Bob Kerns wrote: > If I have a service used by > several applications, I currently have to supply it in every > application, and arrange to negotiate just which one actually provides > the service.
That's not the only option -- see below. > The alternative, of a separate APK is prohibitive because it depends > on the user seeing the dependency, understanding what to do about it, > and taking action. Those three steps can be handled by the application that has the dependency. If your application requires other capabilities: -- use PackageManager to see if the required component is there -- if not, pop up a dialog saying that you need to download/install the dependency before you can continue (or before certain features are enabled) -- start up the relevant Market Uri, or download and kick off the installation yourself, depending on how the component is distributed > However, if we could declare in our manifest that a package *requires* > package, and the Market handled this, most of our problems would be > solved. It would certainly solve all of the above problems, and related ones (e.g., uninstalling no-longer-needed applications once whatever depended on them is uninstalled, warning a user if they try to uninstall something that somebody else depends upon). I suspect it will introduce new and exciting problems, but that remains to be seen. FWIW, I suggested this about a year ago and the notion was squashed. -- Mark Murphy (a Commons Guy) http://commonsware.com | http://twitter.com/commonsguy Android Training...At Your Office: http://commonsware.com/training -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Android Developers" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/android-developers?hl=en
