What are the hidden features of Android M?

These are some new features you may see in the Android M.

1. Full App State Backup : The Android M can automatically backup the app preferences and settings to your Google Drive account.

2. System UI Tuner : With this feature, user can customise the user interface of the device. For example, adding or removing unneccessary items from notification bar.

3. In the next version of Android, user can uninstall an application directly from the homecreen. Just hold the app icon and you will see the option to completely uninstall or remove the shortcut of the app only.

4. In Android M, user can directly install the apps into the memory card of the device. It treats external storage as native storage.

5. It is possible to tether WiFi signals upto 5GHz.

6. It has separate option to adjust the volume of Ringing tone, Alarm and Music.

7. There will be a new easter egg in it.

Android M update will be an extension to Android Lollipop. You cannot expect revolutionary features on it. The update will add some additional features to the Lollipop. Some of the notable features of Android M are:

1. A working native fingerprint scanner. I hope you will get this feature in even in low end devices.
2. Android Pay to make purchase.
3. Supports iOS wearable devices like Apple Watch.

Improvements made in specific modules:
Permission:
In earlier Android devices, any app can access your microphone, camera, phone book etc without user permission. Actually the permissions were pre-approved. In Android M, each app will request for permission. It gives more security.

Battery life:
Developers reported that they have improved memory management, resource management which is optimized to use minimum power. So we can expect improvement in battery life.

System features:
Improvements were made in existing system like more interactive copy/paste/undo toolbar. There are seven new languages added to the existing system. Few improvements were made in Bluetooth interface.

In addition to the above features, Google has not yet revealed a few features which may come with Android M. Developers have been unearthing a few secrets from the developer previews released so far . Here are a couple of them -

1. Uninstallation of apps from homescreen
It was not possible hitherto to uninstall apps from the homescreen. Though not a great feature, yet simple and useful way to get rid of unwanted apps.

2. Easy scrolling of apps in app drawer
In addition to the vertical scrolling, you can now search for the app by typing in the name in the search box. Also there are letters that appear which help you scroll.

3. Google Voice search from lockscreen
You can now use Google voice search from lockscreen itself. No need to unlock your device.

4. Dark and light theme
You can now switch between dark and light themes. When you switch to dark theme, everything switches to material dark.

5. Do Not Disturb mode
Do not disturb (DND) mode has been improvised. You can set DND modes for weekends, nights or during meetings.