Google Updates Android SDK

Google has released an update to the SDK (software development kit) for Android, its mobile-phone operating system.

It's the first update since the SDK was released in November and includes changes requested by developers.

Google highlighted a couple of changes in the updated SDK, which was released midweek. It has a new user interface that the search giant said is still a work in progress.

In addition, developers can now support additional file formats in the Android media player. Also, applications can translate an address into a coordinate and the reverse, in location-based programs.

Developers haven't had much time to review the updates; few have posted reactions on the Android developers' blog.

Even though developers said that the first version of the SDK was thin, Android has managed to gain momentum. Four chip makers, including Qualcomm and Texas Instruments, showed off prototypes that support Android this week in Barcelona at the annual Mobile World Congress.

Still, Android faces competition from the established mobile operating systems as well as companies that have rallied behind LiMo, the consortium that is developing an open Linux mobile operating system. At the conference in Barcelona, LiMo announced 18 phones that comply with the operating-system specification that are either on the market already or will be.