Android Intents

• An intent is a message with a fully qualified name and zero or more parameters.
• Some application fires off an intent at the request of the user.
• Other appliciations are asked / a table is checked to see which applications might respond to this intent.
• A dialog may be presented asking the user which of these applications to handle the intent.
• They process the intent and possibly return a message which the original application gets (if the intent is, say, to select a contact to send a message to.)

Kind of like an upgraded Plan 9 plumber.