Android Developer Tools Essentials

Colophon

The animal on the cover of Android Developer Tools Essentials is a cassowary (genus Casuarius), a large, flightless bird that is native to the rainforests of New Guinea and Australia. This genus consists of three species: one is extinct and the rest are living but endangered. It is estimated that only 1,500 cassowaries exist in the entirety of Australia. Like the ostrich and the emu, the cassowary is a ratite, or flightless bird. Although the three species of cassowary differ slightly in size, the Southern cassowary is the largest, with females reaching heights of six and a half feet. Despite their enormous size, cassowaries subsist mainly on fruits that have fallen from trees and will occasionally eat fungus or insects if necessary. They swallow their food whole, sometimes taking in entire bananas or mangos in one gulp.

All species of cassowary are black with bright blue and red necks and hard outgrowths of flesh on the tops of their heads called casques. There is much debate about what purpose the casques serve, with theories ranging from protection from falling fruit to an amplifier of the birds’ rumbling calls. It is also possible that they allow the bird to forge ahead through dense forest growth, with the casque acting as a battering ram to clear foliage out of the way. The thick feathers that adorn the bird’s body are also thought to provide protection from the undergrowth given their unique two-quilled design.

Female cassowaries are much larger than males and are ...