Google Play Developer Console introduces Universal App Campaigns and User Acquisition performance reporting

At Google I/O in May, we previewed some new and powerful tools to help you further grow your business and improve decision making based on smarter insights on Google Play. We are happy to announce that, today, these features are live in the Developer Console.



User Acquisition: AdWords Campaigns



With just a few simple steps, universal app campaigns lets you easily set up ad campaigns from within the Google Play Developer Console and promote your app across Google Play, Google Search, YouTube and the Google Display Network. You will now be able to more effectively find and grow your install base with the help of Google’s unparalleled reach.

App install ads generated from one universal app campaign


Universal app campaigns automatically pull in images, video, and descriptions from your Google Play store listing to generate ad formats that look great wherever they are placed. From there, our systems automatically optimize your campaigns and experiment with different creatives and bids to maximize app install volume as close as possible to your target cost-per-install.



"With universal app campaigns, we only had to set up one campaign that drove more than 10,000 new installs in one month and install volume is continuing to trend up over time. We're also seeing a 20% lower CPI compared to other channels." – José Maria Pertusa, CMO of Linio


To get started with your first campaign, select the User Acquisition tab for your app in the Developer Console and choose ‘AdWords Campaigns.’


User Acquisition: Performance report




When you’re growing an audience for your app, you’ll want to understand where your most valuable users are coming from. The new performance report on the User Acquisition tab in the Developer Console lets you see how people are finding your Play Store listing, how many install your app, and how many go on to make purchases.

The performance report also tracks marketing links tagged with UTM tags, so you’ll be able to get more granular detail on how well your promotion is doing. Once you’ve got visitors to your Play Store listing, you’ll want to start thinking of ways to increase the number of visitors turning into installers. The new Store Listing Experiments feature can help you run A/B tests to do just that.


How to get started in the Developer Console


To learn how to take advantage of these new features in the Developer Console, watch the DevByte video below in which I explain how to set up your first universal app campaign and how to view the new data offered on the performance tab.






We hope you’ll use these user acquisition tools to grow a valuable audience for your app or game. We continue to improve our features for developers based on your feedback – like the recent improvements to beta testing and Store Listing Experiments – in order to help you grow your app or game business globally on Google Play.

User Data Marshmallow

Marshmallow introduced several changes that were designed to help your app look after user data. The goal was to make it easier for developers to do the right thing. So as Android 6.0, Marshmallow, gains traction, we challenge you to do just that.


This post highlights the key considerations for user trust when it comes to runtime permissions and hardware identifiers, and points you to new best practices documentation to clarify what to aim for in your own app.

Permission Changes

With Marshmallow, permissions have moved from install-time to runtime. This is a mandatory change for SDK 23+, meaning it will affect all developers and all applications targeting Android 6.0. Your app will need to be updated anyway, so your challenge is to do so thoughtfully.


Runtime permissions mean that your app can now request access to sensitive information in the context that it will be used. This gives you a chance to explain the need for the permission, without scaring users with a long list of requests.


Permissions are also now organized into groups, so that users can make an informed decision without needing to understand technical jargon. By allowing your users to make a decision, they may decide not to grant a permission or to revoke a previously-granted permission. So, your app needs to be thoughtful when handling API calls requiring permissions that may have been denied, and about building in graceful failure-handling so that your users can still interact with the rest of your app.

Identifier Changes

The other aspect of user trust is doing the right thing with user data. With Marshmallow, we are turning off access to some kinds of data in order to direct developers down this path.


Most notably, Local WiFi and Bluetooth MAC addresses are no longer available. The getMacAddress() method of a WifiInfo object and the BluetoothAdapter.getDefaultAdapter().getAddress() method will both return 02:00:00:00:00:00 from now on.



However, Google Play Services now provides Instance IDs, which identify an application instance running on a device. Instance IDs provide a reliable alternative to non-resettable, device-scoped hardware IDs, as they will not persist across a factory reset and are scoped to an app instance. See the Google Developer's What is Instance ID? help article for more information.

What’s Next

User trust depends largely on what users see and how they feel. Mishandling permissions and identifiers increases the risk of unwanted/unintended tracking, and can result in users feeling that your app doesn’t actually care about the user. So to help you get it right, we’ve created new documentation that should enable developers to be certain that their app is doing the right thing for their users.

• Understand how permissions and user data are linked


• Learn more about the best practices for permissions


• Discover the best practices for unique identifiers, with clarity based on changes in Marshmallow.

So happy developing! May your apps make users happy, and may your reviews reflect that. :)

Announcing the Google Play Indie Games Festival in San Francisco, Sept. 24

If you’re an indie game developer, you know that games are a powerful medium of
expression of art, whimsy, and delight. Being on Google Play can help you reach
over a billion users and build a successful, global business. That’s why we
recently introduced programs, like the IndieCorner, to help more gamers discover your works of art.


To further celebrate and showcase the passion and innovation of indie game
developers, we’re hosting the Google Play Indie Games Festival at the google maps place Terra in San Francisco, on September 24.

This is a great opportunity for you to showcase your indie title to the public,
increase your network, and compete to win great prizes, such as Tango devices,
free tickets for Google I/O 2017, and Google ad campaign support. Admission will
be free and players will get the chance to play and vote on their favorites.


If you’re interested in showcasing your game, we’re google play indie games now through August 14. We’ll then select high-quality games that
are both innovative and fun for the festival. Submissions are open to US and
Canadian developers with 15 or less full time staff. Only games published on or
after January 1, 2016 or those to be published by December 31, 2016 are
eligible. See google play indie games.


We encourage virtual reality and augmented reality game submissions that use the
Google VR SDK and the TangoTablet Development Kit.


At the end of August, we’ll announce the group of indies to be featured at the
festival.


You can learn more about the event indie games festival.
We can’t wait to see what innovative and fun experiences you share with us!

Improving Stability with Private C/C++ Symbol Restrictions in Android N

Posted by nopi yanto



As documented in the preview Android N
behavioral changes, to protect Android users and apps from unforeseen
crashes, Android N will restrict which libraries your C/C++ code can link
against at runtime. As a result, if your app uses any private symbols from
platform libraries, you will need to update it to either use the public NDK APIs
or to include its own copy of those libraries. Some libraries are public: the
NDK exposes libandroid, libc, libcamera2ndk, libdl,
libGLES, libjnigraphics, liblog, libm, libmediandk, libOpenMAXAL, libOpenSLES,
libstdc++, libvulkan, and libz as part of the NDK API. Other libraries are
private, and Android N only allows access to them for platform HALs, system
daemons, and the like. If you aren’t sure whether your app uses private
libraries, you can immediately check it for warnings on the N Developer Preview.


We’re making this change because it’s painful for users when their apps stop
working after a platform update. Whether they blame the app developer or the
platform, everybody loses. Users should have a consistent app experience across
updates, and developers shouldn’t have to make emergency app updates to handle
platform changes. For that reason, we recommend against using private C/C++
symbols. Private symbols aren’t tested as part of the Compatibility Test Suite
(CTS) that all Android devices must pass. They may not exist, or they may behave
differently. This makes apps that use them more likely to fail on specific
devices, or on future releases — as many developers found when Android 6.0
Marshmallow switched from OpenSSL to BoringSSL.


You may be surprised that there’s no STL in the list of NDK libraries. The three
STL implementations included in the NDK — the LLVM libc++, the GNU STL, and
libstlport — are intended to be bundled with your app, either by statically
linking into your library, or by inclusion as a separate shared library. In the
past, some developers have assumed that they didn’t need to package the library
because the OS itself had a copy. This assumption is incorrect: a particular STL
implementation may disappear (as was the case with stlport, which was removed in
Marshmallow), may never have been available (as is the case with the GNU STL),
or it may change in ABI incompatible ways (as is the case with the LLVM libc++).


In order to reduce the user impact of this transition, we’ve identified a set of
libraries that see significant use from Google Play’s most-installed apps, and
that are feasible for us to support in the short term (including
libandroid_runtime.so, libcutils.so, libcrypto.so, and libssl.so). For legacy
code in N, we will temporarily support these libraries in order to give you more
time to transition. Note that we don't intend to continue this support in any
future Android platform release, so if you see a warning that means your code
will not work in a future release — please fix it now!



Table 1. What to expect if your app is linking against private native libraries.

Libraries	App's targetSdkVersion	Runtime access via dynamic linker	Impact, N Developer Preview	Impact, Final N Release	Impact, future platform version
NDK Public	Any	Accessible
Private (graylist)	<=23	Temporarily accessible	Warning / Toast	Warning	Error
	>=24	Restricted	Error	Error	Error
Private (all other)>	Any	Restricted	Error	Error	Error

What behavior will I see?

Please test your app during the N Previews.

N Preview behavior

• All public NDK libraries (libandroid, libc, libcamera2ndk, libdl, libGLES,
  libjnigraphics, liblog, libm, libmediandk, libOpenMAXAL, libOpenSLES, libstdc++,
  libvulkan, and libz), plus libraries that are part of your app are accessible.
  
• For all other libraries you’ll see a warning in logcat and a toast on the
  display. This will happen only if your app’s targetSdkVersion is less than N. If
  you change your manifest to target N, loading will fail: Java’s
  System.loadLibrary will throw, and C/C++’s dlopen(3) will return NULL.

Test your apps on the Developer Preview — if you see a toast like this one, your app is accessing private native APIs. Please fix your code soon!

N Final Release behavior

• All NDK libraries (libandroid, libc, libcamera2ndk, libdl, libGLES,
  libjnigraphics, liblog, libm, libmediandk, libOpenMAXAL, libOpenSLES, libstdc++,
  libvulkan, and libz), plus libraries that are part of your app are accessible.
  
• For the temporarily accessible libraries (such as libandroid_runtime.so,
  libcutils.so, libcrypto.so, and libssl.so), you’ll see a warning in logcat for
  all API levels before N, but loading will fail if you update your app so that
  its targetSdkVersion is N or later.
  
• Attempts to load any other libraries will fail in the final release of
  Android N, even if your app is targeting a pre-N platform version.

Future platform behavior

• In O, all access to the temporarily accessible libraries will be removed.
  As a result, you should plan to update your app regardless of your
  targetSdkVersion prior to O. If you believe there is missing functionality from
  the NDK API that will make it impossible for you to transition off a temporarily
  accessible library, please file a bug here.

What do the errors look like?

Here’s some example logcat output from an app that hasn’t bumped its target SDK
version (and so the restriction isn’t fully enforced because this is only the
developer preview):

03-21 17:07:51.502 31234 31234 W linker  : library "libandroid_runtime.so"
("/system/lib/libandroid_runtime.so") needed or dlopened by
"/data/app/com.popular-app.android-2/lib/arm/libapplib.so" is not accessible
for the namespace "classloader-namespace" - the access is temporarily granted
as a workaround for http://b/26394120

This is telling you that your library “libapplib.so” refers to the library
“libandroid_runtime.so”, which is a private library.


When Android N ships, or if you set your target SDK version to N now, you’ll see
something like this if you try to use System.loadLibrary from Java:

java.lang.UnsatisfiedLinkError: dlopen failed: library "libcutils.so"
("/system/lib/libcutils.so") needed or dlopened by "/system/lib/libnativeloader.so"
is not accessible for the namespace "classloader-namespace"
  at java.lang.Runtime.loadLibrary0(Runtime.java:977)
  at java.lang.System.loadLibrary(System.java:1602)

If you’re using dlopen(3) from
C/C++ you’ll get a NULL return and dlerror(3) will
return the same “dlopen failed...” string as shown above.

Android Studio 2.0

Android Studio 2.0 is the fastest way to build high quality, performant apps for the Android platform, including phones and tablets, Android Auto, Android Wear, and Android TV. As the official IDE from Google, Android Studio includes everything you need to build an app, including a code editor, code analysis tools, emulators and more. This new and stable version of Android Studio has fast build speeds and a fast emulator with support for the latest Android version and Google Play Services.


Android Studio is built in coordination with the Android platform and supports all of the latest and greatest APIs. If you are developing for Android, you should be using Android Studio 2.0. It is available today as a easy download or update on the stable release channel.


Android Studio 2.0 includes the following new features that Android developer can use in their workflow :

• Instant Run - For every developer who loves faster build speeds. Make changes and see them appear live in your running app. With many build/run accelerations ranging from VM hot swapping to warm swapping app resources, Instant Run will save you time every day.


• Android Emulator - The new emulator runs ~3x faster than Android’s previous emulator, and with ADB enhancements you can now push apps and data 10x faster to the emulator than to a physical device. Like a physical device, the official Android emulator also includes Google Play Services built-in, so you can test out more API functionality. Finally, the new emulator has rich new features to manage calls, battery, network, GPS, and more.


• Cloud Test Lab Integration - Write once, run anywhere. Improve the quality of your apps by quickly and easily testing on a wide range of physical Android devices in the Cloud Test Lab right from within Android Studio.


• App Indexing Code Generation & Test - Help promote the visibility your app in Google Search for your users by adding auto-generated URLS with the App Indexing feature in Android Studio. With a few click you can add indexable URL links that you can test all within the IDE.


• GPU Debugger Preview - For those of you developing OpenGL ES based games or apps, you can now see each frame and the GL state with the new GPU debugger. Uncover and diagnosis GL rendering issues by capturing and analyzing the GPU stream from your Android device.


• IntelliJ 15 Update - Android Studio is built on the world class Intellij coding platform. Check out the latest Intellij features here.

Deeper Dive into the New Features

Instant Run

Today, mobile platforms are centered around speed and agility. And yet, building for mobile can sometimes feel clunky and slow. Instant Run in Android Studio is our solution to keep you in a fast and fluid development flow. The feature increases your developer productivity by accelerating your edit, build, run cycles. When you click on the Instant Run button (), Instant Run will analyze the changes you have made and determine how it can deploy your new code in the fastest way.

New Instant Run Buttons


Whenever possible, it will inject your code changes into your running app process, avoiding re-deployment and re-installation your APK. For some types of changes, an activity or app restart is required, but your edit, build and run cycles should still be generally much faster than before. Instant Run works with any Android Device or emulator running API 14 (Ice Cream Sandwich) or higher.


Since previewing Instant Run at the end of last year, we’ve spent countless hours incorporating your feedback and refining for the stable release. Look for even more acceleration in future releases because build speeds can never be too fast. To learn how you can make the most out of Instant Run in your app development today, please check out our Instant Run documentation.

Android Emulator

The new Android Emulator is up to 3x faster in CPU, RAM, & I/O in comparison to the previous Android emulator. And when you're ready to build, ADB push speeds are a whopping 10x faster! In most situations, developing on the official Android Emulator is faster than a real device, and new features like Instant Run will work best with the new Android emulator.


In addition to speed and performance, the Android Emulator has a brand user interface and sensor controls. Enhanced since the initial release, with the emulator you can drag and drop APKs for quick installation, resize and rescale the window, use multi-touch actions (pinch & zoom, pan, rotate, tilt) and much more.

Android Emulator User Interface: Toolbar & Extend Controls Panel


Trying out the new emulator is as easy as updating your SDK Tools to 25.1.1 or higher, create a fresh Android Virtual Device using one of the recommended x86 system images and you are ready to go. Learn more about the Android Emulator by checking out the documentation.

Cloud Test Lab

Cloud Test Lab is a new service that allows you to test your app across a wide range of devices and device configurations at scale in the cloud. Once you complete your initial testing with your Android Emulator or Android device, Cloud Test Lab is a great extension to your testing process that provides you to run through a collection of tests against a portfolio of physical devices hosted in Google’s data centers. Even if you do not have tests explicitly written, Cloud Test Lab can perform a basic set of tests to ensure that your app does not crash.


The new interface in Android Studio allows you to configure the portfolio of tests you want to run on Cloud Test Lab, and allows you to also see the results of your tests. To learn more about the service go here.

Setup for Cloud Test Lab

App Indexing

It is now easier for your users to find your app in Google Search with the App Indexing API. Android Studio 2.0 helps you to create the correct URL structure in your app code and add attributes in your AndroidManifest.xml file that will work the Google App Indexing service. After you add the URLs to your app, can you test and validate your app indexing code as shown here:

Google App Indexing Testing



Check out this link for more details about app indexing support in Android Studio.

GPU Debugger Preview

If you are developing OpenGL ES games or graphics-intensive apps, you have a new GPU debugger with Android Studio 2.0. Although the GPU debugger is a preview, you can step through your app frame by frame to identify and debug graphics rendering issues with rich information about the GL state. For more details on how to setup your Android device and app to work with the tool, check out the tech documentations here.

GPU Debugger Preview

What's Next

Update

If you are using a previous version of Android Studio, you can check for updates on the Beta channel from the navigation menu (Help → Check for Update [Windows/Linux] , Android Studio → Check for Updates [OS X]). If you need a new copy of Android Studio, you can download it here. If you developing for the N Developer Preview, check out this additional setup instructions.



Set Up Instant Run & Android Emulator

After you update to or download Android Studio 2.0, you should upgrade your projects to use Instant Run, and create a fresh Android Virtual Device (AVD) for the new Android emulator and you are on your way to a fast Android development experience.


Using Instant Run is easy. For each of your existing projects you will see a quick prompt to update your project to the new gradle plugin version (com.android.tools.build:gradle:2.0.0).

Prompt to update your gradle version in your project



For all new app projects in Android Studio 2.0, Instant Run is on by default. Check out the documentation for more details.


We are already hard at work developing the next release of Android Studio. We appreciate any feedback on things you like, issues or features you would like to see. Connect with us -- the Android Studio development team --































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Connecting your App to a Wi-Fi Device

With the growth of the Internet of Things, connecting Android applications to
Wi-Fi enabled devices is becoming more and more common. Whether you’re building
an app for a remote viewfinder, to set up a connected light bulb, or to control
a quadcopter, if it’s Wi-Fi based you will need to connect to a hotspot that may
not have Internet connectivity.



From Lollipop onwards the OS became a little more intelligent, allowing multiple
network connections and not routing data to networks that don’t have Internet
connectivity. That’s very useful for users as they don’t lose connectivity when
they’re near Wi-Fis with captive portals. Data routing APIs were added for
developers, so you can ensure that only the appropriate app traffic is routed
over the Wi-Fi connection to the external device.


To make the APIs easier to understand, it is good to know that there are 3 sets
of networks available to developers:

• WiFiManager#startScan returns a list of available Wi-Fi networks. They are
  primarily identified by SSID.
• WiFiManager#getConfiguredNetworks returns a list of the Wi-Fi networks
  configured on the device, also indexed by SSID, but they are not necessarily
  currently available.
• ConnectivityManager#getAllNetworks returns a list of networks that are being
  interacted with by the phone. This is necessary as from Lollipop onwards a
  device may be connected to multiple networks at once, Wi-Fi, LTE, Bluetooth,
  etc… The current state of each is available by calling ConnectivityManager#getNetworkInfo
  and is identified by a network ID.

In all versions of Android you start by scanning for available Wi-Fi networks
with WiFiManager#startScan,
iterate through the ScanResults
looking for the SSID of your external Wi-Fi device. Once you’ve found it you can
check if it is already a configured network using WifiManager#getConfiguredNetworks
and iterating through the WifiConfigurations
returned, matching on SSID. It’s worth noting that the SSIDs of the configured
networks are enclosed in double quotes, whilst the SSIDs returned in ScanResults
are not.


If your network is configured you can obtain the network ID from the
WifiConfiguration object. Otherwise you can configure it using WifiManager#addNetwork
and keep track of the network id that is returned.


To connect to the Wi-Fi network, register a BroadcastReceiver that listens for
WifiManager.NETWORK_STATE_CHANGED_ACTION
and then call WifiManager.enableNetwork(int netId, boolean disableOthers), passing in your network ID. The
enableNetwork call disables all the other Wi-Fi access points for the next scan,
locates the one you’ve requested and connects to it. When you receive the
network broadcasts you can check with WifiManager#getConnectionInfo
that you’re successfully connected to the correct network. But, on Lollipop and
above, if that network doesn’t have internet connectivity network, requests will
not be routed to it.


Routing network requests


To direct all the network requests from your app to an external Wi-Fi device,
call ConnectivityManager#setProcessDefaultNetwork
on Lollipop devices, and on Marshmallow call ConnectivityManager#bindProcessToNetwork
instead, which is a direct API replacement. Note that these calls require
android.permission.INTERNET; otherwise they will just return false.


Alternatively, if you’d like to route some of your app traffic to the Wi-Fi
device and some to the Internet over the mobile network:

• For HTTP requests you can use Network#openConnection(java.net.URL),
  directly routing your request to this network.
• For low-level socket communication, open a socket and call href="https://developer.android.com/reference/android/net/Network.html#bindSocket(java.net.Socket)">Network#bindSocket(java.net.Socket),
  or alternatively use Network#getSocketFactory.

Now you can keep your users connected whilst they benefit from your innovative
Wi-Fi enabled products.

Announcing Android add-ons for Docs and Sheets

Posted by By Saurabh Gupta, Product Manager, Google Apps

We know many of you consider your mobile device as your primary tool to consume business information, but what if you could use it to get more work done, from anywhere?

We’re excited to introduce Android add-ons for Docs and Sheets, a new way for you to do just that—whether it’s readying a contract you have for e-signature from your phone, or pulling in CRM data on your tablet for some quick analysis while waiting for your morning coffee, Android add-ons can help you accomplish more.

Get more done with your favorite third-party apps, no matter where you are

We’ve worked with eight integration partners who have created seamless integrations for Docs and Sheets. Here’s a preview of just a few of them:

• DocuSign - Trigger or complete a signing process from Docs or Sheets, and save the executed document to Drive. Read more here.

DocuSign lets you easily create signature envelopes right from Google Docs

• ProsperWorks - Import your CRM data to create and update advanced dashboards, reports and graphs on Sheets, right from your device. Read more here.


• AppSheet - Create powerful mobile apps directly from your data in Sheets instantly — no coding required. Read more here.


• Scanbot - Scan your business documents using built-in OCR, and insert their contents into Docs as editable text. Read more here.

You can find these add-ons and many more, including PandaDoc, ZohoCRM, Teacher Aide, EasyBib and Classroom in our Google Play collection as well as directly from the add-on menus in Docs or Sheets.

Try them out today, and see how much more you can do.





Calling all developers: try our developer preview today!


As you can see from above, Android add-ons offer a great opportunity to build
innovative integrations and reach Docs and Sheets users around the world.
They’re basically Android apps that connect with href="http://developers.google.com/apps-script?utm_campaign=android_discussion_googledocs_072816&utm_source=anddev&utm_medium=blog">Google Apps Script projects
on the server-side, allowing them to access and manipulate data from Google Docs
or Sheets using standard Apps Script techniques. Check out href="https://developers.google.com/apps-script/add-ons/mobile?utm_campaign=android_discussion_googledocs_072816&utm_source=anddev&utm_medium=blog">our
documentation which includes href="https://developers.google.com/apps-script/add-ons/mobile/mobile-style?utm_campaign=android_discussion_googledocs_072816&utm_source=anddev&utm_medium=blog">UI
guidelines as well as href="https://developers.google.com/apps-script/add-ons/mobile/?utm_campaign=android_discussion_googledocs_072816&utm_source=anddev&utm_medium=blog#see_what_you_can_make">sample
code to get you started. We’ve also made it easy for you to publish your
apps with the Apps Script editor.


Android add-ons are available today as a developer preview. We look forward to
seeing what you build!

Android Developer Story: Culture Alley reaches millions of English learners on Google Play

CultureAlley developed the app HelloEnglish to help Indians learn English through gamification, supporting over
15 dialects. More than 13 million people now use Hello English in India and
around the world.


Hear Nishant Patni, Founder & CEO and Pranshu Bhandari, Co-Founder, explain how
they optimized the app to address challenges faced by emerging markets. Learn
how they used various Google Play tools to address varying levels of
connectivity and device capabilities, and improve user retention.



building for billions and watch the 10 tips to build an app for billions of users’ video to get more tips.
Also, get the
Playbook for Developers app and stay up-to-date with more features and best
practices that will help you grow a successful business on Google Play.

Introducing new app categories -- From Art to Autos to Dating -- to help users better find your apps

With more than 1 billion active users in 190 countries around the world, Google
Play continues to be an important distribution platform for you to build a
global audience. To help you get your apps in front of more users, it’s
important to make them more quickly and easily discoverable in Google Play.
That’s why we rolled out major features, such as SearchAds, IndieCorner, storelisting experiments, and more, over the past year.


To improve the overall search experience, we’re introducing new app categories
and renaming a few existing ones, making them more comprehensive and relevant to
what users are looking for today.


The new categories include:

• Art & Design
• Auto & Vehicles
• Beauty
• Dating
• Events
• Food & Drink
• House & Home
• Parenting

In addition, the “Transportation” category will be renamed “Maps & Navigation,”
and the “Media & Video” category will be renamed “Video Players & Editors.”


To select a new category for your app or game

1. Sign in to your Google Play
   Developer Console.
2. Select an app.
3. On the left menu, click Store Listing.
4. Under "Categorization," select an application type and category.
5. Near the top of the page, click Save draft (new apps) or Submit update
   (existing apps).

Newly added categories will be available on Google Play within 60 days. If you
choose a newly added category for an app before the category is available for
users, your current app category may change. See additional details and view our
full list of categories in the HelpCenter.

Improvements for smaller app downloads on Google Play

Google Play continues to grow rapidly, as Android users installed over 65
billion apps in the last year from the Google Play Store. We’re also seeing
developers move to update their apps more frequently to push great new content,
patch security vulnerabilities, and iterate quickly on user feedback.


However, many users are sensitive to the amount of data they use, especially if
they are not on Wi-Fi. Google Play is investing in improvements to reduce the
data that needs to be transferred for app installs and updates, while making
data cost more transparent to users.


Read on to understand the updates and learn some tips for ways to optimize the
size of your APK.

New Delta algorithm to reduce the size of app updates

For approximately 98% of app updates from the Play Store, only changes(deltas) to APK files are downloaded and merged with the existing
files, reducing the size of updates. Google Play has used delta algorithms since 2012, and we recently rolled out an additional delta algorithm, bsdiff (created by Colin Percival)^{id="fnref1">1}bsdiff, that our experimentation shows
can reduce delta size by up to 50% or more compared to the previous algorithm
for some APKs. Bsdiff is
specifically targeted to produce more efficient deltas of native libraries by
taking advantage of the specific ways in which compiled native code changes
between versions. To be most effective, native libraries should be stored
uncompressed (compression interferes with delta algorithms).


An example from Chrome:

Patch Description

Previous patch size

Bsdiff Size

M46 to M47 major update

22.8 MB

12.9 MB




M47 minor update

15.3 MB

3.6 MB





Apps that don’t have uncompressed native libraries can see a 5% decrease in size
on average, compared to the previous delta algorithm.

Applying the delta algorithm to APK Expansion Files to further
reduce update size

APK Expansion Files allow you to include additional large files up to 2GB in
size (e.g. high resolution graphics or media files) with your app, which is
especially popular with games. We have recently expanded our delta and
compression algorithms to apply to these APK Expansion Files in addition to
APKs, reducing the download size of initial installs by 12%, and updates by 65%
on average. APK Expansion file patches use the xdelta algorithm.

Clearer size information in the Play Store

Alongside the improvements to reduce download size, we also made information
displayed about data used and download sizes in the Play Store clearer. You can
now see actual download sizes, not the APK file size, in the Play Store. If you
already have an app, you will only see the update size. These changes are
rolling out now.

---

1. 
   
   Colin Percival, Naive differences of executable code,
   http://www.daemonology.net/bsdiff/, 2003. ↩

Example 1: Showing new “Download size” of APK

Example 2: Showing new “Update size” of APK

Tips to reduce your download sizes

1. Optimize for the right size measurements: Users care about download size (i.e. how many bytes are transferred when installing/updating an app), and they care about disk size (i.e. how much space the app takes up on disk). It’s important to note that neither of these are the same as the original APK file size nor necessarily correlated.

Chrome example:

	Compressed Native Library	Uncompressed Native Library
APK Size	39MB	52MB (+25%)
Download size (install)	29MB	29MB (no change)
Download size (update)	29MB	21MB (-29%)
Disk size	71MB	52MB (-26%)

Chrome found that initial download size remained the same by not compressing the native library in their APK, while the APK size increased, because Google Play already performs compression for downloads. They also found that the update size decreased, as deltas are more effective with uncompressed files, and disk size decreased as you no longer need an compressed copy of the native library. However, please note, native libraries should only be uncompressed when the minimum SDK version for an APK is 23 (Marshmallow) or later.

2. Reduce your APK size: Remove unnecessary data from the APK like unused resources and code.

3. Optimize parts of your APK to make them smaller: Using more efficient file formats, for example by using WebP instead of JPEG, or by using Proguard to remove unused code.

Readmore about reducing APK sizes and watch the I/O 2016 session Putting Your App on aDiet to learn from
Wojtek Kaliciński, about how to reduce the size of your APK.

Final Developer Preview before Android 7.0 Nougat begins rolling out

Posted by Dave Burke, VP of Engineering

As we close in on the public rollout of href="https://developer.android.com/preview/index.html?utm_campaign=android_launch_developerpreview5_071816&utm_source=anddev&utm_medium=blog">Android 7.0 Nougat
to devices later this summer, today we’re releasing Developer Preview
5, the last milestone of this preview series. href="http://android-developers.blogspot.com/2016/06/android-n-apis-are-now-final.html">Last
month’s Developer Preview included the final APIs for Nougat; this preview
gives developers the near-final system updates for all of the supported preview
devices, helping you get your app ready for consumers.


Here’s a quick rundown of what’s included in the final Developer Preview of
Nougat:

• System images for Nexus and other preview devices
• An emulator that you can use for doing the final testing of your apps to
  make sure they’re ready
• The final N APIs (API level 24) and latest system behaviors and UI
• The latest bug fixes and optimizations across the system and in preinstalled
  apps

Working with this latest Developer Preview, you should make sure your app
handles all of the href="https://developer.android.com/preview/behavior-changes.html?utm_campaign=android_launch_developerpreview5_071816&utm_source=anddev&utm_medium=blog">system
behavior changes in Android N, like Doze on the Go, background
optimizations, screen zoom, permissions changes, and more. Plus, you can take
advantage of href="https://developer.android.com/preview/api-overview.html?utm_campaign=android_launch_developerpreview5_071816&utm_source=anddev&utm_medium=blog">new developer
features in Android N such as href="https://developer.android.com/preview/api-overview.html?utm_campaign=android_launch_developerpreview5_071816&utm_source=anddev&utm_medium=blog#multi-window_support">Multi-window
support, Direct Reply and other href="https://developer.android.com/preview/api-overview.html?utm_campaign=android_launch_developerpreview5_071816&utm_source=anddev&utm_medium=blog#notification_enhancements">notifications
enhancements, href="https://developer.android.com/preview/api-overview.html?utm_campaign=android_launch_developerpreview5_071816&utm_source=anddev&utm_medium=blog#direct_boot">Direct
boot, href="https://developer.android.com/preview/api-overview.html?utm_campaign=android_launch_developerpreview5_071816&utm_source=anddev&utm_medium=blog#emoji">new
emojis and more.


Publish your apps to alpha, beta or production channels in Google
Play


After testing your apps with Developer Preview 5 you should publish the updates
to Google Play soon. We recommend compiling against, and optionally targeting,
API 24 and then publishing to your alpha, beta, or production channels in the
Google Play Developer Console. A great strategy to do this is using href="https://developer.android.com/distribute/engage/beta.html?utm_campaign=android_launch_npreview_061516&utm_source=anddev&utm_medium=blog">Google
Play’s beta testing feature to get early feedback from a small group of
users -- including Developer Preview users — and then doing a staged rollout as
you release the updated app to all users.


How to get Developer Preview 5


If you are already enrolled in the Android
Beta program, your devices will get the Developer Preview 5 update right
away, no action is needed on your part. If you aren’t yet enrolled in Android
Beta, the easiest way to get started is by visiting href="https://android.com/beta">android.com/beta and opt-in your eligible
Android phone or tablet -- you’ll soon receive this preview update over-the-air.
As always, you can also download and href="https://developer.android.com/preview/download.html?utm_campaign=android_launch_npreview_061516&utm_source=anddev&utm_medium=blog#flash">flash
this update manually. The Nougat Developer Preview is available for Nexus 6,
Nexus 5X, Nexus 6P, Nexus 9, and Pixel C devices, as well as General Mobile 4G
[Android One] devices.


Thanks so much for all of your feedback so far. Please continue to share
feedback or requests either in the href="https://code.google.com/p/android/issues/list?can=2&q=label%3ADevPreview-N">N
Developer Preview issue tracker, href="https://plus.google.com/communities/103655397235276743411">N Preview
Developer community, or href="https://plus.google.com/communities/106765800802768335079">Android Beta
community as we work towards the consumer release later this summer. Android
Nougat is almost here!


Also, the Android engineering team will host a Reddit AMA on r/androiddev to
answer all your technical questions about the platform tomorrow, July 19
from 12-2 PM (Pacific Time). We look forward to addressing your
questions!

Changes to Trusted Certificate Authorities in Android Nougat

In Android Nougat, we’ve changed how Android handles trusted certificate
authorities (CAs) to provide safer defaults for secure app traffic. Most apps
and users should not be affected by these changes or need to take any action.
The changes include:

• Safe and easy APIs to trust custom CAs.
• Apps that target API Level 24 and above no longer trust user or admin-added
  CAs for secure connections, by default.
• All devices running Android Nougat offer the same standardized set of system
  CAs—no device-specific customizations.

For more details on these changes and what to do if you’re affected by them,
read on.

Safe and easy APIs

Apps have always been able customize which certificate authorities they trust.
However, we saw apps making mistakes due to the complexities of the Java TLS
APIs. To address this we improvedthe APIs for customizing trust.

User-added CAs

Protection of all application data is a key goal of the Android application
sandbox. Android Nougat changes how applications interact with user- and
admin-supplied CAs. By default, apps that target API level 24 will—by design—not
honor such CAs unless the app explicitly opts in. This safe-by-default setting
reduces application attack surface and encourages consistent handling of network
and file-based application data.

Customizing trusted CAs

Customizing the CAs your app trusts on Android Nougat is easy using the Network
Security Config. Trust can be specified across the whole app or only for
connections to certain domains, as needed. Below are some examples for trusting
a custom or user-added CA, in addition to the system CAs. For more examples and
details, see thefull documentation.

Trusting custom CAs for debugging

To allow your app to trust custom CAs only for local debugging, include
something like this in your Network Security Config. The CAs will only be
trusted while your app is marked as debuggable.

<network-security-config>  
      <debug-overrides>  
           <trust-anchors>  
                <!-- Trust user added CAs while debuggable only -->
                <certificates src="user" />  
           </trust-anchors>  
      </domain-config>  
 </network-security-config>

Trusting custom CAs for a domain

To allow your app to trust custom CAs for a specific domain, include something
like this in your Network Security Config.

<network-security-config>  
      <domain-config>  
           <domain includeSubdomains="true">internal.example.com</domain>  
           <trust-anchors>  
                <!-- Only trust the CAs included with the app  
                     for connections to internal.example.com -->  
                <certificates src="@raw/cas" />  
           </trust-anchors>  
      </domain-config>  
 </network-security-config>

Trusting user-added CAs for some domains

To allow your app to trust user-added CAs for multiple domains, include
something like this in your Network Security Config.

<network-security-config>  
      <domain-config>  
           <domain includeSubdomains="true">userCaDomain.com</domain>  
           <domain includeSubdomains="true">otherUserCaDomain.com</domain>  
           <trust-anchors>  
                  <!-- Trust preinstalled CAs -->  
                  <certificates src="system" />  
                  <!-- Additionally trust user added CAs -->  
                  <certificates src="user" />  
           </trust-anchors>  
      </domain-config>  
 </network-security-config>

Trusting user-added CAs for all domains except some

To allow your app to trust user-added CAs for all domains, except for those
specified, include something like this in your Network Security Config.

<network-security-config>  
      <base-config>  
           <trust-anchors>  
                <!-- Trust preinstalled CAs -->  
                <certificates src="system" />  
                <!-- Additionally trust user added CAs -->  
                <certificates src="user" />  
           </trust-anchors>  
      </base-config>  
      <domain-config>  
           <domain includeSubdomains="true">sensitive.example.com</domain>  
           <trust-anchors>  
                <!-- Only allow sensitive content to be exchanged  
             with the real server and not any user or  
    admin configured MiTMs -->  
                <certificates src="system" />  
           <trust-anchors>  
      </domain-config>  
 </network-security-config>

Trusting user-added CAs for all secure connections

To allow your app to trust user-added CAs for all secure connections, add this
in your Network Security Config.

<network-security-config>  
      <base-config>  
            <trust-anchors>  
                <!-- Trust preinstalled CAs -->  
                <certificates src="system" />  
                <!-- Additionally trust user added CAs -->  
                <certificates src="user" />  
           </trust-anchors>  
      </base-config>  
 </network-security-config>

Standardized set of system-trusted CAs

To provide a more consistent and more secure experience across the Android
ecosystem, beginning with Android Nougat, compatible devices trust only the
standardized system CAs maintained in AOSP.


Previously, the set of preinstalled CAs bundled with the system could vary from
device to device. This could lead to compatibility issues when some devices did
not include CAs that apps needed for connections as well as potential security
issues if CAs that did not meet our security requirements were included on some
devices.

What if I have a CA I believe should be included on Android?

First, be sure that your CA needs to be included in the system. The preinstalled
CAs are only for CAs that meet our security requirements
because they affect the secure connections of most apps on the device. If you
need to add a CA for connecting to hosts that use that CA, you should instead
customize your apps and services that connect to those hosts. For more
information, see the Customizing trusted CAs section above.


If you operate a CA that you believe should be included in Android, first
complete the Mozilla CA
Inclusion Process and then file a feature request
against Android to have the CA added to the standardized set of system CAs.

Building for Billions

Posted by Sam Dutton, Ankur Kotwal, Developer Advocates; Liz Yepsen, Program Manager

‘TOP-UP WARNING.’ ‘NO CONNECTION.’ ‘INSUFFICIENT BANDWIDTH TO PLAY THIS
RESOURCE.’

These are common warnings for many smartphone users around the world.

To build products that work for billions of users, developers must address key
challenges: limited or intermittent connectivity, device compatibility, varying
screen sizes, high data costs, short-lived batteries. We first presented href="https://developers.google.com/billions/?utm_campaign=android_discussion_billions_063016&utm_source=anddev&utm_medium=blog">developers.google.com/billions
and related Android and Web resources at Google I/O last month, and today you
can watch the video presentations about href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vaEV8bNi1Dw">Android or the href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6hGubMkNfM">Web.

These best practices can help developers reach billions by delivering
exceptional performance across a range of connections, data plans, and devices.
g.co/dev/billions will
help you:

Seamlessly transition between slow, intermediate, and offline
environments

Your users move from place to place, from speedy wireless to patchy or expensive
data. Manage these transitions by storing data, queueing requests, optimizing
image handling, and performing core functions entirely offline.

Provide the right content for the right context

Keep context in mind - how and where do your users consume your content?
Selecting text and media that works well across different viewport sizes,
keeping text short (for scrolling on the go), providing a simple UI that doesn’t
distract from content, and removing redundant content can all increase
perception of your app’s quality while giving real performance gains
like reduced data transfer. Once these practices are in place, localization
options can grow audience reach and increase engagement.

Optimize for mobile hardware

Ensure your app or Web content is served and runs well for your widest possible
addressable market, covering all actively used OS versions, while still
following best practices, by testing on virtual or actual devices in target
markets. Native Android apps should set minimum and target SDKs. Also, remember
low cost phones have smaller amounts of RAM; apps should therefore adjust usage
accordingly and minimize background running. For in-depth information on
minimizing APK size, check out this href="https://medium.com/@wkalicinski/smallerapk-part-8-native-libraries-open-from-apk-fc22713861ff">series
of Medium posts. On the Web, optimize JavaScript CPU usage, avoid raster
image rendering, and minimize resource requests. Find out more href="https://developers.google.com/web/fundamentals/performance/?utm_campaign=android_discussion_billions_063016&utm_source=anddev&utm_medium=blog">here.

Reduce battery consumption

Low cost phones usually have shorter battery life. Users are sensitive to
battery consumption levels and excessive consumption can lead to a high
uninstall rate or avoidance of your site. Benchmark your battery usage against
sessions on other pages or apps, or using tools such as Battery Historian, and
avoid long-running processes which drain batteries.

Conserve data usage

Whatever you’re building, conserve data usage in three simple steps: understand
loading requirements, reduce the amount of data required for interaction, and
streamline navigation so users get what they want quickly. Conserving data on
behalf of your users (and with native apps, offering configurable network usage)
helps retain data-sensitive users -- especially those on prepaid plans or
contracts with limited data -- as even “unlimited” plans can become expensive
when roaming or if unexpected fees are applied.

Have another insight, or a success launching in low-connectivity conditions or
on low-cost devices? Let us know on our href="https://plus.sandbox.google.com/+GoogleDevelopers/posts/WffV23WSrc8">G+
post.

New video tips to help news publishers find success on Google Play

Today we have released a three-part video series ‘Tips for your news app on Google Play’, where you can find actionable tips and learn best practices for developing, launching and monetising a high quality news app. The video series accompanies the recently published NewsPublisher Playbook. Watchthe video series to learn: 10 tips on how to design and develop your News app 10 tips to help you launch your News app and start gaining readers 10 tips to engage your readers and monetize your News app You can also getthe News Publisher Playbook on the Play Store to help you develop a successful news mobile strategy on Android. It includes tips on mobile website optimization, how to create a Google Play Newsstand edition, how to improve your native app, and more. Give us your feedback Once you’ve checked out the video series, we’d love to hear your feedback so we can continue to help you find success with and achieve your business objectives. Leave a comment or a thumbs up, and subscribeto the Android Developers YouTube channel! Also, checkout our other videos in in the Tips for Success on Google Play series, including the recent video on 10tips to build an app for billions of users. For more best practices to find success on Google Play, get the newPlaybook for Developers app.

Introducing the Android Basics Nanodegree

Posted by Shanea King-Roberson, Lead Program Manager Twitter: @shaneakr Instagram: @theshanea






Do you have an idea for an app but you don’t know where to start? There are over
1 billion Android devices worldwide, providing a way for you to deliver your
ideas to the right people at the right time. Google, in partnership with
Udacity, is making Android development accessible and understandable to
everyone, so that regardless of your background, you can learn to build apps
that improve the lives of people around you.


Enroll in the new Android Basics
Nanodegree. This series of courses and services teaches you how to build
simple Android apps--even if you have little or no programming experience. Take
a look at some of the apps built by our students:


The app "ROP Tutorial" built by student Arpy Vanyan raises awareness of a
potentially blinding eye disorder called Retinopathy of Prematurity that can
affect newborn babies.










And user Charles Tommo created an app called “Dr Malaria” that teaches people
ways to prevent malaria.










With courses designed by Google, you can
learn skills that are applicable to building apps that solve real world
problems. You can learn at your own pace to use href="http://developer.android.com/tools/studio/index.html">Android Studio
(Google’s official tool for Android app development) to design app user
interfaces and implement user interactions using the Java programming language.


The courses walk you through
step-by-step on how to build an order form for a coffee shop, an app to track
pets in a shelter, an app that teaches vocabulary words from the Native American
Miwok tribe, and an app on recent earthquakes in the world. At the end of the
course, you will have an entire portfolio of apps to share with your friends and
family.


Upon completing the Android Basics Nanodegree, you also have the opportunity to
continue your learning with the Career-track Android Nanodegree (for
intermediate developers). The first 50 participants to finish the Android Basics
Nanodegree have a chance to win a scholarship for the Career-track Android
Nanodegree. Please visit href="http://udacity.com/legal/scholarship">udacity.com/legal/scholarship
for additional details and eligibility requirements. You now have a complete
learning path to help you become a technology entrepreneur or most importantly,
build very cool Android apps, for yourself, your communities, and even the
world.


All of the individual courses that make
up this Nanodegree are available online for no charge at href="http://udacity.com/google">udacity.com/google. In addition, Udacity
provides paid services, including access to coaches, guidance on your project,
help staying on track, career counseling, and a certificate upon completion for
a fee.


You will be exposed to introductory computer science concepts in the Java
programming language, as you learn the following skills.

• Build app user interfaces
• Implement user interactions
• Store information in a database
• Pull data from the internet into your app
• Identify and fix unexpected behavior in the app
• Localize your app to support other languages

To enroll in the Android Basics Nanodegree program, href="http://udacity.com/nd803">click here.


See you in class!