Android session

I just got out of the Introduction to Android session in room three. A fabulous presentation about the state and goals of Android as a platform. Discussion included licencing, goals, features and the constant allusion to actual handsets. When? When? When? According to the Open Handset Alliance they will start to be available in the second half of this year. Vague. :-( The first Android developer challenge with a 5M$ purse has wrapped itself up with over 1700 submisions and the second will start sometime after the ephirieal release of real hardware.

Meanwhile we can use the Android emulator which they assure us provides identical functionality as a device will. I'm a little sceptical, having developed in virtual devices (Palm) in the past with mixed results, but oh so hopeful. In stream of consiousness, and between sessions, I don't really feel I can do justice to the presentation but it reenfources my need to refresh my Java programming. And it seems move on from my beloved Vim to Eclipse which, given that all Google toolkits have Eclipse plugins, seems to be the favored environment at Google, and in particular the Android team.

Regardless, my battery is back to 40% (which I'm sure to grind through bits of in the next session) and 'Leveraging Web 2.0 Design Patterns For Enhanced Accessibility' has already started, so I'm off. I'm sure I'll be standing/sitting on the floor again. Ah well such is life, but my back still doesn't have to like life.