is not just it, because:

• Android studio provides smarter editor features when you create files with R8. You can check syntax highlighting, completion, and errors.
• Live Kotlin templates with the IntelliJ feature support you in enhancing the quality and performance of your app. For more details, you can check their website.
• You can now switch to clangd instead of C++  as the primary language. Because this one helps you navigate the code and lets you do an inspection of the errors or warnings.  

Build Analyzer

Many android developers utilize custom build logic and Gradle plugins to develop their system for the apps. Now you can save lots and lots of productive time and lessen the longer build times by using a build analyzer. It enables you understand and address the bottlenecks in the build, and highlight the plugins initially responsible for the build time. It allows you to orchestrate steps in order to mitigate the regressions during the overall build time.

With Android Gradle plugin 4.0.0 and help from Android studio’s build analyzer, now you can use Java 8language APIs. It aids you in creating a feature on feature dependencies between dynamic feature modules. Now you can also make use of standard language APIs available in recent android such as java.util.stream, java.util.function and java.time etc.

You can also enable and disable the features by using discrete plugins. It is stated that it proves effective in the build of bigger projects and in improving their performance. Now, you can control features with :

android {
    // The default value for each feature is shown below.
    // You can change the value to override the default behavior.
    buildFeatures {
        // Determines whether to support View Binding.
        // Note that the viewBinding.enabled property is now deprecated.
        viewBinding = false
        // Determines whether to support Data Binding.
        // Note that the dataBinding.enabled property is now deprecated.
        dataBinding = false
        ...
    }
}

In addition to this, you can also get built-in support for build script files ( *.kts) of Kotlin DSL. This good news for Kotlin script users, because they make the quick fixes in the architecture of the project that they are building.

Android Studio 4.0 Upgrades in Layout Inspector

 Have you ever wanted to debug your UI to investigate data including attributes? Well, now you can access all the information related to a running app and get more insights. It allows you to resolve any issues and you can view a live 3D display of the nested views.

So, now you can get perfect pixels of the UI on the 3D model of your running app. If you want to know more about additional features in this dynamic layout, you can always ask us more about it. Talk to our experts and hire app developer here.

Layout Validation makes it possible for you to develop multiple form factors, sizes for screens and resolutions so that the UI looks great on every screen. With this, you can make sure that your app is working perfectly on every device. It also shows you previews and configurations on different websites.

Since we are on the topic of app development. Looking to create an app for android or ios? Build your first app with the developer of your choice. If you already have an app and want some improvisations, let us help you in the process.

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