Google’s mobile operating system has been following the same naming scheme since its early days, and all the versions that have been released after 1.0 and 1.1 have been named after a type of sweet in an alphabetical order, starting with “Cupcake” and following with “Donut”, “Eclair”, “Froyo” and so on. Today, the latest Android version (6.0) is known as “Marshmallow”, and if history is any indication then Google’s next major Android release will be named after a sweet beginning with the letter “N”. Whether it will be “Nougat”, “Nut Roll”, “Nutella” or something else should be settled later this year, following the operating system’s expected unveiling at Google I/O.
At the moment, there’s little information regarding the upcoming features of Android “N”. Aside from the mystery surrounding the operating system’s moniker, there’s not much to be said about the software additions either. However, a couple of intriguing screenshots have been recently published by the Android Developers blog, showing the familiar Android settings menu (the Bluetooth sub-menu to be precise) in both dark and light (or Day & Night) themes. It’s worth noting that, although previously showcased in early Marshmallow builds, the light and dark theme feature was not part of the final Android 6.0 release. More importantly, the sub-menu seems to accommodate a hamburger button in the upper-left corner of the screen – a feature that is currently missing in Android 5.0 Lollipop and Android 6.0 Marshmallow. Although the screenshots seem to originate from a Nexus 5, they don’t seem to have been captured on your standard build of Android 6.0 Marshmallow.
As with the dark and light themes, there’s no guarantee that the final build of Android “N” will feature a hamburger button within the settings menu. This feature may or may not make the cut in the final build, so only time will shed more light on the matter. Other features rumored to be part of Google’s next major Android release include native stylus support, improved Smart Lock features, additional optimizations for the battery-conscious Doze mode, and various subtle changes within the user interface. Google I/O 2016 begins on May 18 and ends on the 20th, and throughout these couple of days, the search engine giant is expected to reveal its progress and future plans for the Android world.