Android App Distribution
Learn how to publish and distribute commercial apps on the Google Play Store. This book gives you all the knowledge you need for a successful Android app launch including the nuts and bolts of getting your app on the Play Store, how to ensure your app is sleek and secure, how to distribute it to testers and how to attract and manage user feedback and monitor performance post- release. This is everything you need to publish and distribute a professional, secure and successful Android app! By Fuad Kamal & Evana Margain Puig.
Who is this for?
While Android developers of all experience levels will find the information in this book useful, there are two groups that will benefit the most: New Android developers and experienced Android developers who either haven’t worked on consumer apps or who weren’t involved in the details of releasing the app.
Covered concepts
- The steps to getting the perfect build.
- Quickly getting started using the app store.
- Using test tracks to test your app.
- Release strategies.
- How to master app permissions for a great user experience.
- Best practices for securing your app.
- Optimizing app size and obfusticating your APK.
- Techniques for adding features dynamically.
- How to add build variants and flavors to your app.
- Automation tools for your local environment.
- Tips and tricks for getting top ratings and avoiding negative reviews.
- How to set up CI to automate your deployment process.
- Monitoring your app performance and vitals.
If you’re planning on releasing a commercial app to the Google Play Store, you need this book. It will walk you through the entire process of uploading the app to the Play Store, distributing it to testers, creating a release strategy and making sure your users will continue to love...
moreBefore You Begin
This section tells you a few things you need to know before you get started, such as what you’ll need for hardware and software, where to find the project files for this book, and more.
Section I: App Store Quick Start
You need some fundamental things to publish an app to the app store. For example, you need the nuts and bolts of building and getting the app published along with some key concepts surrounding test tracks, including beta and alpha releases, and release strategies. Taken together, these concepts are what we like to call minimal viable product, or MVP, for publishing an app to the app store.
Section II: Security & Optimization
A secure and svelte app can be the difference between having a successful release and one with problems. This section will show you the various steps of developing apps that are secure, reasonably sized and optimized. Topics covered include app permissions, obfuscation and steps for hardening your app’s security.
Dynamically deploying features allows you to do limited testing. Depending on the technique you use, it can also be a great way to keep the app smaller by only loading features that a user needs. You’ll learn about that in chapter 8.
You also may want to create a white label version of your app or build flavors for testing. Chapter 9 covers all of that to help guide you through creating build variants and flavors.
Section III: Automation: Continuous Integration & Delivery
Manually building and releasing your app can quickly become time-consuming and error-prone. Chapter 11 guides you through tools and steps to help automate the process. It’s also important to have reliable builds that can build on multiple machines and to constantly integrate code so that releases don’t become a big, error-prone, merging event. Chapter 12 shows you some tips and tricks to get CI set up for your project.
Section IV: Beyond Publication
In an ideal world, you could release an app and, without doing anything, have it be wildly successful and generate money while you relax in the tropics. However, in the real world, an app is a living thing that needs continuous care and feeding.
App ratings can make or break an app’s success in the store. Chapter 13 talks about techniques for cultivating good reviews and addressing negative ones. Two common causes of bad app reviews are app crashes and poor performance. Chapter 14 dives into monitoring and improving your app’s performance to proactively address issues before they turn into poor reviews.