Darryl Bayliss - Android Apprentice

Third Edition

By Darryl Bayliss, Tom Blankenship

Fuad Kamal & Namrata Bandekar

Darryl Bayliss, Tom Blankenship, Fuad Kamal & Namrata Bandekar

Copyright 2020 Razeware LLC.

All rights reserved. No part of this book or corresponding materials (such as text, images, or source code) may be reproduced or distributed by any means without prior written permission of the copyright owner.

This book and all corresponding materials (such as source code) are provided on an as is basis, without warranty of any kind, express of implied, including but not limited to the warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, and noninfringement. In no event shall the authors or copyright holders be liable for any claim, damages or other liability, whether in action of contract, tort or otherwise, arising from, out of or in connection with the software or the use of other dealing in the software.

All trademarks and registered trademarks appearing in this book are the property of their own respective owners.

"To Dhaval, for always supporting me. To Ginger, for all the laughs and hugs!"

Namrata Bandekar

"To Rachael, for putting up with me whilst I spent many nights and weekends to help write this book. To my family, for being there for me always."

Darryl Bayliss

"To my wife Tracy, for her love and understanding while I worked many late nights and weekends. To my son Austin for his support and many corrections to my rough drafts. To my daughter Alaina, for her beautiful smiles and encouragement. To my parents who bought my first Atari computer and set me on this great journey."

Tom Blankenship

"To my parents, who took care of me when I was small. To my children, the apples of my eyes, who provided the light when it was dark and the inspiration to keep going. To my wife, for putting up with me. To Ray Wenderlich, and the entire Ray Wenderlich team, for establishing the gold standard for quality content and writing and showing me the way its done."

Fuad Kamal

Darryl Bayliss is an author of this book. Darryl is a Mobile Engineer at Axon Vibe and lives in London with his wonderful girlfriend Rachael. Away from programming he is usually reading or playing some fantastical video game involving magic and dragons. You can say hello on Twitter over at @dazindustries

Tom Blankenship is an author on this book. Tom has been addicted to coding since he was a young teenager, writing his first programs on Atari home computers. He currently runs his own software development company focused on native iOS and Android app development. He enjoys playing pickleball, guitar, and drums, and spending time with his wife and two children.

Fuad Kamal is one of the authors and a tech editor of this book. He provides mobile strategy, architecture and development for the Health, Fitness, & Telematics markets. If youve ever been to an airport, youve likely seen his work the flight arrival and departure screens are a Flash 7 interface he wrote towards the beginning of the millennium. He's also into photography. He can be contacted through anaara.com. He's @FlexRonin on Twitter and Instagram.

Namrata Bandekar is one of the authors and a tech editor of this book. She is a Software Engineer focusing on native Android and iOS development. When she's not developing apps, she enjoys spending her time travelling the world with her husband, SCUBA diving and hiking with her dog. She has also spoken at a number of international conferences on mobile development. Say hi to Namrata on Twitter: @NamrataCodes.

Kevin Moore is a technical editor for this book. He has been developing Android apps for over 9 years and at many companies. Hes written several articles at www.raywenderlich.com and created the "Programming in Kotlin" video series. He enjoys creating apps for fun and teaching others how to write Android apps. In addition to programming, he loves playing volleyball and running the sound system at church.

Ellen Shapiro is a tech editor on this book. Ellen is a mobile engineer at Apollo GraphQL working on the iOS SDK. Ellen is a prolific speaker at iOS and Android conferences, and loves travel, cycling, cats, and playing sous-chef to her fiance Lilia. When shes not writing or talking about code, shes usually tweeting about it at @designatednerd.

Eric Soto is the final pass editor of this book. Eric is a Professional Software Engineer, certified Agile-Scrum Master and Mac fanatic. Focusing on Apple iOS, Android Apps, NodeJS and APIs, Eric works with clients all across the US including many big-name brands. During his 30+ year career, Eric has also worked with web applications, server back-end systems, automated infrastructure deployments and more. Follow Eric on Twitter @ericwastaken or on his website ericsoto.net.

This book is your introduction to building great apps for Android, using the Kotlin language. Whether you consider yourself a novice programmer, or have extensive experience programming for other platforms, this is the book for you!

It's not our aim to teach you all the ins and outs of Android development or the Kotlin language. They are huge concepts on their own and there is no way we can cover everything. Fortunately, all you need is to master the essential building blocks of Kotlin and Android to start creating apps. As you work on more apps, you'll find the foundations you learn in this book will give you the knowledge you need to easily figure out more complicated details on your own.

The most important thing you'll learn is how to think like a programmer. This will help you approach any programming task, whether its a game, a utility, a mobile app that uses web services, or anything else you can imagine.

If youre looking for more background on the Kotlin language, we recommend our book, the Kotlin Apprentice, which goes into depth on the Kotlin language itself: