Virtual keyboard and other features being added to Android

Last week a new branch of the Android smartphone operating system was made public. This update, code named Cupcake, will add a number of new features to the Android platform and is expected to be merged into the main trunk of the publicly accessible Android source code tree over the next few weeks.

The biggest updates to come from Cupcake are the addition of video recording and playback, Bluetooth stereo support, new browser features like copy/paste and quick search, and the overdue addition of an on-screen virtual QWERTY keyboard. A video of what appears to be Cupcake's on-screen keyboard was posted on YouTube a few days ago and can be seen below.

One of the stranger additions to Android to be packaged into Cupcake is new "x86" support. This basically means that support for Intel and AMD's desktop PC processors is being added to the platform, though we are not sure for what purpose.

A full list of new features and bugs addressed by Cupcake is available from the Android source code website. [via AndroidAuthority]