runescape is a hugely popular mmo, now in its 20th year, which has recently been ported from desktop pc to mobile platforms. the galaxy gamedev team were involved from an early stage in development, profiling the game and providing optimisation recommendations for the development team. while we made a number of suggestions over the time we supported the game, the most significant was the recommendation to move rendering api calls onto a dedicated render thread (a.k.a deferred rendering). this aligned with the work the runescape team were already doing to move to a separate thread for rendering. it is not uncommon for pc games to rely on a single thread which handles the main game loop and also the rendering, but this can be a limiting factor for framerate on mobile; the cpu was taking much longer to submit a frame than the gpu was taking to render it. the major difference between a desktop pc and a mobile device is the power requirements for each. a desktop pc can be plugged into the mains and draw a large amount of power, 500w plus for gaming pcs, and can use large fans to keep cool. a mobile device normally relies on a small battery, and needs to be comfortable to hold, restricting how hot it can get. for long battery life and comfortable temperature, the device should use around 3-4w of power. this means that mobile cpus cannot reach the high frequencies of a desktop cpu, making it hard to match the single-threaded performance. however, both desktop and mobile cpus have had multiple cpu cores for some time, making it possible to spread the load across several cores. the simplest architecture for breaking up a single threaded game is to create two threads, one for the main game and other systems, and one for rendering the scene. this is the approach that jagex took with runescape for mobile and it made a big difference to performance: framerate more than doubled in some cases. more complex architectures use job systems to split up certain cpu tasks such as physics and animation to be run on several cores in addition to having a separate render thread. this approach can be found in game engines such as ue4 and unity. it’s worth noting that even if your game is running at 60fps using a single thread it may still be beneficial to switch to multithreading. this is because there is not a linear relationship between clock frequency and power usage. by running everything on one core, that core will need to run at a higher frequency than if the work was spread across more cores, and that will cause higher power usage and battery drain. it may also cause the device to throttle the cpu to avoid overheating. stay in touch with galaxy gamedev in addition to the many resources on this site, the galaxy gamedev team is starting a new, quarterly newsletter focuesed on optimizing games for mobile devices. if you found this article interesting, please sign up for this newsletter. if you have questions about developing for samsung galaxy devices, please join us on the samsung developer forum.

more improvements to seller portal were released at the end of september. this past month, the seller portal team made some changes based on requests from you. also, learn more about two upcoming events in october that will give you the opportunity to provide us additional feedback. settlement and financial reports include local currency information new local currency information has been added to the settlement and financial reports. the type of currency is defined in the payment currency column (for example, usd) and reflects where the sales occurred. there are new local currency columns for sales, commission, transaction fee, and vat. seller portal timeout after you log in to seller portal, an inactive session remains open for up to 24 hours. that means you only have to log in to seller portal once a day and won’t see the login pop-up notification every 20 minutes. if your session is idle for 24 hours, you are automatically logged out and you will receive a pop-up notification 10 minutes prior to being logged out. for security purposes, remember to log out of seller portal when you have completed your tasks. requirements for samsung iap and android r if your app is integrated with samsung in-app purchase (iap) version 6.0 or earlier with target api level 30 (android r) or higher, an android policy change requires an update to the manifest file. without this update, android r (or higher) users may not be able to make a payment. to the https://developer.android.com/training/basics/intents/package-visibility manifest file, add the following: <queries> <package android:name="com.sec.android.app.samsungapps" /> </queries> iap subscriptions and your customers in india the reserve bank of india issued a regulation that, starting october 1, 2021, customers in india must consent to renew a subscription at the end of a subscription period. auto-recurring (automatically renewed) subscriptions are no longer allowed. if you are using samsung iap, your subscription customers in india will automatically receive an email notification to renew their subscription. if you are using another payment service provider for your subscription items, you must consult with this payment service provider about the changes you need to make to comply with this regulation. see this seller portal notice and the iap subscription guide for more information. iap beta testing the samsung in-app purchase (iap) team needs your help! if you have published an app or game integrated with samsung iap, you may be eligible to participate in an upcoming beta test to review and provide feedback on the following features: manage item prices and information separately from app information change the status of each item to active/inactive, when necessary provide a price template that allows you to manage all items with the same price look for an announcement in october with more information, including how you can apply. sdc21 is coming join us online for the samsung developer conference on october 26th. see what’s cooking with development tools and our latest technology. learn from and network with our experts and your fellow developers and designers. shape. design. create. additional resources on the samsung developers site this site has many resources for developers looking to build for and integrate with samsung devices and services. stay in touch with the latest news by creating a free account and subscribing to our monthly newsletter. visit the marketing resources page for information on promoting and distributing your apps. finally, our developer forum is an excellent way to stay up-to-date on all things related to the galaxy ecosystem.

the galaxy store seller portal team has been busy, bringing you many new and updated features. let’s check them out! galaxy store seller portal policy page seller portal-related policies are being collected and organized onto a single web page. content about app distribution, pricing, and legal requirements that are available in separate notices, guides, and pages can all be viewed from the galaxy store seller portal policy page. bookmark this page and stay up-to-date on any new or updated policies. galaxy store badge images galaxy store badges are used to link to your app detail page or brand page. samsung also provides an image, in different languages, for your link. previously you had to create a badge url in order to download a badge image. the ui has been updated to allow you to download a badge image at any time, without having to create a badge url. for more information about galaxy store badges, see galaxy store badge promotion. app re-registration if your app fails to pass the pre-review phase, you can quickly and easily re-register the app to fix the issues. after reviewing the reasons for rejection, click the re-register button from the app list or the reasons for approval rejection window. your app will move to the re-registering status, allowing you to edit your app information. support for galaxy watch4 apps galaxy watch4 apps registered in seller portal can only be sold in china. to sell your galaxy watch4 apps in any other country, register them in google play. note that galaxy store only supports .apk files. therefore any .aab file must be converted before it can be uploaded to seller portal. for more information about registering a galaxy watch4 app in seller portal, refer to this seller portal notice. support for galaxy z fold3 and flip3 the new galaxy z devices have been released and are added to seller portal’s list of supported devices. if your existing uploaded binaries support these devices, you don’t need to do anything to start selling your apps on these devices. to check if these devices are supported by your app, go to the binary tab and click selected devices. in the detailed device settings window, locate the galaxy z flip3 5g and galaxy z fold3 5g phones and verify their checkboxes are selected. seller portal newsletter archive did you miss any of the earlier issues of the seller portal newsletter? you can view past versions from the archive page. sign up for email notifications (seller portal > profile) and have the monthly newsletter delivered directly to your inbox. don’t miss out on future announcements! additional resources on the samsung developers site this site has many resources for developers looking to build for and integrate with samsung devices and services. stay in touch with the latest news by creating a free account or by subscribing to our monthly newsletter. visit the marketing resources page for information on promoting and distributing your apps. finally, our developer forum is an excellent way to stay up-to-date on all things related to the galaxy ecosystem.

the galaxy store seller portal team has brought forth new enhancements for may. don’t miss out on valuable information about galaxy store seller portal in the past, important changes and the latest news about seller portal were shared through announcements posted on the seller portal system. now, you can receive these announcements directly through email notifications. email notifications contain valuable insights and information about seller portal. you will still continue to receive important announcements about the latest updates to seller portal, but now you can opt in and subscribe to receive benefits, tips, and news focusing on you, the seller. change your email notification preferences at any time from your seller portal user profile. subscribe now and don't miss any of the valuable information from the galaxy store seller portal team. import beta app after beta testing your app, if no updates are required, you don’t need to upload the binary again. instead, you can import the existing binary you used for beta testing to quickly register it for commercial distribution. from the binary tab, click import beta app. app groups an app and its beta test apps are organized and displayed together as a group in your list of apps. you can easily identify which app is on sale in galaxy store or is being registered and if any apps were added as beta test apps. the group can be expanded or collapsed. watch face keywords a new field for watch face keywords has been added for watch face apps (when "watch faces" is selected as the category). previously, we asked you to add keywords used on your watch faces in the description field. this information is used to help us more quickly review your designs and identify any possible ip infringement. in the app information tab of your watch face app, the watch face keywords field is used for you to identify all words (such as your brand name) that appear on your watch face design. text for commonplace terms, such as the names of days or months, do not need to be included. promotional opportunities for galaxy store while discovering apps, a user may download an app based on various factors such as the app name, icon, screenshots, or description. screenshots are one of the most important assets and can be used to make a big impact and visual impression. did you know that your uploaded screenshots may be used for a banner in galaxy store? if you upload an image with a 16:9 ratio, the galaxy store team can immediately consider it for their promotions. have you tried out last month’s updates to beta testing? last month, enhancements to beta testing included testing any app at any time and running open and closed beta tests simultaneously, improving your ability to find and fix issues with your app before publishing in galaxy store. read more about these added features in enhancements for beta testing apps in seller portal. additional resources on the samsung developers site this site has many resources for developers looking to build for and integrate with samsung devices and services. stay in touch with the latest news by creating a free account or by subscribing to our monthly newsletter. visit the marketing resources page for information on promoting and distributing your apps. finally, our developer forum is an excellent way to stay up-to-date on all things related to the galaxy ecosystem.

yes, samsung's unpacked august 2022 is happening! livestream the event wed, aug 10th at 9am et/6am pt on samsung.com and samsung's youtube channel. here's what to expect: announcements about the samsung galaxy z fold4, galaxy z flip4, and galaxy watch5. plus, reserve yours before august 10th and get a $100 samsung credit for a galaxy smartphone or a $200 samsung credit for a galaxy smartphone bundle. last year, samsung shipped nearly 10m foldable smartphones worldwide, which was a 300%+ increase from 2020. foldables are definitely going mainstream and gaining a larger share of the overall smartphone market. according to dr. tm roh, president and head of mx business, samsung electronics, the foldable form factor is now the preferred choice for millions. this unpacked announcement will focus on foldables being the optimal tool for productivity and creative expression. mark your calendar to be part of unpacked aug 10, 2022; livestream the event at 9am et/6am pt, on samsung.com and samsung's youtube channel. developer content we've also been busy creating technical content about foldables for developers. foldables podcast with guests from microsoft, google, and samsung (season 3, episode 7) guy merin (microsoft), ade oshineye (google), and søren lambæk (samsung) discuss foldable trends and how companies are working together to help developers create for this new and innovative technology. follow along in our code labs and tutorials about foldables. boost your apps' value with foldable and large screen optimization discover more about implementing, optimizing, and testing your apps on galaxy z devices. this foldables and large screens page is a collection of code labs, blogs, and docs that you can review at your own pace. how to use jetpack windowmanager in android game dev - code lab with the increasing popularity of foldable phones such as the galaxy z fold3 and galaxy z flip3, apps on these devices are adopting foldable features. in this blog, you can get started on how to use foldable features on android game apps. develop a camera web app on foldables - code lab learn to develop a camera web application that detects partially folded postures and adjusts its layout accordingly to improve the user's experience on samsung foldable devices. companion blog to the camera web - tutorial (spanish version here) follow along with laura morinigo, web developer advocate, samsung, as she guides you step-by-step on how to create a web app for a foldable device when the device changes postures. she also gives a tech talk: unfolding the future of response web design (from sdc 21). how to test your mobile apps through a web browser -- video tutorial don't have a foldable device to do your development and testing? you can use the remote test lab, it's free! additional resources on the samsung developers site the samsung developers site has many resources for developers looking to build for and integrate with samsung devices and services. stay in touch with the latest news by creating a free account and subscribing to our monthly newsletter. visit the galaxy store games page for information on bringing your game to galaxy store and visit the marketing resources page for information on promoting and distributing your android apps. finally, our developer forum is an excellent way to stay up-to-date on all things related to the galaxy ecosystem.

in the last two updates of seller portal, the galaxy store seller portal team included enhancements for beta testing. and this month, they’ve done it again. the latest seller portal update introduces multiple and simultaneous closed beta testing and the ability to manage your beta apps using the galaxy store developer api. run up to six beta tests simultaneously a previous enhancement allowed you to run both an open and closed beta test at the same time. now, you can have up to five (5) closed beta tests and one (1) open beta test for one app running at the same time. that’s a total of six (6) beta tests being run at the same time for the same app! why run multiple beta tests for the same app? you could run a beta test for a bug fix and another for an upcoming major release. you could test different features with different users which can help you to decide what to include in the next release of your app. and, with your beta test apps grouped and located below your commercially distributed app in seller portal, you can easily see and keep track of each beta test version of your app. each beta test app has an automatically-generated prefix added to its name. however, you can edit the app name as you wish. to take advantage of this feature, the following is required: testers must have galaxy store version 4.5.27.9 installed. you must use the closed beta urls generated after may 25, 2021, which contain the content id. urls generated before may 25th do not contain the content id and, if used, may not direct the tester to the correct version of the app. distribute and manage your beta test apps using the galaxy store developer api the galaxy store developer api is a set of server-to-server apis that allow you to manage apps, manage in-app items, and check app statistics without accessing seller portal. use the apis to programmatically access the same types of functionality provided by galaxy store seller portal. the content publish api is used to view, modify, submit, and change the status of apps registered in galaxy store seller portal. the iap publish api is used to view, register, modify, and remove samsung in-app purchase (iap) items. finally, the gss (galaxy store statistics) metric api is used to get statistics about apps registered in galaxy store. start managing your commercially distributed apps and beta test apps programmatically using the galaxy store developer api. seller portal update announcements if you missed any of our announcements about enhancements to beta testing, you can find the information in the enhancements for beta testing apps in seller portal and may updates for galaxy seller portal are here! blogs. you can also opt-in to receive the seller portal newsletter to find out what has been updated in seller portal each month. the june newsletter includes tips about beta testing such as configuring licensed testers, responding to tester’s comments, and much more. subscribe or unsubscribe from the newsletter in the email notifications section of your seller portal profile. additional resources on the samsung developers site this site has many resources for developers looking to build for and integrate with samsung devices and services. stay in touch with the latest news by creating a free account or by subscribing to our monthly newsletter. visit the marketing resources page for information on promoting and distributing your apps. finally, our developer forum is an excellent way to stay up-to-date on all things related to the galaxy ecosystem.

here are the updates and announcements the seller portal team cooked up for you in october. introducing staged rollouts have you ever been worried about finding issues in your app just after releasing or updating it? using staged rollouts, you can distribute your app gradually, allowing you to monitor it and observe user responses. you can: set options for staged rollout when you register an app apply the same rollout rate for all countries or set different rates for individual countries pause and resume a staged rollout update an app after pausing its rollout see set a staged rollout for more information. managing licensed testers when running a closed beta test, if you want to allow testers to purchase in-app items without charging them, you must add them to the licensed testers list. when registering your binary, you can manage up to 400 testers from the beta test section by clicking license tester setting. advanced mode is removed when registering an app, all configuration options are displayed, not just the required or basic information. you no longer have to select advanced mode to display everything. quickly find the essential information you want to add or update. chrome is the official browser of seller portal chrome is the officially supported browser of seller portal. internet explorer is no longer supported and seller portal services are not optimized for other browsers such as microsoft edge and mozilla firefox. updates to unity and unreal samsung iap plugins the unity and unreal samsung iap plugins have been updated to version 6.1.2 due to a change in android’s policy. if you are using samsung iap version 6.0 or lower with a target api level 30 (android r os) or higher, you must manually update your manifest file. see this seller portal notice for more information. free galaxy game plays font we have created a galaxy game plays font for our galaxy store users. from your galaxy mobile device, in all countries except china and south korea, click here to download it for free. in south korea, from your galaxy mobile device, click here. coming soon, updates to review periods in early november, the length of a review period will be added to the description of the publish automatically, publish on date, or publish manually options. this will help you decide which publishing option is right for you. in addition, the button in the app list that allows you to update your publishing options will be renamed to publication settings. clicking this button opens a window from which you can publish the app “now” or change the publishing start date. congratulations to all of the best of galaxy store award winners the best of galaxy store awards ceremony was held during the samsung developer conference, sdc21, on october 26th. awards for the best apps, games, themes, and bixby capsules were announced. find out more about the award winners on the best of galaxy store awards page or watch the video. additional resources on the samsung developers site the samsung developers site has many resources for developers looking to build for and integrate with samsung devices and services. stay in touch with the latest news by creating a free account and subscribing to our monthly newsletter. visit the marketing resources page for information on promoting and distributing your apps. finally, our developer forum is an excellent way to stay up-to-date on all things related to the galaxy ecosystem.

having both large and small screens on the same device provide an advantage when implementing out-of-the-box design concepts. it also creates the challenge of making a responsive user interface for such a device. guideline is a visual guide which allows you to align views, with the guideline itself remaining invisible at runtime. guidelines can be arranged either vertically with a width of zero and a height equal to its parent constraint layout, or horizontally with a height of zero and a width equal to its parent constraint layout. in this blog, we learn how to start using guideline to make a responsive layout in your applications. figure 1: guideline visibility in android studio layout blueprint mode so let’s find out what needs to be changed to take advantage of these features. implementation step 1: to add horizontal or vertical guidelines, navigate to helpers > guideline (horizontal) or guideline (vertical) and drag the desired element to your layout. figure 2: guidelines in the helpers menu step 2: when you add a guideline using drag and drop, it has the app:layout_constraintguide_begin value. the problem with this value is that it is static, which may break the responsive layout standard. that is why i prefer to use app:layout_constraintguide_percent instead, which can be set as a percentage value. in the example below, a value of “0.6” equals 60% of the screen width. <androidx.constraintlayout.widget.guideline android:id="@+id/vguideline2" android:layout_width="wrap_content" android:layout_height="wrap_content" android:orientation="vertical" app:layout_constraintguide_percent="0.6" /> the screenshot below shows the output of the above guideline example in android studio. figure 3: guideline example in android studio step 3: next, let’s add a view and align it with four different guidelines. in the example below, we have added a button, then aligned it to “hguideline1” and “hguideline2” at the top and bottom respectively. in the same way, we aligned “vguideline1” and “vguideline2” to start (left) and end (right) respectively. <button</p> android:id="@+id/button" android:layout_width="wrap_content" android:layout_height="wrap_content" android:text="next" app:layout_constraintbottom_totopof="@+id/hguideline2" app:layout_constraintend_tostartof="@+id/vguideline2" app:layout_constraintstart_tostartof="@+id/vguideline1" app:layout_constrainttop_totopof="@+id/hguideline1" /> figure 4: view aligned to four guidelines we have also added a textview in the top. check the sample application for the full implementation. demonstration now, let’s run the same code on both a foldable device and a galaxy s22. figure 5: sample application running on the foldable cover display (small display) figure 6: sample application running on the foldable main display (large display) figure 7: sample application running on the foldable main display (large display) in landscape mode figure 8: sample application running on a galaxy s22 sample application a sample application has been developed to illustrate the basic implementation of guideline. guideline sample application (19.99 mb) oct 20, 2022 conclusion foldable devices provide a richer experience than phones and to take advantage of their features, every new form factor should be added to the application configuration. the responsive layout feature is one way to provide an enhanced user experience. if you want to learn about more foldable feature implementations, check out my other blogs: implementing drag-and-drop across apps in multi-window mode, foldable adaptation essentials: app continuity and multi-window handling, and adapt your app for galaxy flex mode. additional resources on the samsung developers site the samsung developers site has many resources for developers looking to build for and integrate with samsung devices and services. stay in touch with the latest news by creating a free account and subscribing to our monthly newsletter. visit the galaxy store games page for information on bringing your game to galaxy store and visit the marketing resources page for information on promoting and distributing your android apps. finally, our developer forum is an excellent way to stay up-to-date on all things related to the galaxy ecosystem.

international women's day provides an important opportunity to celebrate women's achievements while calling for greater equality. to support and strengthen gender equality in the developer community – and tech in general – here’s a round up of some of our favorite initiatives that support women in the space. online communities and organizations django girls - this volunteer-run organization and community empowers women to organize free, one-day programming workshops by providing tools, resources, and support. more than 20,000 female devs have already become django girls at events spanning 98 countries and 526 cities. tech ladies - through a supportive online group, a free job board and opportunities to learn, tech ladies has helped thousands of women grow their technology careers. members can connect with 100,000 females working in the tech space through this international community. women who code - envisioning a world where women are proportionally represented as technical leaders, executives, founders, vcs, board members, and software engineers, women who code provides over 200,000 members with access to programs and services designed to support career growth. this global community connects female devs with jobs, leaders, scholarships, and more. 80% of members reported positive career impact after joining wwcode. e-mail subscription lists ada’s list - with a mission to make women in technology stronger as a community and as individuals, this community asks its members to listen, ask, answer, support, participate, and be thoughtful, helpful, open, honest, and respectful. they aim to address female under-representation in tech by providing a space for discourse and change. systers - the world’s largest email community of women in technical computing roles, systers provides a private, safe online forum. members gain support by networking, sharing advice, and experiences, and collaborating on various projects. with 23 different affinity groups, women technologists from a variety of backgrounds and self-identified cultures can connect. organizations that promote strong female voices women who design - this directory of accomplished women in the design industry helps people find notable and relevant voices to follow on twitter by parsing twitter bios for popular keywords, including developers, ux designers, web designers, and more. women talk design - this organization elevates women and gender non-binary speakers and their talks so organizers can better discover them. it also provides tools, information and resources to organizers on how to design more inclusive events, and offers training, events, and community for new speakers. organizations aimed at supporting the next generation girls who code - on a mission to build the largest pipeline of future female engineers in the united states, girls who code is a supportive sisterhood of peers and role models who create clear pathways for young women to join the computing workforce. techbridge girls – for the past 20 years, techbridge girls has aimed to excite, educate and equip girls from low-income communities by delivering high-quality stem programming, empowering them to achieve economic mobility and make better life choices. in the next ten years, they’re aiming to have empowered 1 million young women through their programming. within our samsung developer team, we have a roster of strong women in leadership roles – each of whom contribute in meaningful and unique ways. we have made great strides as an industry and are looking forward to an even more diverse and inclusive developer space in the years to come. check out the above resources and drop a comment if we missed any that you love. happy international women’s day 2020!

this blog is the fourth in a series of posts about remote test lab (rtl). in previous blogs, we covered what is remote test lab, its new features, and auto repeat. in this blog, we show you how to connect rtl to android studio and how to deploy and debug your app on the remote device. in an upcoming blog, we are going to take a deep dive into some additional features of remote test lab. remote test lab allows you to run and debug your application on real devices remotely. in this blog, we will connect a remote test lab device with a local development machine’s adb (android debug bridge) using remote debug bridge. the remote debug bridge tool enables you to run and debug your app to check compatibility with the latest samsung mobile devices, which solves the problem of not having your own physical devices. connect your remote test lab device to android studio to get started, launch a remote test lab client, then go to remote test lab and reserve one of the available mobile devices. the operating system version, device location, and desired time can be selected on the remote test lab page. a jnlp file is downloaded to your computer when you click the start button. if you run this file, the remote test lab client is launched and a live image of the device is shown in the client. step 1. when the live image is shown, right-click on the device's screen and select ‘test > remote debug bridge.’ step 2. in the pop-up window, view the required command and port number to connect your android studio to the remote test lab device. step 3. open a command prompt window and run the adb command with the given port number. in this example, the command is: adb connect localhost:50964 note: you must accept the rsa key prompt by allowing usb debugging when you run the adb connect command for the first time on a remote test lab device. deploy and debug apps from android studio step 1. the device is now ready to deploy your app from android studio. build and run your app from android studio. in the following screenshot, an app is being deployed on a remote test lab device from android studio. step 2. the app is deployed and launched successfully on the remote test lab device step 3. debug your app from android studio just like on a real device. in conclusion, remote test lab offers a convenient and effective way to check the compatibility of your app and use debug facilities. finally, our developer forum is an excellent way to stay up-to-date on all things related to the samsung galaxy ecosystem. remote test lab article series get started with remote test lab for mobile app testing what's new in remote test lab testing your app with auto repeat using remote test lab with android studio web-based client preview (coming soon) go to remote test lab