good overview of android programming
581395
good overview of android programming. deals with the current Android developer toolset as well as best practices. overall very valuable to get up to speed with android programming quickly if you are an experienced programmer. If you aren't an experienced programmer there is still enough depth but you will probably have to spend more time letting the examples sink in and do more of the sample projects.
60352
This book is really a good way to start developing Android Apps. It presents the basics of Android, if you already know Java and XML it will be a lot easier. This book talks about basic applications, don't expect to be an expert with this book. Keep in mind that this book is meant for people with basic or null experience on Android.
3616516
First of the kind. A clear overview is extreme important for developers who has just started their works since Android Framework has changed so rapidly, it is better not too focus on technical details. (Yet, this book give enough details)
3993888
When I saw preview copies of this book being offered, I jumped at the chance!  As an experienced Android SDK developer with a background as a professional C/C++ developer, this is a topic I want to learn more about.  I've only just opened the book, so these are my initial thoughts and I will post an update when I complete the book.

The book starts with an introduction to the NDK and walks the user through setting up the environment.  Even though I've already worked with the NDK, I still found good information in the first chapter.  Remember, the NDK isn't for everything and the author explains the pros and cons of NDK development.  There are not many chapters in the book, as this gives the author plenty of opportunity to go in depth on the topics.  If the first chapter is representative of the rest of the book, this is going to be time well spent.
793473
Learning Android by Marko Gargenta is a well-written guide for getting started developing Android applications. It is targeted at programmers that have some level of Java development experience, but you need not be a Java expert by any stretch to make good use of this book. As long has you have a fundamental understanding of Java programming, this book will serve as a great guide to developing Android applications.

Even though many more advanced developers will not need the opening sections on choosing a development environment, these sections should be read by all. The information it contains on making your development environment efficient, and avoiding some frustrating pitfalls that can hamper even experienced developers is invaluable.

The book does a great job of explaining the architecture and workings of the Android environment without getting sidetracked or being too technical. This straightforward approach to explaining the key concepts of the operating system and how it interacts with applications makes this book an invaluable reference for any programming working in the Android environment.

The most helpful feature of the book is that it walks through developing a Twitter client application from concept to completion using practical software development techniques. You not only get the benefit of learning how to develop a robust Android application, but you learn to use iterative development to construct and improve an application.

Marko Gargenta provides an amazing book that allows you to learn how to build Android applications while also learning how to make use of modern software development practices. This book is a must read for anyone wanting to develop and market Android applications.
4752630
This is the book to read if you want a quick tutorial on Android programming. Got my own app up and running withing a week of reading it. You only need to read the first 100 pages to get the hang of it. The rest of the book offers some additional topics that you can pick and choose from as needed by your app. Some simple programming concepts are a prerequisite though, such as classes, switch statements, for looops and the basics of OOP.
4295844
I'm absolutely have no idea about programming before I read this book. I finished reading the books after 2 months (a bit slow, since I am a dummy when it's come to programming); plus 1 month for reading examples in the internet and trying, then I have my first application. The app is pretty good for personal use, I eventually uploaded it to Google play, and at the time of writing, it had about 600 downloads (it was published in 29 Aug 2014).

So to anyone wonder whether you can start making android app after reading this book, the answer is "Yes". The book gives you basic knowledge for android programming and most of it's features. It's guide you from download the necessary program to the last step of publishing you app to the market. However, if you want to make your apps like those in the Google play, you'll have to spend more time google it.

For example, the book won't tell you how make an alarm clock, but if you read a guide in an programming website, they will tell you that you'll need "Broadcast Receiver" and "Pending Intent". And yes, the book will teach you those two.

For those who afraid that the book is out of date, Barry Burd have his website allmycode.com with update information. During the time I read the book, I found no trouble developing the app for android 4.4 version.

The only thing I don't like about the book is that it's give me too much information, I'm a amateur developer, I really don't need to know how to programming without Eclipse. I stop reading the book after the "App Inventor" section, and I think you should do the same.

Long story short:
Pro: Easy to understand, help you with everything to start programming. The best choice for beginners.
Con: Not suitable for experienced Android programmer, have some unnecessary sections.
2707882
Learning to program in one day might actually be possible but I'm not sure if everyone can do that especially if you're a complete beginner as there are lots of basic and fundamental stuff to learn about before one can proceed to producing a good program. Most people who choose the path of app development are mostly those who are not new to programming in general just like my husband. Point is, the title is a little too absurd BUT the contents of this book are pretty good especially for beginners in app development particularly on Android. The author discussed the basics and fundamentals in a concise and comprehensive manner so regardless of your level, it was easy to follow through the book.
2912353
I am a seasoned .NET / iOS developer who is relatively new to functional programming and this is my first F# book. I really enjoyed the concise, practical and succinct introduction to F# with short-n-sweet examples. I found that the quick introduction helped me bridge the gaps in some topics I did not fully grasp and helped me understand the concepts.

This book provides a concise view of F# from a vantage point of general purpose software development. In this introductory text, author provides more or less standard collection of basic data structures and algorithms with examples. The author provides illustrations, code samples and explains the ideas thoroughly, which is evident in first few chapters where the concept of data structure and language style are still familiar and a concise writing works well. Some places are bit shallow in detail on each topic and could have been further expanded upon. The chapter quotes and interesting code examples are a nice touch.
437990
I was looking for a multiplatform approach to mobile development and the work of Mono team is amazing, so many things happened to Mono now [...] Its hard to say this is a definitive book about Android but its a open door to another alternatives. In the search of re-use our .NET / C# capabilities we found and patent a visual approach more info here [...]
Hope this help, nice book.
3467860
This book serves as a great overview of the jQuery Mobile API. The book goes over the main areas you need to know about as a new comer to the framework. For the more experienced, as I am, I found the book to be useful for uncovering the methods we can use to manipulate a project programmatically (i.e. with JavaScript rather than writing static HTML with the relevant classes applied). Because the official documentation is not yet fully complete, this book is invaluable, with each plugin's API laid out. The book also includes handy references to things such as ui-icon attribute names, for example.

The book is also very friendly to users who may be unfamiliar with some of jQuery's more advanced features and design patterns, with plenty of explanatory pull-quotes and helpful tips. This book should definitely be your first reference point to get a good overview of what's possible and how the framework is set up. There are more books on jQuery Mobile due to be released in the coming months which can help build upon the basics laid out here.
2523660
If you are looking for a book to get your feet wet into android dev then this is the book to buy. If you are new to programming and are not too familiar with Java then I recommend a Java-based book first. This book is the best written android development book in terms of easy to read code, explanations, and diagrams on the print book. As someone not too familiar with android, this book broke down many important elements in android and explained them very well. After following along with the exercises and practices, I feel very comfortable branching out and creating my own projects from the knowledge I learned. I would have liked to see more chapters on Material Design and better UI for some of the examples, but functionality what you just focus on first. Alongside, I would have liked to see some third party libraries like Butterknife being used, but learning the pure android way is always good first. As a side note, android is constantly evolving so some things may be different in the book, but make sure to check out the forums. Overall if you are looking on learning android, I highly recommend this book, and I always keep the book nearby if I ever need more information on a certain topic.
1776796
Very good book with simple examples. I have experience programming other android applications, but needed a good example for creating game animations. This book did that very well.
2023568
Very helpful and easy learning book. The graphics of your phone and screen actions, and less intense reading, makes this a very handy tool for new and moderately experienced Android OS users.
2167499
This book is a distilled version of the Android Bootcamp training course developed by author. It is written for Android beginners. As most of such books  it provides overview of Android operating system and its history, explains main building blocks and how to set up application development environment.

From chapter 5 on, author shows us various Android's features: how to build user interface, preferences, menus, services, database, use lists and adapters, content providers, system services... How to develop a reasonably complex Android application: all on the example of Twitter like application (micro blogging application which enables user to connect to Twitter like service, pull down own and other people messages, and update own status).

Everything went more or less smoothly until the end of chapter 9. TimelineActivity class was mentioned on several places but never used. Refactoring was done, we got rid of the file DbHelper.java. But during chapter 10, DbHelper.java was there again. It seems that some reshuffling of text or chapters was done without proper check. That was little confusing.

This book is not for novice programmers. If you do not know Java or at least some other OO programming language you will struggle with obstacles which you have to resolve alone or with help of book errata page or forum.

There are errata pages (Unconfirmed errata list and Confirmed errata list) at O'Reilly (search for Learning Android, links deleted by Amazon). It is pity the author stop responding on reports sometime in August 2011.

There is also the author's book forum page: Android - Learning Android book Forum at Marakana [link deleted by Amazon] which is updated by the author and book users. Here you can get more information on how to resolve some issues.

Despite of all typos, issues, and some outdated examples (some methods used are depreciated) I still like this book. It teaches you a lot and all problems could be easily resolved.
849091
This is a well written book with many good examples starting with the old favourite "Hello World".  I have found Android programming difficult to learn because  so much depends on imported library methods and classes.  I have not found these well documented anywhere so you depend on examples as in this book to get you started on a project, both to know which android files to import and their methods and  attributes.  The book is large format so needs a lot of desk space but the font is large.  All the code can be downloaded so it is not necessary to type everything in although I found it good practice to do so initially.
1235274
I gave this book 5 stars because it is very comprehensive and up to date as of pre-Kit-Kat. It does include Kit Kat materials online as an additional source though. I originally started learning android through the android developer site, but kept getting stuck due to lack of explanation for *why* things had to be done in a certain way. This book filled in the gaps by explaining the history of android and the reason why all the various APIs function the way they do. Great for understanding the platform.