Managing Accounts with the Account Manager

From a user perspective, the Android 2.0 platform introduced many exciting new device features. For instance, the user can register and use multiple accounts for email and contact management. This feature was provided through a combination of new synchronization and account services that are also available to developers. Although you can use the account and synchronization packages with any kind of data, the intention seems to be to provide a way for developers and companies to integrate their business services with the system that synchronizes data to the built-in Android applications.

Android user accounts are manipulated using the classes available in the android.accounts package. This functionality is primarily designed for accounts with services that contain contact, email, or other such information in them. A good example of this type of online service is a social networking application that contains friends’ contact information, as well as other relevant information such as their statuses. This information is often delivered and used on an Android device using the synchronization service (we talk more about synchronization later in the chapter).