Techinical Details

The Android OS running on the Shield is a modified version of Android 11(R), tailored to the components and capabilities of the device.

For the most part, development of applications intended to be used on the Shield can be accomplished by following standard Android development methodologies and by leveraging existing Android APIs. The APIs listed below are some of the prominent features of Android for which default APIs should be leveraged:

• Camera – Use Camera2 or CameraX.

• Sensors – Use SensorManager.

• Bluetooth – Use BluetoothManager and BluetoothAdapter. Bluetooth 5.0 BR/EDR/LE are supported.

• Database – Standard Android SQLite and Jetpack Room are supported.

There are some components of the Shield which will require device-specific APIs to access; these APIs will be covered in detail in other sections of the SDK documentation.

Supported Application Development

The Shield supports any application develop for Android.

You can develop in Java with the Android Java APIs, in Kotlin using the Android Kotlin APIs or in C/C++ using Android NDK Layer and APIs.