Google announces new Android Honeycomb features

Today during Google's web broadcast on YouTube, the Android team announced some exciting new features for Android 3.0 "Honeycomb." The new mobile OS will be the next major milestone for Android, with a ton of new and improved features, including widgets, hardware acceleration and more. Google announced that Honeycomb will feature an easy to access multitasking toolbar, showing your recently opened and running applications, all from the home screen. Honeycomb will improve the way widgets can be displayed, allowing for developers to create widgets that are based on collections of data, which will allow for the user to run apps in 'little windows' on your home screen. Android 3.0 will also come with a new notification system, with toast popups in the lower right-hand corner. The notifications can now contain images of friends when they send you a message. The notification system will even allow for apps, like a media player, to appear on screen, for quick access. Honeycomb will come with hardware acceleration, and with just a single line of code, existing applications can take advantage of the 2D hardware acceleration. Honeycomb will come with a new engine for powering 3D graphics on your devices. Lastly, Android 3.0 'Honeycomb' will allow support video chat, with a supported handset or tablet with a front-facing camera, using Google Talk.

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