Unable to Qualify for Developer Select Program on Amazon

Insplisity

Thanks to both. @tamwortheat, I don't quite understand what you mean, sorry. Could you please give an example?

Hm... I wish Amazon would be a little more clear about the reported problems. I just hope they will reply with more detail than usual.

tamworthheat

I will try to find the Amazon resource/help page for this but it goes something like this:

(Although this isn't always a concerning factor it can be used as a reason for non-compliance)

Provide Alternative Bitmaps

---

Since Android runs in devices with a wide variety of screen densities, you should always provide your bitmap resources tailored to each of the generalized density buckets: low, medium, high and extra-high density. This will help you achieve good graphical quality and performance on all screen densities.

To generate these images, you should start with your raw resource in vector format and generate the images for each density using the following size scale:

• xhdpi: 2.0
• hdpi: 1.5
• mdpi: 1.0 (baseline)
• ldpi: 0.75

This means that if you generate a 200x200 image for xhdpi devices, you should generate the same resource in 150x150 for hdpi, 100x100 for mdpi and finally a 75x75 image for ldpi devices.

Then, place the generated image files in the appropriate subdirectory under res/ and the system will pick the correct one automatically based on the screen density of the device your application is running on:

MyProject/
  res/
    drawable-xhdpi/
        awesomeimage.png
    drawable-hdpi/
        awesomeimage.png
    drawable-mdpi/
        awesomeimage.png
    drawable-ldpi/
        awesomeimage.png

Then, any time you reference @drawable/awesomeimage, the system selects the appropriate bitmap based on the screen's dpi.

Edit>> This isn't always a concerning factor but can be used as a reason for non-compliance.
I think this is usually to do with any activity using HTML/CSS.  As with a dashboard though, providing a high res image that will be auto scaled down will suffice but seen as they require compatibility with 3rd gen devices (not sure of screen res) your image will at the largest be shown at 50% of screen width (2680/2=1340px size image).

But it does look like they are being really picky and like you say they are never specific about what they require of your particular app.

Insplisity

Thanks for looking this up! As I said yesterday, I've sent them an email, asking the reasons why my app (which was previously in the Dev Select Program) wasn't eligible anymore, and I've just noticed it's back again! The original reason was a "force close" message on Kindle7 and 8.9 HD devices.

I was concerned about being dropped out of the Dec Select Program as the app was even featured as FREE app of the day.

I haven't received a detailed reply about other incompatibility issues yet. If they'll send specifics, I'll be happy to forward them to the Andromo team.

However, I must say that when Amazon decides to give you "personal" attention, they are always very fair and kind in their communication. They even custom enabled the Kindle HDX 7 I've received (as a part of that mobile ads promotion thing) to my region, even if it's not officially supported here.

tamworthheat

After looking into it, i think my last comment may be largely irrelevant anyway, thats more to do with system icons.

Although, a basic compatibility issue is the use of absolute pixels, such as;

For specifying text size, instead of saying for instance 12px, to use 12dp

And for layouts, instead of saying height=50px, use height=50sp

This way, when displayed on devices with different dpi it is displayed correctly.

(I think actually there are too many potential compatibility issues, that they should be more specific)

meoldTest

Just a small comment regarding resources. Just so there isn't any confusion, Andromo does use the correct Android implementation for it's resources, ie. providing multiple dpi versions for different screen densities etc. That however doesn't apply to any HTML/Javascript content you've included yourself.

While we don't know if it's related to the issues some are having, for those who write a lot of HTML/HTML5 content, the following section of articles may be useful. Also look at the "See Also" section of links on some of the article pages:

http://developer.android.com/guide/webapps/index.html

Insplisity

Thanks to both for all the info.

Insplisity

@darryl: Great stuff, thanks.

I got a more detailed reply about one of my apps. The problems is this:
"Change the mode of an app from portrait to landscape and vice verse the app force closes."

However, I strongly believe that this was just a coincidence. I use a 1200x1200 background image and the app never crashed while tested on multiple devices.

I'll send an inquiry about other apps as well.