I’m sure that most Mac users haven’t even thought about such a thing as launching an Android app on their Macs. Well, the only reason possible is to do this out of sheer curiosity and to see how the things are going on alternative platform. But the reality is that among 750 000+ apps created for Android there are surely some that will be interesting and useful for a Mac user.
In case you’ve finally decided to try and see what Android application looks like, you can do that with the help of a free app called App Player. This app has been created by a start-up BlueStacks. They spent two years for development of this utility. App Player Alpha for Mac was released in June, 2012, and not long ago the company presented a beta-version of its product.
This application uses technology called LayerCake which provides proper environment for launching Android ARM applications on the devices that run under other operating systems. After installing of the App Player on your PC you can download any Android app directly from the program without using Android smartphone. It also should be mentioned that in order for the app to work you’ll need a fast processor and powerful graphic card. For example, Angry Birds will play smoothly on dual-core 2.5 GHz processor and 512 Mb graphic card. Though it also depends on the app you’ve launched.
Previously, users could launch only some of the Android apps (like Fruit Ninja or Pulse RSS-client) but with the release of a beta-version any Android app should launch on your computer. Well, not of them will work perfectly due to control peculiarities.
You may find a short story about the creation of BlueStacks from the video below:
As it is seen from the video, App Player has already achieved success in the world of Windows – according to the latest data, more than 5.3 million people have used this app. And the guys from BlueStacks begin to cooperate with different manufacturers (like AMD and Asus) for getting investments, for process optimization and for pre-installing of App Player on computers.
Some journalists write that BlueStacks startup can make the development of Android apps more attractive for developers, because now users can launch Android apps both on Mac and Windows devices. Developers can also add an option of in-app purchase without the necessity to give the third part of the income to the app store.
