I’m thrilled to announce the launch of our newest course at Cloudinary Academy: Introduction to Cloudinary’s Android SDK. Designed specifically for Android developers, this course delves into the optimization of image and video handling for Android applications. This marks a significant milestone as the inaugural mobile course in Cloudinary Academy.
With 6.3 billion smartphone users globally and a staggering 257 billion app downloads annually, mobile technology stands at the forefront of innovation.
Cloudinary provides Mobile SDKs for Android, iOS, Kotlin, Flutter, and React Native. We have additional development courses, however, for today’s discussion, we’ll concentrate on the Android SDK and the most recently released course.
Cloudinary’s Android SDK is dedicated to streamlining mobile app development by offering powerful solutions for image and video management and optimization.
The Introduction to Cloudinary’s Android SDK course is designed to equip developers with the necessary tools for efficient asset management within Android applications.
The course covers:
- Environment setup. Get started with setting up your development environment to seamlessly integrate Cloudinary’s Android SDK into your projects.
- Asset delivery. Learn how to upload, transform, optimize, and deliver assets such as images and videos within your Android applications.
- Video capabilities. Explore the native video player powered by Media3 ExoPlayer, enabling seamless video utilization and delivery within your apps.
- Image loading libraries. Discover popular image-loading libraries like Glide, Picasso, and Fresco, and learn how to integrate them with Cloudinary for efficient image handling.
I collaborated with Adi Mizrahi, Staff Mobile Developer at Cloudinary, to create this course. Adi has contributed insightful blogs on mobile development, available on our Cloudinary blog page. Together, we crafted an Android application for this course, and I’m thrilled to present it to you!
The application we created for this course serves as a practical example of how to utilize the Cloudinary Android SDK to programmatically manipulate media assets within a real-world application environment.
Through this hands-on experience, participants will gain valuable insights into integrating Cloudinary’s features seamlessly into their own Android projects, enhancing their ability to effectively manage and optimize media content.
To participate in this course, ensure you have the Android Studio IDE and Java, version 6 or higher, installed. Additionally, you can obtain the code from our Cloudinary Academy GitHub Repository.
Running the cloned code from this repository displays the application in the Android Studio emulator, enabling you to view the output of your code in real time. The Android Emulator mimics Android devices on your computer, allowing you to test your application across various devices and Android API levels without needing physical devices. You could also run the code on a real device.
To complete this course, you’re not required to clone and run this course’s app on your own. You can gain all of the information by watching the demo, reviewing the code, and completing the assessment. However, if you decide to clone the repository we’ve created, exploring transformations and options within each fragment can significantly enrich your learning journey.
The course begins with uploading assets to Cloudinary’s cloud. From simple uploads to utilizing the Cloudinary Upload Widget, developers will understand seamless asset uploading directly from device galleries. With features like pre-processing and chunked uploads for larger files, Cloudinary’s Android SDK ensures a smooth and secure upload process.
Next, learn the ins and outs of delivering assets with Cloudinary, focusing on transformations and optimizations. Transformations enable dynamic changes to asset properties, while optimizations ensure efficient storage, less bandwidth usage, and faster loading times.
Next, we work with Cloudinary’s video features, powered by Media3 ExoPlayer, which offer flexible and customizable media playback. Using the CLDVideoPlayer, developers can instantiate and integrate the player with ease.
We’ll also discuss how video feed integration, exemplified in the Cloudinary Academy Android app, enhances user engagement with seamless playback and sound support.
Preview this section of the Introduction to Cloudinary’s Android SDK course on YouTube:
In this course you’ll discover how to integrate popular image-loading libraries like Glide, Picasso, and Fresco with Cloudinary’s Android SDK. Each library offers unique functionalities, and developers will learn how to leverage Cloudinary’s dynamic URLs for seamless integration and transformation tasks.
We also highlight the deeper integration offered by Glide, allowing Cloudinary requests directly within Glide’s API for efficient image loading and transformations.
With the Introduction to Cloudinary’s Android SDK course, developers gain access to a comprehensive set of tools for seamless asset management within Android applications. From uploading assets to delivering optimized content to working with video, Cloudinary’s Android SDK empowers developers to enhance user experiences and streamline app development processes.
Explore the capabilities of Cloudinary’s Android SDK today! If you found this blog post helpful and want to discuss it in more detail, head over to the Cloudinary Community forum and its associated Discord. Be sure to keep an eye out for our next mobile course offering, Introduction to Cloudinary iOS SDK, with another custom iOS app built to support the course.
