Today is the 15th birthday of Google Maps Street View, Google's project to take ground-level, 360-degree photographs of the entire world. To celebrate, the company is rolling out a few new features. From a report: First up, Google is bringing historical Street View data to iOS and Android phones. The feature has long existed on desktop browsers, where you can click into Street View mode and then time travel through Google's image archives. When you tap on a place to see Street View imagery, a "see more dates" button will appear next to the current age of the photo, letting you browse all the photos for that area going back to 2007. Google says the feature will release "starting today on Android and iOS globally," though, like all Google product launches, it will take some time to fully roll out.

If you'd like to help Google with its plan to photograph the entire world, the company is launching "Street View Studio." Google calls this "a new platform with all the tools you need to publish 360 image sequences quickly and in bulk." The Street View app is still around for people who want to build a 360 photosphere from a regular smartphone camera, but Google imagines Street View Studio as a tool for people with consumer 360 cameras. Google has a store-style page that lists compatible 360 cameras; the options range from sub-$200 fisheye cameras to the $3,600, ball-shaped Insta360 Pro, which looks like something out of Star Wars.

Today at Build 2022, Microsoft unveiled Project Volterra, a device powered by Qualcomm's Snapdragon platform that's designed to let developers explore "AI scenarios" via Qualcomm's new Snapdragon Neural Processing Engine (SNPE) for Windows toolkit. From a report: The hardware arrives alongside support in Windows for neural processing units (NPUs), or dedicated chips tailored for AI- and machine learning-specific workloads. Dedicated AI chips, which speed up AI processing while reducing the impact on battery, have become common in mobile devices like smartphones. But as apps like AI-powered image upscalers come into wider use, manufacturers have been adding such chips to their laptop lineups. M1 Macs feature Apple's Neural Engine, for instance, and Microsoft's Surface Pro X has the SQ1 (which was co-developed with Qualcomm). Intel at one point signaled it would offer an AI chip solution for Windows PCs, but -- as the ecosystem of AI-powered Arm apps is well-established, thanks to iOS and Android -- Project Volterra appears to be an attempt to tap it rather than reinvent the wheel.

It's not the first time Microsoft has partnered with Qualcomm to launch AI developer hardware. In 2018, the companies jointly announced the Vision Intelligence Platform, which featured "fully integrated" support for computer vision algorithms running via Microsoft's Azure ML and Azure IoT Edge services. Project Volterra offers evidence that, four years later, Microsoft and Qualcomm remain bedfellows in this arena, even after the reported expiration of Qualcomm's exclusivity deal for Windows on Arm licenses. Arriving later this year, Microsoft says (somewhat hyperbolically) that Project Volterra will come with a neural processor that has "best-in-class" AI computing capacity and efficiency. The primary chip will be Arm-based, supplied by Qualcomm, and will enable developers to build and test Arm-native apps alongside tools including Visual Studio, VSCode, Microsoft Office and Teams. Project Volterra is the harbinger of an "end-to-end" developer toolchain for Arm-native apps from Microsoft, as it turns out, which will span the full Visual Studio 2022, VSCode, Visual C++, NET 6, Windows Terminal, Java, Windows Subsystem for Linux and Windows Subsystem for Android (for running Android apps).

Microsoft has updated the Windows Subsystem for Android (WSA) to Android 12.1 and shipped improvements to Android integration with Windows, networking, the camera in apps, the Settings app, and more. ZDNet reports: Current limitations aside, Microsoft is continuing to invest in bringing Android to Windows 11, as seen in its update to the WSA on Windows 11 (version 2204.40000.15) to Android 12.1, which is available to Insiders on the Dev Channel, according to a Microsoft blogpost. WSA launched with Android 11. Microsoft has improved networking on the Windows Subsystem for Android, so that Android apps can connect to devices on the same network as a Windows PC. Advanced networking allows users to set up smart home devices such as speakers and security cameras with a compatible Android app. This feature is available in Windows 11 preview builds 22621 and higher, with advanced networking on by default for new x64 Windows builds.

Android-Windows integration has also been improved. Windows taskbar icons now show which Android apps are currently using hardware features like the mic and location in the system tray. The taskbar now also correctly appears or disappears when apps are running or stopped. Android notifications also show as Windows notifications and the Windows title of an Android app now reflects the Android activity title. Android apps won't restart afresh after exiting connected standby mode, but instead will recommence where the app was paused.

Of the "many camera updates" in this release, Microsoft highlights that camera orientation is fixed to natural orientation, and that it's fixed incorrect camera previews, letterboxing (where the app window is wider than it is high, or horizontally longer), and a "squishing of the camera feed." Mouse and keyboard inputs in Windows Subsystem for Android have been improved. Microsoft also improved scroll-wheel support, fixed the onscreen keyboard focus, and ensured the Android soft keyboard displays correctly. The updated Windows Subsystem for Android Settings app gained redesigned UX and diagnostics data viewer. As of this update, telemetry collection is off by default. However, Microsoft is encouraging users to enable the setting, so it can collect data about Android app usage. "Other important updates include reduced flicker when apps are restored from a minimized state, the addition of VP8 and VP9 video hardware decoding, and the addition of Chromium WebView 100 to the Windows Subsystem for Android," adds ZDNet.

SlashData's "State of the Developer Nation" surveyed more than 20,000 developers in 166 countries, taken from December 2021 to February 2022, reports InfoWorld.

It found the most popular programming language is JavaScript — followed by Python (which apparently added 3.3 million new net developers in just the last six months). And Rust adoption nearly quadrupled over the last two years to 2.2 million developers.

InfoWorld summarizes other findings from the survey: Java continues to experience strong and steady growth. Nearly 5 million developers have joined the Java community since the beginning of 2021.

PHP has grown the least in the past six month, with an increase of 600,000 net new developers between Q3 2021 and Q1 2022. But PHP is the second-most-commonly used language in web applications after JavaScript.

Go and Ruby are important languages in back-end development, but Go has grown more than twice as fast in the past year. The Go community now numbers 3.3 million developers.

The Kotlin community has grown from 2.4 million developers in Q1 2021 to 5 million in Q1 2022. This is largely attributed to Google making Kotlin its preferred language for Android development.

After nearly 20 years, Hollywood Designer 6.0 is "very stable and mature", write its developers — envisioning both hobbyist and professional users (with its support for modern graphics-editing features like filter effects and vector graphics) in its massive new evolution.

Long-time Slashdot reader Mike Bouma explains: Airsoft Softwair has released Hollywood Designer 6.0, "a full-blown multimedia authoring system that runs on top of Hollywood and can be used to create all sorts of multimedia-based applications, for example presentations, slide shows, games, and applications. Thanks to Hollywood, all multimedia applications created using Hollywood Designer can be exported as stand-alone executables for the following systems: AmigaOS3, AmigaOS4, WarpOS, MorphOS, AROS, Windows, macOS, Linux, Android, and iOS."

The current version of Hollywood is v9.1 with various updated add-ons. To see earlier versions of Hollywood 9.0 & Designer 5.0 in action have a look at Kas1e's short demonstration on AmigaOS4 / AmigaOne X5000.

Munich-based developer Aaron Ardiri is Slashdot reader #245,358, with a profile that still identifies him as a Palm OS developer. Which surprised me, because Palm OS's last update was in 2007. (Then again, ardiri's Slashdot profile also still includes his screen name on AOL Instant Messenger.)

So, a long-time Slashdot reader. And this week he stopped by to share a little history — in more ways than one. ardiri writes: Before the iOS and Android entered the scene — heck, even before the smartphone concept — was the handheld personal digital assistant, with the likes of Newton, Palm OS, Windows Mobile and Symbian.

Palm OS had a thriving gaming scene; with the likes of emulators and implementations/clones of classics such as LodeRunner, Lemmings, and the classic Game and Watch.
But the real news of ardiri's original submission is hidden in its headline. "Palm OS developer releases source to classic games, 20+ years after release." Written mainly in C and optimizations in assembler — maybe these games will make their way to the various Arduino like micro-controllers out there; designed for low memory, low processing power environments they would port perfectly.

Match Group, the parent company of dating apps Tinder, Hinge and OkCupid, is getting along better with Google, just by a little bit. From a report: On Friday, Match withdrew its request for a temporary restraining order against the company, which it accuses of wielding unfair monopoly power in its mobile app marketplace. Match filed an antitrust lawsuit against the search giant earlier this month over the company's restrictions on Android in-app payments, which drive app users toward remaining in its mobile ecosystem. The company filed the temporary restraining order request a day after suing Google.

Match cited a handful of "concessions" from Google in its decision to withdraw the restraining order request, including assurances that its apps would not be rejected or deleted from the Google Play Store for providing alternative payment options. The company will also place up to $40 million aside in an escrow account in lieu of paying fees to Google directly for Android app payments that happen outside of Google Play's payment system, arguing that those fees are "illegal under federal and state law." The escrow account will remain in place while the case awaits its day in court.

An anonymous reader shares a report: Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 set the stage for the biggest Android smartphones of 2022, including Samsung's flagship Galaxy -- but it's about to be surpassed by a better "Plus" version that'll no doubt appear in buy-it-for-the-bragging-rights gaming phones and luxury handsets. It's called the Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1, which just rolls off the tongue, and Qualcomm says it'll offer 10 percent faster CPU performance, 10 percent faster GPU clocks, and -- get this -- use 15 percent less power for "nearly 1 hour" of extra gameplay or, say, 50 minutes of social media browsing. Technically, Qualcomm says it's achieved "up to 30 percent" better power efficiency from both the CPU and GPU, and 20 percent better AI performance per watt, but that doesn't necessarily all transfer into more battery life -- some of it's about performance, too.

Qualcomm is particularly touting better sustained performance from the new chip too -- theoretically maintaining its clockspeed for longer as it heats up while gaming or tapping into 5G. Of course, that all depends on how phone manufacturers decide to cool the chip. The company's not breaking down where the extra performance and efficiencies are coming from, but you can see some of the chip's other features in the slide above, even though many of them (like Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, 10Gbps of theoretical 5G, and 8K HDR video capture) haven't changed from the original Snapdragon 8 Gen 1. Qualcomm says it'll live alongside that older chip, so you can probably expect a price premium.

"The developer of the open source email client FairEmail pulled all of his applications from Google Play and announced that he would stop development," reports gHacks. The announcement comes shortly after the developer received an email from Google stating that they believed the app was spyware. From the report: FairEmail was a popular email client for Google's Android operating system that was free to use. It was privacy-friendly, had no limitations in regards to email accounts that users could set up in the app, supported unified inbox, conversation threading, two-way synchronizing, support for OpenPGP, and a lot more. Marcel Bokhorst, the developer of the application, announced major changes to the project yesterday on XDA Developers.

Earlier that week, Bokhorst received a policy violation email from Google stating that Google believed that the FairEmail application was spyware. The full statement has not been published, but Bokhorst believes that Google might have misinterpreted the use of favicons in the app. He resubmitted a new version of the application that had the use of favicons removed. The appeal he received as a response "resulted in a standard answer". While the content of the answer is unclear, it appears to have been a generic answer that Google Play Store developers have been frustrated with for a long time. Bokhorst decided to pull the application and all of his other applications from the Google Play Store. The apps won't be maintained and supported anymore according to the info.

Other factors played a role in Bokhorst's decision, including the discrepancy between answering thousands of support questions per month and the application's revenue, and the inability to do something against unfair reviews in the Google Play Store. He considered keeping the applications on GitHub, but this would result in an 98% loss of audience. Google also recently forced Total Commander's developer to remove the ability to install APKs from the File Manager.

If you're looking for an alternative email client, gHacks recommends the open-source app K-9 Mail.

Over the past few weeks, Google Messages users in India have been reporting more and more ads showing up through RCS messaging. 9to5Google reports: While many brands -- even in the US and other countries -- have used messaging apps and SMS texts to advertise new products to former customers, these ads going on in India are not necessarily the result of a user's buying activity. Business messaging on RCS, as Google's Jibe website points out, is supposed to be used for things such as sending copies of your travel tickets or sending links for buying additional products based on a past purchase based on a user's request. [...] That is very much not what is happening in India right now.

Brought to our attention by Ishan Argwal on Twitter, RCS ads in Google Messages appear to be coming from "Verified Business" accounts. Google first announced that functionality back in 2020, for the purposes of allowing customers to talk to businesses. Advertising was surely part of the functionality, but it's clearly being abused in India. Android Police says these ads have been going out for almost a year now, citing examples of ads sent by Kotak Mahindra Bank, Bajaj Finserv, Buddy Loan, and PolicyBazaar. From what we can tell from user reports, it appears the frequency of these ads has been picking up over the past few months especially.

These ads are not harmless, either, with many of the examples we've seen being for personal loans, a category that tends to be full of predatory practices. One user reports that they were sent one of these ads on a phone that didn't even have an active SIM card in it. Currently, it seems as though this practice is primarily happening in the Indian market, at least in this quantity. What can be done about these ads in Google Messages? The solutions are all not quite ideal, unfortunately. You can report these businesses and block them from sending future messages [...]. Alternatively, you can turn off RCS features entirely within the Google Messages app.

An anonymous reader shares a report: Total Commander has been around since the 90s, eventually expanding into Android after the platform launched over a decade ago. The app has more than 10 million downloads on the Play Store, still supporting OS versions as far back as Android 2.2. With a new update, developer Christian Ghisler has removed the ability to install APK files on Android, blaming Google Play policies in the patch notes for the app. It's a shocking twist for the service and, seemingly, a bad omen of things to come for other mobile file managers. A forum post from Ghisler sheds some more light on what's going on here, as Google sent him a notice warning of his app's removal from the Play Store within a week if the app went unmodified. The company's automated response pointed the developer to the "Device and Network Abuse" policy.

Eric Migicovsky, founder of smartwatch company Pebble and lover of small Android phones, decided to take matters into his own hands and "rally other fans of small phones together" to put pressure on phone manufacturers to consider making a small Android phone -- complete with all the premium features one could expect to find in a larger device. Essentially, what he wants is an iPhone Mini-sized phone running Android. Is that too much to ask?

Here's an excerpt from his manifesto (via smallandroidphone.com): My Dream Small Android phone Optimizes for only 3 things:

- Sub 6" display, matching size and design of iPhone 13 Mini
- Great cameras
- Stock Android OS

If you can hit these three bullets, you've built the perfect phone. Currently there are ZERO premium Android phones with less than 6" displays. No amount of money can buy one right now. Focus on these three bullets, all other specs are flexible.

Price: $700-800 (again, we have no alternatives so we should be willing to pay a bit more!) In a call-to-action, Migicovsky asks readers who agree with him to sign up on this page to help "convince a manufacturer to build us our dream phone." He adds: "If no one else makes one I guess I will be forced to make it myself, but I really really don't want it to come to that!"

Spotify is testing a way for artists to display their non-fungible token (NFT) collections. From a report: The music streaming platform has rolled out the test for some users on Android in the US and currently includes NFT previews for artists like Steve Aoki and The Wombats. "Spotify is running a test in which it will help a small group of artists promote their existing third-party NFT offerings via their artist profiles," a Spotify spokesperson said in a statement to Music Ally. "We routinely conduct a number of tests in an effort to improve artist and fan experiences. Some of those tests end up paving the way for a broader experience and others serve only as an important learning." More companies are trying to catch the NFT wave, but it looks like that initial surge could be petering out (at least for the time being). According to The Wall Street Journal, daily NFT sales have dipped 92 percent from 225,000 in September of last year to just 19,000 as of May 3rd. The number of active NFT wallets is also on the decline, from about 119,000 in November to 14,000 toward the end of April.

ZDNet reports news from PyCon 2022 ("the first in-person meet-up for Python contributors since 2019 due to the pandemic")

"Developers revisited the idea of running Python code in the browser...." CPython developer Christian Heimes and fellow contributor Ethan Smith detailed how they enabled the CPython main branch to compile to WebAssembly. CPython, short for Core Python, is the reference implementation that other Python distributions are derived from. CPython now cross-compiles to Wasm using Emscripten, a toolchain that compiles projects written in C or C++ to Node.js or Wasm runtimes. The Python Software Foundation highlighted the work in a blog post: "Python can be run on many platforms: Linux, Windows, Apple Macs, microcomputers, and even Android devices. But it's a widely known fact that, if you want code to run in a browser, Python is simply no good — you'll just have to turn to JavaScript," it notes.

"Now, however, that may be about to change."

While the Foundation notes cross-compiling to WebAssembly is still "highly experimental" due to missing modules in the Python standard library, nonetheless, PyCon 2022 demonstrated growing community interest in making Python a better language for the browser.
The article notes additional news from Anaconda (makers of the a Python distribution for data science): the announcement of PyScript, "a system for interleaving Python in HTML (like PHP)." It allows developers to write and run Python code in HTML, and call Javascript libraries in PyScript. This system allows a website to be written entirely in Python.

PyScript is built on Pyodide, a port of CPython, or a Python distribution for the browser and Node.js that's based on WebAssembly and Emscripten.... "Pyodide makes it possible to install and run Python packages in the browser with micropip. Any pure Python package with a wheel available on PyPI is supported," the Pyodide project states. Essentially, it compiles Python code and scientific libraries to WebAssembly using Emscripten.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from XDA Developers: Google created Flutter a number of years ago, with the aim to make a cross-platform software framework. Flutter's biggest strength is that it can be used to build applications for Android, iOS, Linux, Windows, macOS, and even the web, and all from the same shared codebase. While building apps for Windows received stable support back in February, both macOS and Linux were still only in beta. Now that's changing, as Google has announced Flutter 3 at this year's Google I/O, complete with stable support for building apps for macOS and Linux.

Of course, cross-platform support for both of these new platforms requires more than just programs being able to run. They need to fit in with the rest of the experience, and they need to support specific features that may be unique, as well. That's why Google is highlighting two things: the first is that Linux support helped by Canonical (the publisher of Ubuntu) and Google collaborating in order to "offer a highly-integrated, best-of-breed option for development."

As Google puts it, Canonical is already developing with "Flutter for key shell experiences including installation and firmware updates." What's more, their Linux-specific packages "provide an idiomatic API for core operating system services including dbus, gsettings, networkmanager, Bluetooth and desktop notifications, as well as a comprehensive theme and widget set for Yaru, the Ubuntu look and feel." As for macOS, Google invested in supporting both Intel and Apple Silicon devices, with Universal Binary support that allows apps to package executables that run natively on both architectures. Tim Sneath, Director of Product and UX for Flutter & Dart, highlights all the new improvements in a Medium post.

At Google I/O, the company said their Android Auto car interface app is now "built to adapt to any screen size." Ars Technica reports: Google says "there are three main functionalities that drivers prioritize in their cars: navigation, media and communication," and the new Android Auto design puts each of those interfaces in its own panel. Maps gets the biggest, main panel, media and communication panels get stacked next to each other, and there's a combo status/navigation bar. To accommodate the million different screen sizes, these items can be arranged in whatever orientation works best in the car.

One example, close to the current Android Auto configuration, shows the combo bar oriented vertically against the side of the screen, followed by a vertical stack of the message and media panels, then a big Google Maps panel. Another example of a more vertical screen design shows a big Google Maps panel on top of the message and media panels, with the combo bar on the bottom. Things can be arranged to fit. The new interface will be out "this summer."

Google is expanding end-to-end encryption (E2EE) to include group texts in the Messages app. The feature will be available as an open beta later this year. Engadget reports: Google hasn't revealed more details about E2EE in group chats, but it will surely be similar to how the option works in one-on-one conversations. Everyone in the group will need to have RCS chat functions switched on to use the feature. You'll be able to tell if a message you're about to share with the group is encrypted if there's a lock icon on the send button. The Messages app now has more than 500 million monthly active users with RCS. So, there's already a large number of people who'd be able to take advantage of E2EE in group chats.

At its I/O developer conference, Google today launched Google Wallet, a new Android and Wear OS app that will allow users to store things like credit cards, loyalty cards, digital IDs, transit passes, concert tickets, vaccination cards and more. TechCrunch reports: That's pretty straightforward, but from here on out, it gets a bit confusing. [...] [Back in 2018, Google Wallet was folded into Google Pay.] Currently, Google Pay is available in 42 markets, Google says. Because in 39 of those markets, Google Pay is still primarily a wallet, those users will simply see the Google Pay app update to the new Google Wallet app. But in the U.S. and Singapore, Google Pay will remain the payments-focused app while the Wallet app will exist in parallel to focus on storing your digital cards. Meanwhile, in India, Google says that "people will continue to use their Google Pay app they are familiar with today."

"The Google Pay app will be a companion app to the Wallet," said Arnold Goldberg, the VP and GM of Payments at Google, who joined the company earlier this year after a long stint at PayPal. "Think of [the Google Pay app] as this higher value app that will be a place for you to make payments and manage money, whereas the wallet will really be this container for you to store your payment assets and your non-payment assets." Goldberg noted that Google decided to go this route because of the rapid digitization we've been seeing during the last two years of the pandemic.

Google announced several new gadgets during its I/O developer conference on Wednesday, including its long-awaited Pixel Watch, a new budget Pixel 6a phone and headphones. It also teased its flagship Pixel 7 phone, which is coming this fall. From a report: The Google Pixel Watch offers features similar to the Apple Watch's and sports a refined and sleek look that could appeal to customers who use Android instead of the iPhone, which it doesn't work with. It will integrate Fitbit's technology, allowing it to pull on years of research and development from the fitness startup it acquired last year. The Fitbit tech will let users track their sleep, heart rate and workouts. The watch runs Google's Wear OS software that lets users do things such as check messages and download music. Users can also get directions with Google Maps or connect it with their smart home devices, so they can, for example, change their thermostat temperature or make sure the lights are turned off.

Google will release its latest budget Pixel phone this summer. The Pixel 6a has mostly the same design as the Pixel 6, but will be slightly smaller and cost $449. Google promised an all-day battery that can last up to 72 hours when in the Extreme Battery Saver mode, which it said is a first for Pixel phones. It also uses Google Tensor, so the budget phone will have the same power as the more expensive Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro. [...] Google teased the new Pixel 7 and Pixel 7 Pro flagship phones. They'll use the next generation of the Google Tensor chip and will ship with Android 13. The company didn't provide pricing, but the Pixel 6 had been targeted at the midrange market with a $599 starting price, while the 6 Pro started at $899.

ellithligraw writes: Analytics company Pixalate found that there are over 1.5 million abandoned iOS and Android apps. This analysis comes after Apple's announcement of changes to their App Store for abandoned apps, prompting a discussion on the Web.

"Pixalate claims they crawled the App Store and Play Store to analyze all apps available for download based on their last update to determine their degree of 'abandonment,'" reports InfoQ. "Based on the previous definitions, Pixalate found over 650k iOS apps and about 870k Android apps to qualify as abandoned apps (haven't been updated in over two years). Of those, just about 180k iOS apps and 130k Android apps qualify as super-abandoned (haven't been updated in at least five years)." Note that according to Statista there are 4 million iOS apps, and 3 million Android apps available.