Multi-Window, Like It or Not, Again

About a week ago, I warned you that your activities might go into multi-window mode even if you opt out. That post was focused on Android apps enabling the capability for power users.

I failed to mention — because I failed to notice :-( — that there is a “Force activities to be resizable” setting in the “Developer options” area of the Settings app on Android 7.0. This knowledge is starting to make the rounds, not only of Android enthusiast blogs, but also more general-purpose media outlets.

The “seven taps” trick to enable “Developer options” helps avoid users accidentally messing with those options. However, as has occurred a few times in the past, plenty of users are willing to play around with “Developer options” to adjust settings to their liking, if they are given instructions to do so from some site that they like.

So, once again, do not assume that your opt-out of multi-window is going to hold up. For most users, it will. For power users — and even a few not-so-power users — your activity will be in multi-window mode, like it or not. The sooner you get your app to be friendly to multi-window, the fewer support issues you may have.