Writing your first Android program

Following tradition, I started learning Android by going to the Hello World tutorial and implementing it.  The Hello World tutorial for Android can be found at:

http://developer.android.com/resources/tutorials/hello-world.html

This tutorial covers a lot more than just how to write Hello World to the screen.  It covers:

1. Installing a Platform using the Android SDK Manager - Installing the Android SDK does not install everything you need  (Neither would you want it to because you may not want to program for all versions of Android released to date or you may not have room to install them all).  I think I only installed the latest version as suggested in the tutorial.
2. Creating an Android Virtual Device using the AVD Manager - The virtual device or emulator is used to test your Android program.  Yes you could test it out on your own device, however you probably have one may be two Android devices (Possibly a smart phone and a tablet) - using the AVD Manager you can emulate devices that you don't own.
3. Creating your first Android Project - After creating the Android project, browse the folders so that you get a feel for what an Android project contains.  Have a look at the AndroidManifest.xml and the res/layout/main.xml - you will learn more about these later.
4. Creating a User Interface using Code
5. Running the Application
6. Updating the User Interface to use an XML layout which the code loads in

Work through the tutorial, then have a play - try writing different things to the screen, remember you will never learn much just following steps in a tutorial.  You need to play, try things out and read around the subject.

I will be back with more later, when we start delving deeper into the world of Android.