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Android Programming for Beginners

Android Programming for Beginners - Fourth Edition

By : John Horton
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Android Programming for Beginners

Android Programming for Beginners

By: John Horton

Overview of this book

Modern Android development has evolved rapidly, with Kotlin and Jetpack Compose becoming the standard tools for building powerful mobile applications. Android Programming for Beginners provides a practical introduction for readers with little or no coding experience. Rather than overwhelming you with theory, the book teaches concepts gradually through hands-on experimentation and small, focused apps that reinforce core programming fundamentals. You will begin by learning Kotlin essentials including variables, loops, functions, lambdas, collections, and object-oriented programming before moving into Android Studio and Jetpack Compose. As your skills grow, you will create interactive projects ranging from UI layouts and games to multimedia and database-driven applications. Along the way, you will explore Android development techniques such as state management, navigation, Material Design, Room databases, Canvas drawing, and responsive layouts. To help future-proof your workflow, each chapter also includes optional AI-assisted programming exercises that show how modern coding tools can support experimentation, accelerate development, and deepen understanding. By the end of the book, you will have built a portfolio of Android apps and gained the confidence to continue toward advanced mobile development projects independently.
Table of Contents (36 chapters)
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1
Part 1: Kotlin & Jetpack Compose Basics
11
Part 2: Data Structures, Kotlin Fundamentals & More Advanced UIs
20
Part 3: Object-Oriented Programming & Building More Advanced Apps
29
Part 4: Vibe Coding & Learning with AI
34
Other Books You May Enjoy
35
Index

Using Nullable Types

We have established that null values are potentially hazardous, but we also know we will regularly require them. What we need to do, then, is explore how to work safely with them. First, consider this code:

val i1 : Int = 2
val i2 : Int = 2
val answer = i1 + i2
Log.d("Nullability", "The answer is $answer")

You are probably aware that the code above creates two integer values, adds them, and outputs The answer is 4 to the logcat. But let's change it a bit. Consider this code:

val i1 : Int = 2
val i2 : Int? = null
val answer = i1 + i2
Log.d("Nullability", "The answer is $answer")

In the preceding code, there will be an error in Android Studio. We have a type-mismatch error, reported by Android Studio: Required Int found Int?. The error is on the i2 of this line of code.

val answer = i1 + i2

The error occurs because we are using a nullable value, and we must handle the possible (in this case, the actual) null case explicitly...

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Android Programming for Beginners
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