Niall Scott

Contractor senior Android engineer

Niall is a long-tenured Android developer, working with Android since 2009 when Android 1.5 Cupcake was the latest tasty treat. For most of this time he has been working on many Android apps and SDKs. But more recently, Niall has been working within the world of Android Automotive. After getting his hands dirty working on Android platform internals, he is now transitioning to be an Android Open Source Project (AOSP) engineer, while still being involved in app development.

Dual booting for testing and curiosity with Dynamic System Updates

Did you know that on some devices, you can "dual boot" with a primary and secondary installation of Android? Perhaps the emulator is not sufficient and you need to test your app's features on real hardware across different system images/OS versions? Or maybe you are a hobbyist who wants to play around with other system images on real hardware? In this lightening session, you will learn about Generic System Images (GSIs) and how they can be used with DSUs to allow you to "dual boot" a supported Android device with a different system image to test your app. You will discover how they are a convenient way to switch between system images without losing data in your primary installation, and how they can be applied much quicker than a full device flash.