Building a mobile app with PhoneGap and Dreamweaver: Submitting to Android Market

When you've created a signed release build of your mobile app, you are ready to publish it to Android Market. This tutorial shows you the final few steps you'll need to complete to prepare your app and get it into Android Market.

Setting a version number is important because this information is central to maintaining and updating your application going forward. Users of your application rely on the version number to identify the version they have installed and determine if a newer update is available. Services through which you will publish your application, including Android Market, will also require the version number so it can be displayed to users.

By default, your application is set to version 1. To see this, open your project's AndroidManifest.xml file in a text editor. Your AndroidManifest.xml file should be in the root of your project. Near the top you'll see the manifest element, which includes android:versionName and android:versionCode properties; for example:

The android:versionCode property is set to an integer value that represents the version of the application code. Typically, you start this property at 1 for the first version that you submit to Android Market and increment it by 1 every time you publish an update.

The android:versionName property is set to a string value that represents the release version of the application code as it should be shown to users. It can have decimals to represent minor and point releases; for example: 1.1.1 .

After setting your application's version information, create a release build by following the steps in Creating a release build of your PhoneGap Android app.

Before you submit your application to the Android Market, you need to test it extensively on at least one device. It is important to test your application on an actual device and not just the Android Virtual Device (AVD), because devices perform differently than the AVD. Further, make an effort to test your application on as many different devices as you can. Different devices may have different resolutions and capabilities that affect how your application looks and performs. Your goal as an Android developer is to get your application working well on many devices. The only way to know if you've achieved this goal is to test it on many devices.

Google also recommends that you consider adding an End User License Agreement, which can help protect you, your organization, and your intellectual property.

You are finally ready to submit your application to the Android Market. When you submit, Android Market verifies that you have included android:versionName and android:versionCode properties, signed your app with a private key, and included android:icon and android:label properties. These should have been automatically included in your AndroidManifest.xml file when you initially set up your Dreamweaver project and selected an icon in the application settings. For more details on how to add your icon, see Building a mobile app with PhoneGap: Creating your first app.

Follow these steps to submit your application to Android Market:

1. Register for an Android Market developer account at http://market.android.com/publish. There is a one-time fee of $25.
2. After you have registered, return to http://market.android.com/publish and click the blue Upload Application button. After you select your release build APK file you'll see an Upload New APK dialog box with details on the file you're uploading (see Figure 1). Click Save.

3. On the Product Details page, add any screen shots or other information you'd like to include with your application.
4. Click Save and Publish and you are done.

Now that you've submitted your first application to Android Market, submitting additional applications will be straightforward.

For more details on publishing to Android Market visit developer.android.com and check out Preparing to Publish: A Checklist. Also see Publishing on Android Market, which has a section on publishing updates to your application.

Now that you've summited an Android application, you may want to walk through the steps of building and submitting your application to the iOS platform:

• Creating a release build for iOS
• Submitting to the Apple App Store