White Label Android Application Installation and Customization Guide

Transcription

1 White Label Android Application Installation and Customization Guide

2 Background

3 Background Application built for civic agencies to bring voting information to the public Code written to make deployment easy, without extensive Android development experience

4 Background

5 Background This is your data that Google is serving!

6 Background - API

7 Background - API Response includes: Contest and Referendum Candidate information Polling locations State and local election official contact info

8 Background White Label App not in the Play Store, but ready to deploy Customizable text and images Feature complete and ready to go

9 Background Open Source BSD 3-Clause License android-white-label-app

10 Basic Requirements Recent Windows, Macintosh, or Linux computer Java SDK GitHub (use desktop app, or command line) Android Studio Device drivers for your Android device Technical proficiency

11 Setup before you start First, get your API keys: Google Civic Information API Key Google Maps Android SDK API Key Google Directions API Key Google Analytics Tracking ID

12 Setup before you start Google makes this really easy:

13 Setup before you start Google makes this really easy: (There are a lot of APIs when you first get to this page, but they re listed alphabetically)

14 Setup before you start Google makes this really easy: Create these two keys

15 Setup before you start

16 Setup before you start Google makes this really easy:

17 Setup Dependencies Java SDK downloads/jdk7-downloads html Details at:

18 Setup Dependencies Android Studio required for Android development: Details at:

19 Setup Dependencies GitHub Details at:

20 Setup get the code Go to If you have the desktop app installed, click Clone in Desktop

21 Setup get the code Open Android Studio and import the project To pull updates from GitHub, go to VCS -> Git -> Repository -> Pull Or use the GitHub app or command line

22 Setup install dependencies Go to Tools -> Android -> SDK Manager

23 Setup install dependencies Install dependencies listed at

24 Setup Settings Copy xmltemplates/api_keys.xml.template to app/src/main/res/values/api_keys.xml

25 Setup Settings Open the api_keys.xml file it should look like this

26 Setup Settings Get your API keys together and update the api_keys.xml file. You can also do this with a plain text editor. Update the Android and Browser keys, and the Analytics Tracking ID The official only and test election options can be set here, too

27 Setup Settings Copy xmltemplates/app_tracker.xml.template to app/src/main/res/xml/app_tracker.xml Update the Analytics Tracking ID

28 Setup Settings Also, update the Brand Name text with what you want the app to be called. This text will be at the top of the home page and can be edited on line 36 of app/src/main/res/values/strings.xml

29 Setup Settings The Google Maps API key requires some information about your specific build of the project. Detailed instructions are in the repository s README file.

30 Setup Settings There is also a way to do this in Android Studio from Build -> Generate Signed APK More info can be found at

31 Setup Settings Copy the APK fingerprint you generate and paste it in the API key in the Google Developer Console

32 Setup Emulator and Devices The Android Emulator does not support Google Play Services, which are required for the Google Maps SDK to function properly. We recommend using an actual Android device for testing. Get documentation about using devices: And drivers for your device:

33 Setup Build the project Click the Run button in the Run menu

34 Run Build the project And the app should load on your device

35 Run Additional Configurations There are a few more things to consider before packaging the app for submittal to the Play Store About, Terms, and Privacy Policy content Customized images Additional language support

36 Run Additional Configurations About, Terms, and Privacy Policy content are in app/src/main/res/values/strings.xml

37 Run Additional Configurations Edit, save, and rebuild You can change any of the text in Android Studio or a plain text editor that supports UTF-16 character encoding.

38 Run Additional Configurations Translations are also in app/src/main/res/ Each translation gets its own values directory Spanish translations are not available yet, but are in progress

39 Run Additional Configurations Customize the app s images by updating files in the app/src/main/res/drawable-{size} directories Tips: Use the same name Keep the same pixel dimensions There are different sets of images to support different screen sizes More detail at:

40 Run Additional Configurations Customize the AppIcons (app_icon.png), an Background (bg_home.png) images for a complete visual rebranding. You don t need to change these, though.

41 Publish That s everything for setup and configuration! The next step is to package the app and submit it to the Play Store. Google has lots of documentation on this process.

42 Publish The publishing process requires completing several steps.

43 Publish Set up a developer account to get started

44 Publish The process takes some time to work through, but isn t particularly difficult. Many of the issues you may encounter are not new, and resolutions can likely be found with a quick Google search. If additional technical support is needed, contact: Jen Tolentino at [email protected]

45 Good luck!

46 White Label Android Application Installation and Customization Guide