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Google Launches Android P Beta 2 With Final APIs (venturebeat.com)

Posted by msmash on from the now-this dept.

An anonymous reader writes: Google today launched the second Android P beta with final APIs and 157 new emoji. If you're a developer, this is your third Android P preview, and you can start testing your apps against this release by downloading the new preview from developer.android.com/preview. The preview includes an updated SDK with system images for the Pixel, Pixel XL, Pixel 2, Pixel 2 XL, and the official Android Emulator. If you're already enrolled and received the Android P Beta 1 on your Pixel device, you'll automatically get the update to Beta 2.

2 of 40 comments (clear)

  1. emojis.... by phlawed · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I'll admit to being a relatively old fart. Can someone please ELI5 the industri-wide obsession with emojis? To me, it rates a divison or two lower on "picks my interest"-scale than a new font. And I generally find fonts quite uninteresting. obl xkcd link

    No, honestly: I would like to know. I see no innovation in adding more emojis, no basic need covered and it is not as if a world of new possibilities suddenly opens itself because 157 new emojis were added. I am not against the very idea of emojis. I just don't understand the general hype and attention to emojis.

    I actually feel a slight bit of secondhand embarassment for this hangup. Is it just me?

    --
    Dag B
    1. Re:emojis.... by iampiti · · Score: 1, Insightful

      It seems the few last Unicode updates have been centered about adding politically correct emoji. I understand why that may be appealing to some people but for the insensitive bastard that I am feels like superficial shit.
      Also, some time ago here in Spain some people organized themselves to petition the Unicode consortium for a paella emoji. Is it really so important to have an emoji of your favourite dish?
      The thing about emojis is that, being images, are particularly suitable for politics games and pressures (see the recently added redhead emojis) so between that and the fact that you can represent anything with an image it looks like Unicode will be more and more cluttered with tons of redundant and stupid emojis (are they gonna ad an image for every possible dish?). Eventually they'll run out of code points and they'll have to develop a new standard with a gazillioni bits for code points