What Prior Knowledge Does Android Development Assume? [closed]

Question

I'm looking into doing some Android app development, just for my own pleasure. I've taken a look at some of the developer articles, the basics etc, and it really sounds like there's a hidden basic assumption about one's prior knowledge in relation to app development.

A lot of what was talked about, even in the basics, seemed to go over my head. I'm relatively new to programming, I've mainly done C++ and a little Java. I've not gotten fully into object oriented, still just doing basic programming.

Honestly, I'm a little overwhelmed as where I need to go next in order to make this work. So what direction can you give me in terms of what to learn first. I get that Java will be a big part of it, but is there anything else that would help?

Thanks,

Andy.

Answer 1

The three big things that you need, in terms of background, are:

• Java programming
• XML
• Experience with widget-based UI models (i.e., pretty much anything other than low-level HTML/CSS/JS stuff)

The specific sorts of stuff in Java that you need include:

• Language fundamentals (flow control, etc.)
• Classes and objects
• Methods and data members
• Public, private, and protected
• Static and instance scope
• Exceptions
• Threads and concurrency control
• Collections
• Generics
• File I/O
• Reflection
• Interfaces

Those will all be covered in any decent Java book/course/mind meld from a friendly Vulcan. Those resources will probably go into other stuff as well (Swing, servlets, etc.) that will not typically be relevant to Android.

Answer 2

You should start at the very beginning.

Follow the 'my first app' tutorial step-by-step here, and if you don't understand a word or term or the code, google it. I'd even suggest you re-type the code rather than copy-pasting, so that you actually think about what each line is doing and get some practice debugging what you do wrong.

You should also read and understand about activities as a minimum, but all of the headings under 'app components' are very relevant.