While many of us are running Android 12 and a lot of people are waiting for Android 12 to be available. However, that does not mean that Google wants to slow down as the company has launched the second developer preview of Android 13 today.
For those interested, the new update focuses mainly on two categories: security and developer productivity. Obviously, the former is what would interest the readers as the latter would be better for the developers.
The Android 13 Developer Developer Preview 2 is available for all Pixel phones starting from Google Pixel 4 series and forward. If you already have the first developer preview installed, you do not have to do anything as you will get the update pretty soon. However, if you want to give this a shot, you can go ahead and manually install it. Last but not the least, if you do not own a Pixel device, you can always try Android 13 using Android Emulator within the Android Studio.
Android 13 Developer Preview 2 Brings Notifications Permissions, Downgradable Permissions, and More
The most notable addition to Android 13 is the new notification permission that Google will have the developers use. At the moment, users need to grant the permissions for apps to access their location, camera, and microphone. With the next version of Android, users will also need to approve access to notifications.
I do understand that this might sound like a trivial thing but it actually is a huge deal. At the moment, apps default to send all the notifications that they want. You will then have to manually alter which apps can send you which notifications. With the new system, however, you will be able to decide from the start if you want the app to send you notifications or not. For someone who installs new apps all the time, it is a much better feature.
Additionally, the Android 13 DP 2 also brings downgradable permissions. This will let developers automatically revoke permissions that are no longer necessary. For instance, if an app you installed once required camera access but now it does not, the OS would automatically downgrade that permission.
