Fresh Air - Android

Additional

Language
Java
Version
v0.1.2 (Mar 1, 2016)
Created
Feb 1, 2016
Updated
Jul 14, 2016 (Retired)
Owner
Rightpoint
Contributor
dylanrjames
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Fresh Air - Android

Fresh Air is an application update library. It is designed to check a remote location for application updates and if updates are available, it prompts the user to upgrade the application. When the new version of the application is started, a dialog can be presented that showcases the new features to the user.

Basic Setup

Fresh Air can be set up with just a few simple steps. A working example can also be found in the sample module of this project.

Including In Your Project

Fresh Air is available on our Bintray Maven repository and can be included in your project with the following changes.

  1. Include our repository in your root project build.gradle:
allprojects {
  repositories {
      jcenter()
      maven { url "https://dl.bintray.com/raizlabs/Libraries" }
  }
}
  1. Include the dependency in your module's build.gradle:
dependencies {
  compile fileTree(dir: 'libs', include: ['*.jar'])
  compile 'com.android.support:appcompat-v7:23.1.0'
  
  ...
  
  compile 'com.raizlabs:FreshAir:0.1.0'
}
  1. Initialize the library before use, typically in your Application class:
public class SampleApplication extends Application {

  @Override
  public void onCreate() {
      super.onCreate();

      FreshAir.initialize(this);
      ...
  }
}

Update Checks

Fresh Air can check for new versions of your application using a remotely hosted JSON file. Just call the following method from the onCreate() of your Application, your first Activity, or any other place you would like to check for updates. Note that this process is asynchronous.

public class SampleApplication extends Application {

 @Override
 public void onCreate() {
     super.onCreate();

     FreshAir.initialize(this);
     FreshAir.checkForUpdates("https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Raizlabs/FreshAir-Android/develop/Schema/release_notes.json");
     ...
 }
}

See Schema/release_notes.json in this repo for an example of the JSON schema

Release Notes

Fresh Air can present a dialog of release notes to showcase the features that you have added in new versions of your application. This dialog will include a scrollable view of features which each contain an image, title, and description. These will be shown once per version, but not again.

  1. Define the release information that you wish to display. This doesn't display the information, but lets Fresh Air know what you will want to display when the time comes. Typically, you want to put this information in your Application.onCreate() after initializing the library. The release notes follow a Builder pattern which takes a set of Features, which are also constructed through a Builder pattern:
public class SampleApplication extends Application {

  @Override
  public void onCreate() {
      super.onCreate();

      FreshAir.initialize(this);
      FreshAir.setReleaseNotes(new ReleaseNotes.Builder()
              .addFeature(
                      new FeatureInfo.Builder()
                              .setImageResource(R.mipmap.ic_launcher)
                              .setTitleResource(R.string.Feature1_Title)
                              .setDescriptionResource(R.string.Feature1_Description)
              )
              .addFeature(
                      new FeatureInfo.Builder()
                              .setImageResource(R.drawable.feature2)
                              .setTitleResource(R.string.Feature2_Title)
                              .setDescriptionResource(R.string.Feature2_Description)
              )
              .addFeature(
                      new FeatureInfo.Builder()
                              .setImageResource(R.drawable.feature3)
                              .setTitleResource(R.string.Feature3_Title)
                              .setDescriptionResource(R.string.Feature3_Description)
              )
              // Sometimes handy for minor updates: see docs
              .setVersionCode(1));
  }
}
  1. When you would like to display the release notes dialog, call the following method. This requires a FragmentActivity from the support library. Typically you want to do this from your main launcher Activity or any other entry point to your application:
public class MainActivity extends FragmentActivity {

  @Override
  protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
      super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
      
      ...
      
      FreshAir.showReleaseNotes(this);
  }
}

Extras

Additional flexibility is available. Consult the JavaDoc for more details, but some of the higher level functionality is listed below.

  • Update Prompts - You can change the text contents of the update prompt via FreshAir.setUpdatePrompt(UpdatePromptInfo). UpdatePromptInfo contains a Builder class for easy overriding.
  • Clear History - You can clear the previously shown updates, forced updates, and release notes via FreshAir.clearFUpdatePromptVersion(), FreshAir.clearForcedUpdateVersion(), and FreshAir.clearReleaseNotesVersion
  • App Disabling - You can manually block out the app via FreshAir.disableApp(). To unset this, you must call FreshAir.clearAppDisabled() and restart the app.
  • Logging - You can alter the level of logging via FreshAir.setLogLevel(int) to clear logging or add more logging for debugging. By default, only warnings and errors are displayed.