All jokes aside – Real and not-so-real developer news from early April

Last week, the internet was awash with some seriously suspect tech innovations from manufacturers and service providers alike. From Samsung’s proposal to turn city pigeons into wi-fi transmitters to HTC’s smartphone ‘Gluuv’ and Virgin Canada’s connected mobile shoes, the April Fools’ Day jokes shone a humorous light on some genuinely important issues for the tech community.

It’s no surprise that many of the pranks related to mobile technology. With more and more mobile devices coming to market, it’s no surprise that people were fooled by the more adventurous designs. Likewise, the proliferation of Android gadgets of different shapes, sizes and capabilities looks set to keep coders busy for the foreseeable future.

The good news is that there are plenty of resources available to help developers keep abreast of upcoming hardware innovations. For those that need a boost with building and optimising apps for Android mobile and embedded platforms, Intel has just released an updated version of Intel® System Studio, its comprehensive tool suite that helps developers create apps for the new generation of high performance mobile tech.

The new feature set includes everything from system software debug via JTAG to device driver and shared object build and optimisation with the Intel® C++ Compiler and the Intel® VTune Amplifier for Systems and Intel® Energy Profiler. It may sound too good to be true but we’re assured that this is no April Fools’ joke.

While (thankfully) it won’t be necessary to optimise your apps for anything resembling the Ocado sLablet in the near future, you can find out more about the available #IntelAndroid devices you might want to build for on the Intel Developer Zone.

• This blog post is written by Softtalkblog, and is sponsored by the Intel Developer Zone, which helps you to develop, market and sell software and apps for prominent platforms and emerging technologies powered by Intel Architecture.

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