Breaking upgrades in Android

Question

It will save a lot of coding if I am able to make a breaking change to my Android application. Instead, they will have to download a clean install and visit a URL to reinitialise the application data.

According to the documentation, "if the package name and signing certificate do not match those of the existing version, Market will consider it a new application and will not offer it to users as an update." This would allow me to publish a new version of the application without the user being able to accidentally upgrade and break the application.

If I do upload a new version of my application with a different signing certificate, will the application appear in the application store twice? If so, is there any way to prevent users from downloading the old application?

Answer 1

If I do upload a new version of my application with a different signing certificate, will the application appear in the application store twice?

Yes, though you can unpublish the older one if you wish. Then, only those who ever installed the old one will still see it as an option, as I understand it.

If so, is there any way to prevent users from downloading the old application?

Unpublish it from the Android Market Developer Console. At most, your current "minimal distribution" will still be able to download it, but nobody else will.