Android Pie, version 9.0 of Google's operating system, is coming out: it is available immediately for those who have one of the new Google Pixel or Essential Phone smartphones, while for other Android users it will be in the coming months.
Android Pie looks more colorful overall, with new animations and smoother edges. The biggest innovation compared to the previous Oreo version, writes the Guardian, is the replacement of the traditional three buttons at the bottom of the screen (to go to the home, to go back and to see the applications used recently) with a single mobile navigation button: if pressed it has the function of the home button, if you slide it up you have the overview of the applications and if you keep pressed it activates Google Assistant. The back button still appears when needed.
Another important novelty concerns the “intelligent” use of the battery and brightness: Android will understand – with use – how to optimize the charge by directing it only to those applications that the user is expected to use at a certain time, and will adjust the brightness based on previous manual adjustments. Google Pixel beta testers seem to have recorded battery savings of 20 percent. Also for the series “I'll give you the answer when you haven't asked the question yet”, Android Pie has a rather advanced system of suggestions on applications to open at a certain time of day, based on habits.
Other small but potentially very useful changes: in the navigation bar at the bottom of the screen there will remain a small button to set the vertical or horizontal view more quickly, and avoid having to change the main orientation setting every time, for example, you are lying down to bed. Then, a magnifying glass will be introduced to facilitate text selection, as iOS did. Android Pie will also make several changes to restrict applications' access to data that users have allowed to release: the data will no longer be available when the application is inactive, for example.
We await new updates that integrate news already announced, such as the ability to view additional information from an app directly in the Google search, as happens with previews of Internet pages.
