I had a discussion with a few of the Android team member at Google IO, and I'd like to throw the idea out here for general brainstorming with the community.
My view is that it is not a good approach to create "sensor-specific" APIs with iterative releases of the Android platform and SDK's. By this, I mean that instead of adding a "location API", and an "accelerometer API", and whatever comes next, we should create a "generic" sensor API that can work with a broad range of sensor types, including sensor configuration, demand read/write/configuration, event notifications, and other functions. In this way, 3rd parties could also add innovative sensing capabilities (or external sensors) to their Android devices which would be "instantly" supported by the platform. Well-known sensor such as geolocation and acceleration could have agreed-to sensor names/namespaces, with full extensibility for additional sensor types. As an example, geolocation as a 2D longitude/latitude is fine for some apps, but for "inside the building" applications or for other apps involving the need to accurate location of people or resources in 3 dimensions, it doesn't cut it. Additionally, one can easily envision inclusion of RFID, environmental, and other sensors in devices that could dramatically enhance the capabilities of Android applications. I welcome your thoughts and comments! Rick --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Android Developers" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/android-developers?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
