Episode 208: Micro optimizations

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1. 

   26 Nov 2024 · 1 hr 10 min

   Episode 211: Rules about performance tools

   In this episode Chet, Romain and Tor chat with Shai Barack about how the Android platform team studies performance and understands system health - and what is system health anyway? We talk about measuring performance, deciding trade-offs, and our favorite tools such as Perfetto, Compiler Explorer, and Android Studio's Memory Profiler. Chapters: Intro (00:00) System health (0:27) Efforts to make apps more efficient (3:35) Telemetry data (5:59) Trade offs between long battery life and good performance (8:21) Scheduling groups (10:38) Static drain (13:32) Collaborating with App developers vs…

2. 

   24 Oct 2024 · 51 min

   Episode 210: Studio Jewelry

   In this episode Chet, Romain and Tor chat with Sebastiano about how the Android Studio team builds UIs. We talk about how Compose for Desktop is used in parts of Android Studio and how the Compose Markdown renderer available in the Jewel library makes Studio Bot tick. Chapters: Intro (00:00) Android Dev UX team (00:39) What kind of libraries and languages are used to build Android studio? (1:52) Swing (2:53) Reactive and declarative programming models (8:25) SKIA for Kotlin (10:01) Jetpack Compose widgets (11:54) Jewel (13:07) Text rendering across platforms (15:51) Differences in behaviors…

3. 

   12 Sep 2024 · 1 hr

   Episode 209: Compose animations

   In this episode Chet, Romain and Tor chat with Doris Liu from the Compose team about animations in Compose -- covering everything from the basic primitives up to the recently added Shared Element Transitions. Chapters: Intro (00:00) Animation capabilities of Compose (1:06) Different types of animation specs (3:43) Layers of functionality, transitions (7:49) TargetBasedAnimation (9:48) Vectors & velocity of color change (12:43) Second layer parallel to animation spec (16:39) Animation interruptions (18:48) Motion layout problem-solving (20:19) Both scale and move in question (25:45) Different…

4. 

   20 Jun 2024 · 52 min

   Episode 207: AI development assistance

   In this episode we talk with Kathy Korevec from the AIDA team at Google about AI assisted developer tools, such as Android Studio -- which is using Gemini AI models provided by AIDA. Romain, Kathy, and Tor Kathy: twitter.com/simpsoka Romain: @romainguy , threads.net/@romainguy , romainguy@androiddev.social Tor: threads.net/@tor.norbye and tornorbye@androiddev.social Check out → https://goo.gle/3wK4EM4 Catch videos on YouTube → https://goo.gle/adb-podcast Subscribe to Android Developers → https://goo.gle/AndroidDevs

5. 

   22 May 2024 · 1 hr 1 min

   Episode 206: Make it faster

   In this episode we cover ADB -- not "Android Developers Backstage", but "Android Debug Bridge", the technology powering device connections. Romain and Tor talk with Fabien Sanglard from the Android Studio team on his work to improve the debug stack -- including the new USB speed detection feature recently unveiled at Google I/O. Chapters: Intro (00:00) You may know Fabien from… (00:50) Applying relevant knowledge to Android Studio (3:28) Communicating with remote devices and debugging (12:18) Accommodating a debugger (13:55) Fixed protocols and how to work around (16:10) What other versions…

6. 

   26 Mar 2024 · 47 min

   Episode 205: Time for Playtime

   In this episode, Tor, Romain, and Chet talk with Aurash Mahbod from the Play Games team at Google -- covering trends in mobile games, challenges for Android games developers, console games, and more! Chapters: Intro (00:00) What's Aurash working on currently? (02:40) How much is Play store providing users with content based on previous interests? (05:29) Longstanding games vs new games (08:34) Mobile gaming vs console (10:07) Are there stats on what type of games people are playing? (18:07) Difficulties and solutions for transitioning games from various devices (21:14) Movie corner - War…

7. 

   5 Aug 2026 · 1 hr 17 min

   Android AI Tools: Vibe coding, sub-agents, and the Android CLI

   Learn how the latest Android Studio AI features can streamline your daily development tasks. While the original agent mode chat was helpful, we rebuilt it with a re-architected experience that supports parallel tool calls and background sub-agents. For instance, you can now have an agent analyze code in the background while you continue working on a different feature. Try out the updated Journeys feature to see how plain text instructions can automatically test your critical user paths. Subscribe to our YouTube channel → https://goo.gle/AndroidDevs Speakers: Tor Norbye, Chet Haase, Xavier…

8. 

   29 Jul 2026 · 1 hr 8 min

   The inside story of Jetpack Compose

   Discover the origin story of Jetpack Compose and how it changed the way Android developers build applications. We discuss the original challenges of unbundling the UI toolkit from the operating system to deliver faster updates. By adopting Kotlin and a declarative approach, the team reduced the boilerplate necessary to build user interfaces. While earlier systems relied heavily on XML, Jetpack Compose shifts to a code-first model for easier iteration. Listen to the team share their insights on modifiers, performance improvements, and the future of Android design. Resources: Android is…

9. 

   18 Feb 2026 · 1 hr 7 min

   What's so great about R8?

   Join hosts Tor and Romain as they sit down with Søren Gjesse, Chris Craik, and Shai Barack. This week, the team dives into R8, the whole-program optimizer that handles the "last mile" of your code before it runs on a device. Learn why implementing R8 is effectively like giving your users a "free hardware upgrade" by making their current devices perform like models that are years newer. Enable app optimization → https://goo.gle/R8-Optimizer Chapters: 0:00 - Intro 0:23 - What is R8? 1:16 - R8 vs D8 1:40 - Tree Shaking & Dead Code 4:14 - Handling Reflection 10:10 - Performance Co-Optimization…

10. 

    14 Jan 2026 · 44 min

    XR: Virtually here

    Join hosts Tor, Chet, and Romain as they sit down with Diego Perez (Android Studio) and Patrick Fuentes (Developer Relations) to explore the new frontiers of Android XR. This episode of Android Developers Backstage breaks down the latest announcements and Developer Preview 3, offering a technical look at how developers can start building for spatial environments today. Resources: Hello Android XR sample → https://goo.gle/3Nbnrre Build for AI Glasses with the Android XR SDK Developer Preview 3 → https://goo.gle/49lUjGr Chapters: 0:00 - Intro 4:42 - Latest announcements 5:46 - AI Glasses 8:28…

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