Android application updates

Question

We have developed an Android application and plan to install them on tablets and distribute to our clients. We now have to decide on a process to send updates to the application whenever they are available.

Can some one suggest the best approach to achieve this process of sending the updates?

Is a silent update possible i.e. updating application without user intervention by checking,downloading and installing the latest version from with in the application?

Thanks in advance, Navin

Answer 1

You can use Google's C2DM service to send a push notification to the device telling it to upgrade. You can then have a broadcast receiver get the push notification and start the download. Check here for more details. http://code.google.com/android/c2dm/index.html

Answer 2

The simplest solution I know of involves retrieving the current version number from the web, comparing it to the existing installed version and if there is an update available pop-up a dialog with a link to the Android Market page for the specific application.

So basically you decide when you want to check (application start, regular intervals, etc)

And then you query a remote file that contains the latest version number.

You compare this to the installed version number and if latest > installed show the user a link to the Android Market.

afaik you cannot do a silent update of the application, for security reasons

Here is some code where someone has implemented the above solution: http://www.androidsnippets.com/check-for-updates-once-a-day

Launching the android market on the device: http://developer.android.com/guide/publishing/publishing.html#marketintent