Google Play Alpha Test - No Update available

Question

I have not updated my Android app for quite a while. Now I would like to use the Alpha Test to run some tests of the In-App Purchase features.

Problem is, that I do not see how I can install the Alpha version on my device using the Play Store. I did the following:

• Created the APK in Android Studio 2.1
• Logged into the Google Play Developer Console
• Selected my app and switched to APK/Alpha-Test
• Uploaded the APK the the Alpha Test and published it
• It is a closed Alpha Test and I am the only tester. The e-mail address I entered in the tester list perfectly matches the address of the Play Account I am using on the device.
• Opened activation URL in Chrome on my Device. Play Store webpage is shown, saying that I am a tester.
• Clicked the link to the Play Store and downloaded the current Version of my app
• Checked if there is an update to the Alpha Version, but there is not

I uploaded/published the alpha APK on three days ago. Even if it can take some hours before an update reaches the store, three days should be long enough, shouldn't it?

I found other threads dealing with this kind of problem and in some cases the solution was to clean the cache of the Play Store App and restart the app. However this did not change anything in my case.

So, none of the suggested solutions I found worked for me. Any other idea what I can do?

UPDATE:

Still not possible to update to the alpha version. I now switch from a Closed Alpha Test an Alpha Test using a Google+ Community. However, the result is the same:

• While logged in with my developer account, I switched to Google+ and created a new Community.
• Invited my test user (one of my other accounts) to the group.
• Copied the URL of the Goole+ Community to the Aplha Testing section in the Developer Console.

• Published the changes.

• When visiting the test URL (https://play.google.com/apps/testing/com.mycompany.myapp) I got the message "You are not a tester"

• Checking the e-mails of my test account. Found the invitation to the Google+ Community and joined.
• When visiting the test URL I could now click on Become a tester and now I am tester.
• Downloaded the App from the Play Store using my test account. Just received the public version.
• No update to the Alpha version available...

UPDATE 2:

Also after switching to a Public Alpha Test still no update available.

I am running out of ideas...

Answer 1

After two weeks I was finally able to solve the issue. I share the solution here, just in case somebody encounters the same type of problem:

I contacted Google Support to find out, if there is any known problem that prevents the test version from beeing downloaded. They told me, that the uploaded APK was not compatible with my test device (Nexus 5) due to an incompatible ABI version.

This was quite confusing, sinc my app did not use any native code and thus did not configure any ABI version at all.

Finally Google told me, that the ABI version of the APK was identified as commons-io-2.4.jar. This still does not make sense, since this is obviously not an ABI version. However with this information I was able to move on and find a way to avoid the problem.

Android Stuido copied the commons-io-2.4.jar file into the lib folder within the APK. The Dev Console identified the content of this folder as ABI version (which does not make any sense) and thus the APK was marked as not compatible with the device.

Either there is a bug in Android Studio (copied the file into the lib folder) or the Dev Console (identifies the lib content als ABI version).

SOLUTION

Since I did not need the commons-io-2.4.jar anymore, I could simply remove it from the project and the new version is distributed without any problem in the Alpha/Beta Test Channel. I have no idea what I would have done, if the app would depend on this lib.

The information in the Dev Console on wether an APK is supported by specific devices or not is quite confusing:

The public version of the APK was (of course) compatible to thousands of different devices, including the Nexus 5 I use for my test. The Dev Console shows the same information (the one of the public APK) for the test APK as well. Thus I assumed, that the test APK is correct and compatible. One can only see the information about the test APK, by clicking on the APK in the Dev Console.