Today I published my P2P video application, “Radar” on the Android Market for free, it took about 15mins in total. You can now all go and download the application and rate it five stars minimum
Serge is also going to try and keep a list of the current applications here.
Installation
We have worked closely with the Android team to ensure that the seamless AIR runtime installation from the desktop is mirrored on devices. This isn’t a simple process and as you will notice, it’s not perfect. Today, the first AIR application that gets installed will ask the users permission to download the AIR runtime – this comes from the Android Market.
To be clear, on mobile devices there is a very clear security process for 3rd party installations. We don’t intend to break that model for the time being as it comes with a number of benefits – like updating the runtime for example.
Adobe AIR is 5.65Mb compressed and 16.3Mb when installed.Get Started
This is obviously a very exciting time and there are already some Flash based games and applications sitting on the market from Flash developers around the world. I tried playing with a few of them and it’s exciting to see so many of you jumping at the chance to go live, arguably a few jumped too soon. Please Please test your applications thorough and ensure high quality!!
Submission process
Set yourself up as an Android Developer, it costs $25 and you can use Google Checkout.
Certificates
Once you’re all signed up, you only need to submit your application APK, created from Flash Professional or using the wonderful command line. In either case, you will need to ensure that your certificate is valid for 25 years.
Go to the AndroidSDK\tools folder using your Terminal or Command Prompt.
adt -certificate -cn flashmobileblog -ou markadoherty -validityPeriod 25 2048-RSA ./androidCert.p12 somepassword
Once completed, you can now compiled your APK as before – selecting this new certificate. Android publishers are free to use self-signed certificates created in this way, however it is advisable to use a proper certificate. The Adobe AIR certificate is well recognized (Verisign based) and works on Android, Mac, Windows, Linux and more to come.
Icons
You will need icons, 48×48 and 72×72. Google have provided a very detailed set of guidelines on icon production, so I suggest you drop by and ensure that you’re following the best practices. Liz Myers has a great video session on icons and how to stand out over here (note that this was for Flash Lite, but the concepts are the same).
Screenshots
In addition, in the Android Market there are usually some marketing screenshots. These help users decide whether they are interested in your app or not and so I suggest that you spend some time making them great. You can submit two of them at 320×480 or 480×854.
Lastly, you will want to submit a promotional graphic for use on websites and other materials at 180×120 portrait.
Marketing
In these early days I recommend adding Adobe AIR into your description for the application. This will ensure that users are aware that they need a Froyo device and you can also benefit from free marketing moving forward as users will be able to search for “Adobe AIR”.