First of all, I'm sorry I don't speak very good english. I have a thesis project to make android app similiar like logo quiz using java. Basicaly, I have to make the admin site of this app or make it updatable not via play store. I'm going to put the newest APK version in a website host. Does anyone here know how to make it work like that? Or maybe you have another idea to make the admin site? please tell me
The update also must be installed. The user will check is there any newest version. Then user will download it and the downloaded APK will be automaticaly installed
This is not easy to do. The only option you have is to write some server side code to let a client know what the latest version is. The client can trigger a local notification and alert the user that a new version is available.
Facebook managed to do what you're asking but I'm sure a lot of engineering effort went into it.
[EDIT]
Google has updated their policy to forbid dynamic updates.
“An app downloaded from Google Play may not modify, replace or update
its own APK binary code using any method other than Google Play's
update mechanism.”
FYI Without uploading on play store, user will never come to know about the updates of your app.
Or
There must be some kind of notification you should implement in your admin and send to your users using the app, and through that notification you should ask user to download updated APK from your web.
Related
I'm developing an android app that won't be downloaded via the Google Play store but instead through an APK listed on my website. I was looking for a way to update this app.
I've done some research and I think the best way would be to run an API at the start of the app that checks the downloaded app's version against the version of the APK listed on the website (at the time of app launch). If the version of the website APK is higher, then I prompt the user for an update. Ideally the API would get the APK itself without the user needing to go to the website.
I have some doubts about this that I hope someone can answer however:
First - Once I download the new APK does the old one get deleted or do I have to do that?
Second - How do I keep User Preferences?
If this isn't the right way to do it I'd appreciate any tips.
If it is the right way and you know of some good resources to build an API like this I'd appreciate those too!
I am installing security software/hardware into a couple different school districts. The application is at it's final stage, however I will need to send updates to users periodically. For example, a general password will be changed for the application every 6 months.
Installing an .apk is considered an "update" after the initial application is installed, correct?
I just have a feeling that there should be some easy way of doing this. I don't really want to give people an .apk. Someone could get smart and tear it apart to find the contents. That, and some others might not understand how to install files on their phone.
What are your ideas? Maybe a web link a user can go to that starts the install for them?
You have multiple misconceptions how updating, APKs and keeping keys secure work.
You have to host your APKs somewhere. Github releases is a pretty common way (but slow), but you could also use google drive, dropbox or your own server.
Your app has to fetch the server regularly and check if a new APK is available (pull-based). Second option is to use push notification in some kind e.g. FCM (push-based). Then you download the APK and let the user install it. Your app cannot start a installation by itself, it has to be done by the user.
But you can redirect the user to the installation menu with that APK, so he just has to click "Install". "Install from unknown sources" has to be enabled for that, if not the user will get an information about that from the OS with a way to enable.
There are apps like "APK extractor" which get you the APKs from google play without root, so there's nothing wrong about giving out the APK. Your APK should never contain secure keys which the user isn't allowed to see. It's easy to reverse engineer those keys, it's just a matter of time.
I have distributed my app through posting the link from google drive where the users can download the .apk file.Now that I haven't published my app in google play how to know how many installs or how many people have installed my application.Is there a way I can increase the count variable in the server or something like that?
Unless you went through the App Store or integrated some third party analytics tool like Fabric you would need to have implemented this in the application with a request to a server with a unique identifier to keep track.
Is there a way I can increase the count variable in the server or something like that?
Well that seems a bit shady. You don't want to lie to people, do you?
When you release an app on the Play Store, Google will keep track of how many users download your app, and update it accordingly. So if people use your app, then your downloads (listed on the Play Store) will reflect that.
To see your current downloads, you should be able to find that information on the "Google Play Developer Console." (I would imagine; I currently don't have access to the dashboard myself.)
we have our android application which is running in kiosk mode. We would like to have feature to automatically check for updates, install those updates and run application again.
We can use some android service for that (actually, that's preferable way).
Do anybody has idea how we can accomplish that?
Thank you.
When the user has activated the auto update option in Play Store, then your update will automatically installed once the user has Wifi. If the user hasn't set this option you can do nothing about that.
You can ping your API every time your app starts, and your API has to tell you whether there is a new version. With this information you can display a popup to the user which forwards him to your PlayStore entry. But the user must select to update your app, you can not automate this process.
What you could do: If you write an HTML5 app, or you have a WebView which loads content from the network, then you can do your magic updates by simple updating the sources on server side.
Let's say I published a game and after some point of time I wanted to release an all new feature for the game. Of course the app must be able recognize and download the update. How does this work specifically with Google Play apps? Does the app download the entire new version of APK from the market and reinstalls itself? I'm using Java for the development, if this info helps. Any tips you can give me about this topic?
With Google Play, the user is notified that app updates are available. It is up to the user to initiate the download of the updates.
You can always include in your app a check to your server as to whether an update is available. However, this becomes a maintenance issue.