bassethound
25-08-11, 12:32
Google's TV platform is being thrown open to the app-building community, although with no UK launch date as yet.
The US search-and-advertising giant is about to release an update for its Honeycomb operating system, which is widely seen as an OS for tablets.
The update will also make Google TV compatible with Android, and is accompannied by and developers' kit for the app industry.
Google TV has yet to catch on with the TV mass market in the USA, and so far, no Google TV kit has been given a launch date in the UK.
Google TV product manager Ambarish Kenghe blogged: 'These are still early days for Google TV, and this release is another step in providing developer tools for the big screen.
'While the number of apps available on TV will initially be small, we expect that through this early release of the add-on you'll be able to bring optimized TV apps into the ecosystem more quickly.'
The developers' kit includes guidelines and emulators to help them build and test apps that will work on big screen as well as they do on tablets or phones, and can be navigated easily using the remote control's directional pad instead of a touch screen.
But the real excitement will begin when developers create TV apps which can be navigated and shift information between the TV and handheld screens, bypassing the remote control altogether.
The US search-and-advertising giant is about to release an update for its Honeycomb operating system, which is widely seen as an OS for tablets.
The update will also make Google TV compatible with Android, and is accompannied by and developers' kit for the app industry.
Google TV has yet to catch on with the TV mass market in the USA, and so far, no Google TV kit has been given a launch date in the UK.
Google TV product manager Ambarish Kenghe blogged: 'These are still early days for Google TV, and this release is another step in providing developer tools for the big screen.
'While the number of apps available on TV will initially be small, we expect that through this early release of the add-on you'll be able to bring optimized TV apps into the ecosystem more quickly.'
The developers' kit includes guidelines and emulators to help them build and test apps that will work on big screen as well as they do on tablets or phones, and can be navigated easily using the remote control's directional pad instead of a touch screen.
But the real excitement will begin when developers create TV apps which can be navigated and shift information between the TV and handheld screens, bypassing the remote control altogether.