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On behalf of the entire Android team, I'm happy to let you know that an updated version of the Android SDK – we're calling it m5-rc14 – is now available. Today, we're continuing the early look at the Android SDK that we started back in November by providing updates to the Android APIs and the developer tools based, in part, on the great feedback and suggestions developers have been giving us. We're excited about the progress that we've made and look forward to making additional updates in the future as the platform evolves towards production-readiness.

There are a couple of changes in m5-rc14 I'd like to highlight:

• New user interface - As I mentioned when we introduced the m3 version of the Android SDK, we're continuing to refine the UI that's available for Android. m5-rc14 replaces the previous placeholder with a new UI, but as before, work on it is still in-progress.
• Layout animations - Developers can now create layout animations for their applications using the capabilities introduced in the android.view.animation package. Check out the LayoutAnimation*.java files in the APIDemos sample code for examples of how this works.
• Geo-coding - android.location.Geocoder enables developers to forward and reverse geo-code (i.e. translate an address into a coordinate and vice-versa), and also search for businesses.
• New media codecs - The MediaPlayer class has added support for the OGG Vorbis, MIDI, XMF, iMelody, RTTL/RTX, and OTA audio file formats.
• Updated Eclipse plug-in - A new version of ADT is available and provides improvements to the Android developer experience. In particular, check out the new Android Manifest editor.

You can find more information about what's changed in a couple of documents that we've published. First is an overview of the changes to the Android APIs in API Changes Overview. If you want a more granular view of what's changed, an API diff between m3-rc37 and m5-rc14 is also available. Finally, Upgrading the SDK provides links to the two previously referenced documents and the release notes, as well as instructions on how to upgrade your development environment.

We still need your help in shaping the platform, so if you find issues with the Android APIs or the developer tools, please let us know through the Android Issue Tracker. If you have general comments or questions, please head on over to the Android groups to get in touch.

We're looking forward to all the applications that developers will create using this new version of the Android SDK. Of course, you can use m5-rc14 or any older version of the SDK for your Android Developers Challenge submission.