Notes

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Field notes, long-form articles, manuals, and decision records — written while building, kept current or explicitly marked stale.

Article

Android 16: adaptive by default, Live Updates

API 36, June 2025. Large screens stopped honouring orientation locks, predictive back and edge-to-edge became the default, and QPR2 shipped the first minor SDK, 36.1.

Oct 202620 min read6 partsPart 18 of 19 · Android, version by version

Article

Android 17: adaptive-first, memory limits

API 37, June 2026. Large screens lost the orientation opt-out, the system started killing apps over a RAM-based memory limit, and two minor SDKs followed.

Oct 202640 min read6 partsPart 19 of 19 · Android, version by version

Article

Android 4.4 to 17: every version at a glance

Eighteen Android releases, API 19 to 37, in one table that links to a note on each, plus the threads that cross them all, from permissions to background work and storage.

Oct 20268 min readPart 1 of 19 · Android, version by version

Article

Android 4.4 KitKat: Android on 512 MB

API 19, October 2013. Project Svelte fit Android into 512 MB of RAM, apps got a storage access framework and NFC card emulation, and SELinux began enforcing.

Oct 202610 min readPart 2 of 19 · Android, version by version

Article

Android 5.0 Lollipop: ART and Material Design

API 21, November 2014. ART replaced Dalvik, Material Design restyled the system, JobScheduler batched background work, and SELinux became enforcing for every domain.

Oct 202612 min read3 partsPart 3 of 19 · Android, version by version

Article

Android 5.1 Lollipop: multi-SIM and anti-theft

API 22, March 2015. A small point release that added multiple SIM cards, Device Protection after a factory reset, carrier privileges, and deprecated the Apache HTTP client.

Oct 20268 min readPart 4 of 19 · Android, version by version

Article

Android 6.0 Marshmallow: permissions at runtime

API 23, October 2015. Apps began asking for dangerous permissions while running, Doze cut background work on idle phones, and the security patch level became a date.

Oct 202614 min read3 partsPart 5 of 19 · Android, version by version

Article

Android 7.0 Nougat: two apps on one screen

API 24, August 2016. Split-screen multi-window, Doze in a moving pocket, file-based encryption with Direct Boot, and apps that stop trusting user-added CAs by default.

Oct 202616 min read5 partsPart 6 of 19 · Android, version by version