Google Play Services Release Notes are Available for the 10.2 Update — Bye Gingerbread!

It was just a few weeks ago when we learned that the Google Play Services 10.2 update would include an Instant Tethering feature. This information came to us from Andreas Proschofsky, who had sideloaded the update and noticed the feature popup. Google likes to take their time when rolling out big updates like this and we're now seeing more and more people receiving this new update. Yesterday, the company released the highlights from the official change log.

We had also previously learned that Firebase and Google Play Services would be dropping support for Gingerbread in early 2017. This is happening right now with this big 10.2 update and it means that applications using SDK release 10.2.x and later will require a minimum Android API level of 14. Google has also made some changes to the Smart Lock for Passwords feature with this update to Google Play Services.

They have improved the behavior of ID tokens with Smart Lock and now require that applications explicitly request a token by calling setIdTokenRequested(true). Google has added some Fence API methods to their Awareness feature that adds the ability to extend the range of time fencing options for developers. There's also some new Snapshot API interfaces that allow it to get semantic time intervals for the current time and location.

This update now enables game developers to use the Google Sign-in API to simplify server-side authentication. It adds some new health data types that let an application write a wider variety of health data to the Google Fit platform. This includes data such as blood pressure, blood glucose, oxygen saturation, body position, body temperature and more. We're also seeing some changes in the way it displays ads in applications. Specifically it adds support for video assets to Native Advanced content ads and Doubleclick for Publishers custom-rendered native ads.

Developers should definitely be sure to check the details of these highlights in the source link below.

Source: Google Developers

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