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In the earlier post on Android Development, we’ve learned how to install and setup a complete Android
development environment. Now, before we start development, you should know the Android architecture in
detail.
Being an Android user you may know how the basic functions such as making a call, sending a text
message, changing the system settings, install or uninstall apps etc. Well! All Android users know these,
but not enough for a developer. Then what else details are a developer required to know about Android, I’ll
explain. To be a developer, you should know all the key concepts of Android. That is, you should know all
the nuts and bolts of Android OS.
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Android Architecture Diagram:
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The above figure shows the diagram of Android Architecture. The Android OS can be referred to as a
software stack of different layers, where each layer is a group of sveral program components. Together it
includes operating system, middleware and important applications. Each layer in the architecture provides
different services to the layer just above it. We will examine the features of each layer in detail.
Linux Kernel
The basic layer is the Linux kernel. The whole Android OS is built on top of the Linux 2.6 Kernel with some
further architectural changes made by Google. It is this Linux that interacts with the hardware and contains
all the essential hardware drivers. Drivers are programs that control and communicate with the hardware. For
example, consider the Bluetooth function. All devices has a Bluetooth hardware in it. Therefore the kernel
must include a Bluetooth driver to communicate with the Bluetooth hardware. The Linux kernel also acts
as an abstraction layer between the hardware and other software layers. Android uses the Linux for all its
core functionality such as Memory management, process management, networking, security settings etc.
As the Android is built on a most popular and proven foundation, it made the porting of Android to variety of
hardware, a relatively painless task.
Libraries
The next layer is the Android’s native libraries. It is this layer that enables the device to handle different
types of data. These libraries are written in c or c++ language and are specific for a particular hardware.
Some of the important native libraries include the following:
Surface Manager: It is used for compositing window manager with off-screen buffering. Off-screen buffering
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means you cant directly draw into the screen, but your drawings go to the off-screen buffer. There it is
combined with other drawings and form the final screen the user will see. This off screen buffer is the reason
behind the transparency of windows.
Media framework: Media framework provides different media codecs allowing the recording and playback
of different media formats
SQLite: SQLite is the database engine used in android for data storage purposes
WebKit: It is the browser engine used to display HTML content
OpenGL: Used to render 2D or 3D graphics content to the screen
Android Runtime
Android Runtime consists of Dalvik Virtual machine and Core Java libraries.
Dalvik Virtual Machine
It is a type of JVM used in android devices to run apps and is optimized for low processing power and low
memory environments. Unlike the JVM, the Dalvik Virtual Machine doesn’t run .class files, instead it runs
.dex files. .dex files are built from .class file at the time of compilation and provides hifger efficiency in low
resource environments. The Dalvik VM allows multiple instance of Virtual machine to be created
simultaneously providing security, isolation, memory management and threading support. It is developed by
Dan Bornstein of Google.
Core Java Libraries
These are different from Java SE and Java ME libraries. However these libraries provides most of the
functionalities defined in the Java SE libraries.
Application Framework
These are the blocks that our applications directly interacts with. These programs manage the basic
functions of phone like resource management, voice call management etc. As a developer, you just consider
these are some basic tools with which we are building our applications.
Important blocks of Application framework are:
Activity Manager: Manages the activity life cycle of applications
Content Providers: Manage the data sharing between applications
Telephony Manager: Manages all voice calls. We use telephony manager if we want to access voice calls
in our application.
Location Manager: Location management, using GPS or cell tower
Resource Manager: Manage the various types of resources we use in our Application
Applications
Applications are the top layer in the Android architecture and this is where our applications are gonna fit.
Several standard applications comes pre-installed with every device, such as:
SMS client app
Dialer
Web browser
Contact manager
As a developer we are able to write an app which replace any existing system app. That is, you are not
limited in accessing any particular feature. You are practically limitless and can whatever you want to do
with the android (as long as the users of your app permits it). Thus Android is opening endless opportunities
to the developer.
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44 comments on “Android Architecture – The Key Concepts of
Android OS”
Prasanna
RE P L Y
JULY 10, 2012 @ 2:39 PM
Hi, Your article is really nice. You have explained the OS architecture concept using
simple English words which every one can easily understand. Thanks. All the best to do
this good work.
Arun
RE P L Y
JULY 31, 2012 @ 12:49 AM
very nice
Hemant Anpat
RE P L Y
AUGUST 16, 2012 @ 11:51 AM
Hi, Your article is really nice.
veeranjaneyulu gorantla
RE P L Y
AUGUST 24, 2012 @ 12:14 PM
nice one
anonymus
RE P L Y
OCTOBER 1, 2012 @ 3:44 PM
nicely written article.
Venkatesh
RE P L Y
OCTOBER 18, 2012 @ 10:48 AM
Can you please help me to know the list of available native libriary in Android.
MITESH
RE P L Y
NOVEMBER 20, 2012 @ 2:54 PM
THANKS
Kiran
RE P L Y
NOVEMBER 26, 2012 @ 2:19 AM
Simple and clear…
Sivaprasad
RE P L Y
NOVEMBER 30, 2012 @ 12:44 PM
Good One..!
renjith
RE P L Y
DECEMBER 8, 2012 @ 10:06 AM
really a good work….
ComputerTutorials
RE P L Y
DECEMBER 13, 2012 @ 11:03 PM
Very useful information. Good work.
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Android Architecture - The Key Concepts of Android OS
kaikeraut
RE P L Y
DECEMBER 20, 2012 @ 11:33 AM
okay okay .. need more explanation.. explain android directory structure if possible.
kaikeraut recently posted..Creating Your First Android App
Author
RE P L Y
DECEMBER 21, 2012 @ 10:38 PM
I think this post will help
Visit: Android Project Structure in Eclipse
osos
RE P L Y
DECEMBER 30, 2012 @ 2:24 AM
v.v.nice article ….now i fully knows about architecture
thanx
Sreeharsha
RE P L Y
JANUARY 1, 2013 @ 5:59 PM
ITs very useful. Short and sweet article…
Jimmy
RE P L Y
JANUARY 8, 2013 @ 10:03 AM
Nice article about android layers, simple and clear.
Jimmy recently posted..Android Application – Spy Camera OS (Open Source)
prasanna
RE P L Y
JANUARY 11, 2013 @ 2:07 PM
Awesome it helped me very much
lee
RE P L Y
JANUARY 11, 2013 @ 7:24 PM
Simple and easy to understand
how does an android app does not disturb the other one : Android Community
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rakesh
RE P L Y
JANUARY 18, 2013 @ 11:24 AM
nice i relay enjoy and this is very usefull
Sumit Patel
RE P L Y
JANUARY 19, 2013 @ 11:28 AM
can you arrange some examples and easy sample source for creating activities. i need to
practice for creating activities.
anu..........
RE P L Y
JANUARY 21, 2013 @ 3:57 PM
can you arrange some examples and easy sample source for creating activities. i need to
practice for creating activities.
Isuru
RE P L Y
FEBRUARY 6, 2013 @ 12:47 AM
Very helpful Article. I was searching such a detailed article about android for 3,4 days.
thanx again
gaurav sharma
RE P L Y
FEBRUARY 13, 2013 @ 10:36 AM
Very nice article… it helped me lot…
gaurav sharma recently posted..Creating Your First Android App
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Android Architecture - The Key Concepts of Android OS
bindu kumari
RE P L Y
FEBRUARY 18, 2013 @ 3:47 PM
Its really very simple and nice content of Android Architecture.
bindu kumari recently posted..Creating Your First Android App
sanjeevakumar
RE P L Y
FEBRUARY 19, 2013 @ 12:52 PM
This article is very very nice.Simple to understand the whole architecture..
cmamatha
RE P L Y
FEBRUARY 20, 2013 @ 9:43 PM
this article is very good simple to understand the architecture thanks all the best to do
good work
Jagannadam
RE P L Y
FEBRUARY 23, 2013 @ 11:56 AM
good, neat and better understanding of the basics thank u buddy.
better explain about the kernel functions in detail……………..
Om Kumar Jami
RE P L Y
MARCH 12, 2013 @ 11:14 PM
Explained very nicely in short…
Sri Lakshmi Tulsi
RE P L Y
MARCH 13, 2013 @ 9:58 PM
Hi App’s Market.com,
Good Document it is very nice and good to understand. How the application will work in
the back end ..
Thanks Providing such a valuable mater ..
Regards,
Sri Lakshmi Tulasi
Alaa Harraz
RE P L Y
JUNE 3, 2013 @ 6:06 PM
Very helpful Article.
KC Raju
RE P L Y
JUNE 8, 2013 @ 9:36 AM
It’s really very useful
Sneha Ingale
RE P L Y
JUNE 10, 2013 @ 1:20 PM
Very good.
Short n simple.
kajal
RE P L Y
JUNE 25, 2013 @ 2:40 PM
was of great help
thanks indeed
n good work.
harsh
RE P L Y
JUNE 29, 2013 @ 11:18 AM
realy nyc artical
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Android Architecture - The Key Concepts of Android OS
Naik
RE P L Y
SEPTEMBER 12, 2013 @ 11:59 AM
Excellent Explanation
Naik - Telangana
RE P L Y
SEPTEMBER 12, 2013 @ 12:01 PM
Nice Article…
Vishal Bhatnagar
RE P L Y
SEPTEMBER 24, 2013 @ 12:19 PM
Excellent Explanation
nandan
RE P L Y
NOVEMBER 18, 2013 @ 11:21 PM
Nice article for beginners.thanks sir!
Sandhya Sasidharan
RE P L Y
NOVEMBER 26, 2013 @ 7:53 PM
nice explanation
deepak
RE P L Y
NOVEMBER 27, 2013 @ 6:12 AM
very good and easy expln.
jay
RE P L Y
JANUARY 22, 2014 @ 10:42 AM
thank u bro………awesome article………
Gopinaath
RE P L Y
JANUARY 23, 2014 @ 2:25 PM
Its nice..thank you friend
marella siri
RE P L Y
FEBRUARY 4, 2014 @ 7:53 AM
it’s wonderful gathering about android
it is very helpful for my seminar also
thanks for your social service
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