I get apps from wherever but mostly from Google Play and Github and F-Droid
and Sourceforge but some are directly from developers & some are reused
from phone to phone (some are extracted while others were saved
beforehand).

At any given time, some of those installed apps are updated automatically.
Some aren't.

Some I can update with a new version manual download.
Some won't.

It seems I have to match sources?
I think?

What's going on?
Can someone explain Android app updates please?

Nick Cine <nickcine@is.invalid> wrote:
> I get apps from wherever but mostly from Google Play and Github and F-Droid
> and Sourceforge but some are directly from developers & some are reused
> from phone to phone (some are extracted while others were saved
> beforehand).
>
> At any given time, some of those installed apps are updated automatically.
> Some aren't.
>
> Some I can update with a new version manual download.
> Some won't.
>
> It seems I have to match sources?
> I think?
>
> What's going on?
> Can someone explain Android app updates please?

Apps are signed with developer keys. To avoid impersonation, Android will
only update apps where the new apk was signed with the same key as the old
one.

F-droid builds and signs apps with their own key, rather than the
developer's key. The result is that you can only update F-droid builds of
apps with another build sourced from the F-droid repo - the same app signed
by the developer from Github or Play won't update the F-droid signed
version, and vice versa.

(If you're getting apps from Github etc, I can recommend Obtainium as a tool
for managing updates for you)

Theo

On 27 Feb 2024 13:14:13 +0000 (GMT), Theo wrote:

> Apps are signed with developer keys. To avoid impersonation, Android will
> only update apps where the new apk was signed with the same key as the old
> one.

Thank you for offering to explain how Android updates apps given the
apps can come from a variety of sources which you won't know over time.

With those keywords, I guess you're explaining this (Play App Signing)?
https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-developer/answer/9842756
"Devices only accept updates when its signature matches the installed
app's signature. By letting Google manage your app signing key,
it makes this process more secure."

> F-droid builds and signs apps with their own key, rather than the
> developer's key. The result is that you can only update F-droid builds of
> apps with another build sourced from the F-droid repo - the same app signed
> by the developer from Github or Play won't update the F-droid signed
> version, and vice versa.

With those keywords, is this the signing process that you're explaining?
https://f-droid.org/2023/09/03/reproducible-builds-signing-keys-and-binary-repos.html
"All the years before, F-Droid created a dedicated key for each app
to sign the published APKs, but now with reproducible builds
F-Droid ships APKs that are signed by the upstream developer(s)."
> (If you're getting apps from Github etc, I can recommend Obtainium
> as a tool for managing updates for you)

I've been using Google Play's update & F-Droid Basic's updates.

But I had never heard of Obtainium, which, after searching - is this.
https://github.com/ImranR98/Obtainium
https://github.com/ImranR98/Obtainium/wiki
https://f-droid.org/packages/dev.imranr.obtainium.fdroid/

"Obtainium's core goal is to automate the process of downloading
and installing Android app updates directly from their "source" websites
(sites where app files are available for direct download)."

When I searched F-Droid Basic for "Obtainium" it said
"No matching apps available" which doesn't make much sense to me.

Searching in F-Droid Basic for "Updater" brought a few updater apps.
OSS Tracker by jroddev (update open source apks direct from repos)
APKTrack by Ivan Kwiatkowski (runs the Google Play Store updates)
OpenDNS Updater (dynamic IP updates on OpenDNS services)
(and a bunch of others - but not obtainium)

Since F-Droid Basic didn't have it, I went back to the deprecated F-Droid
app but it too didn't show it so the right repository must be needed.

Giving up on F-Droid apps on Android I went to Windows & got it there.
https://github.com/ImranR98/Obtainium/releases/tag/v0.14.21-beta

That Github release page showed four different APKs to choose from.
55.2MB app-release.apk (Sep 29, 2023)
20.6MB app-arm64-v8a-release.apk (Sep 29, 2023)
18.7MB app-armeabi-v7a-release.apk (Sep 29, 2023)
21.8MB app-x86_64-release.apk 21.8 (Sep 29, 2023)

I'm never sure which to pick (probably the biggest one is most portable)
but I connected the phone to adb just to check what primary ABI I have.
Windows command line: adb -d shell getprop ro.product.cpu.abi
It output "arm64-v8a"

So I think that means I can use either of the two APKs below:
55.2MB app-release.apk (probably contains everything)
20.6MB app-arm64-v8a-release.apk (Sep 29, 2023)

I copied what I think is the most portable APK to the phone from Windows.
https://github.com/ImranR98/Obtainium/releases/download/v0.14.21-beta/app-arm64-v8a-release.apk
Name: app-arm64-v8a-release.apk
Size: 21605717 bytes (20 MiB)
SHA256: 63DC979B3C851C83788A580614F4F1D53341D1502E5FC6C68CC9F661DCB0687B

After installing Obtainium on Android, I left the settings at the defaults.
It may take a while to figure out how to use it effectively for updating.

One question: Since I couldn't get Obtaininum off of F-Droid (likely
I needed a repo for it to be found), how does it update itself?

Another question is, after loading up a phone for years, is there any way
to easily tell from which repository any given app was installed from?

On 2/26/24 9:53 PM, Nick Cine wrote:
> I get apps from wherever but mostly from Google Play and Github and F-Droid
> and Sourceforge but some are directly from developers & some are reused
> from phone to phone (some are extracted while others were saved
> beforehand).
>
> At any given time, some of those installed apps are updated automatically.
> Some aren't.
>
> Some I can update with a new version manual download.
> Some won't.
>
> It seems I have to match sources?
> I think?
>
> What's going on?
> Can someone explain Android app updates please?

And a variant problem: I have over 150 apps, most of which I rarely
use, and do not update them automatically -- I'd rather do them all at
once when the process won't interfere with my actual usage. Almost all
are genuine playstore apps.

It generally takes several days. I plug in the charger and tell the
phone to UPDATE ALL (via my home wifi) and it starts chugging. At some
point it simply stops updating while there are still un-updated apps.
This happens repeatedly during each update session and for all update
sessions. I don't notice because I'm not watching the process. Our
wifi connection is good 24/7.

WTF is happening?

--
Cheers, Bev
Self Test for Paranoia: You know you have it when you can't
think of anything that's your own fault.

Nick Cine <nickcine@is.invalid> wrote:
> On 27 Feb 2024 13:14:13 +0000 (GMT), Theo wrote:
>
> > Apps are signed with developer keys. To avoid impersonation, Android will
> > only update apps where the new apk was signed with the same key as the old
> > one.
>
> Thank you for offering to explain how Android updates apps given the
> apps can come from a variety of sources which you won't know over time.
>
> With those keywords, I guess you're explaining this (Play App Signing)?
> https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-developer/answer/9842756
> "Devices only accept updates when its signature matches the installed
> app's signature. By letting Google manage your app signing key,
> it makes this process more secure."

It's a basic feature of Android. Google offers a service to do the signing
as part of a Play Store submission where they look after your key and sign
on their server, but you don't have to do that. Many open source apps sign
locally and then upload the signed apk to their website, Github and the Play
Store.

> > F-droid builds and signs apps with their own key, rather than the
> > developer's key. The result is that you can only update F-droid builds of
> > apps with another build sourced from the F-droid repo - the same app signed
> > by the developer from Github or Play won't update the F-droid signed
> > version, and vice versa.
>
> With those keywords, is this the signing process that you're explaining?
> https://f-droid.org/2023/09/03/reproducible-builds-signing-keys-and-binary-repos.html
> "All the years before, F-Droid created a dedicated key for each app
> to sign the published APKs, but now with reproducible builds
> F-Droid ships APKs that are signed by the upstream developer(s)."

Yes. I hadn't noticed they had stopped the practice recently. That post
does describe what did and now do.

It seems they still build themselves, though, rather than just being a repo
of uploaded .apks build by developers. So it's still slightly different
from the other methods, although updates should now be compatible (ie you
can update an F-droid installed app from another source like the Play
Store).

> I'm never sure which to pick (probably the biggest one is most portable)
> but I connected the phone to adb just to check what primary ABI I have.
> Windows command line: adb -d shell getprop ro.product.cpu.abi
> It output "arm64-v8a"
>
> So I think that means I can use either of the two APKs below:
> 55.2MB app-release.apk (probably contains everything)
> 20.6MB app-arm64-v8a-release.apk (Sep 29, 2023)

Most phones / tablets are arm64 aka ARMv8. I think you're right that
app-release.apk has everything. Sometimes when updating something in
Obtainium it can't figure out which download it wants and needs you to
answer that question.

> After installing Obtainium on Android, I left the settings at the defaults.
> It may take a while to figure out how to use it effectively for updating.
>
> One question: Since I couldn't get Obtaininum off of F-Droid (likely
> I needed a repo for it to be found), how does it update itself?

If you add the Obtainium repo URL:
https://github.com/ImranR98/Obtainium

to its app list, then it'll be able to update itself. Then you can go
adding other Github/Gitlab/etc URLs for apps you want to install.

> Another question is, after loading up a phone for years, is there any way
> to easily tell from which repository any given app was installed from?

Not unless there's any telltales in the version number or the signing key.
If they're signed with an F-droid key then that says they came from there.
(I don't know how to read out the key signature from the .apk, but there
must be a way)

Theo

Theo wrote:

>> Another question is, after loading up a phone for years, is there any way
>> to easily tell from which repository any given app was installed from?
>
> Not unless there's any telltales in the version number or the signing key.
> If they're signed with an F-droid key then that says they came from there.
> (I don't know how to read out the key signature from the .apk, but there
> must be a way)

This app tells me information about an app's signature and where it was
installed from but it's in technospeak so it's difficult to figure out.
https://f-droid.org/en/packages/io.github.muntashirakon.AppManager/
https://f-droid.org/repo/io.github.muntashirakon.AppManager_427.apk

For example, if you start that App Manager and search for Obtainium,
on the "Signatures" tab it shows tons of confusing to me technospeak
(only the first half-dozen lines of which are pasted below).

dev.imranr.obtainium Signer Certificate
Subject: CN=Imran Remtulla,OU=Unknown,O=Unknown,L=Toronto,ST=Ontario,C=CA
Issuer: CN=Imran Remtulla,OU=Unknown,O=Unknown,L=Toronto,ST=Ontario,C=CA
Issued date: Fri Jul 24 12:57:26 PDT 2020
Expiry date: Tue Dec 10 11:57:26 PST 2047
Type: X.509, Version: 3, Validity: Valid
Serial Number: 7cec2ed1

I installed, on purpose, an F-Droid app to see what the signature is...
org.woheller69.weather Signer Certificate
Subject: CN=FDroid,OU=FDroid,O=fdroid.org,L=ORG,ST=ORG,C=UK
Issuer: CN=FDroid,OU=FDroid,O=fdroid.org,L=ORG,ST=ORG,C=UK
Issued date: Sat Dec 19 04:26:06 PST 2020
Expiry date: Wed May 06 04:26:06 PST 2048
Type: X.509, Version: 3, Validity: Valid
Serial Number: 00f5a09d9110c0dc97

Looking around for an app I probably got off a developer site, the sig is...
eu.faircode.netguard Signer Certificate
Subject: O=faircode.eu
Issuer: O=faircode.eu
Issued date: Sat Oct 24 06:10:03 PDT 2015
Expiry date: Wed Oct 17 05:10:03 PST 2040
Type: X.509, Version: 3, Validity: Valid
Serial Number: 0eea1073

This was almost certainly grabbed off of the Google Play store, right?
com.whatsapp Signer Certificate
Subject: CN=Brian Acton,OU=Engineering,O=WhatsApp Inc.,L=Santa Clara,ST=California,C=US
Issuer: CN=Brian Acton,OU=Engineering,O=WhatsApp Inc.,L=Santa Clara,ST=California,C=US
Issued date: Fri Jun 25 16:07:16 PDT 2010
Expiry date: Mon Feb 15 15:07:16 PST 2044
Type: X.509, Version: 3, Validity: Valid
Serial Number: 4c2536a4

And this is most likely a system app that came with the device, right?
com.android.location.fused Signer Certificate
Subject: 1.2.840.113549.1.9.1=#161(long number)f6d,CN=Samsung Cert,OU=DMC,O=Samsung Corporation,L=Suwon City,ST=South Korea,C=KR
Issuer: 1.2.840.113549.1.9.1=#161(long number)f6d,CN=Samsung Cert,OU=DMC,O=Samsung Corporation,L=Suwon City,ST=South Korea,C=KR
Issued date: Wed Jun 22 05:25:12 PDT 2011
Expiry date: Sun Nov 07 04:25:12 PST 2038
Type: X.509, Version: 3, Validity: Valid
Serial Number: 00d20995a79c0daad6

There is also a "Installer App" section of the "App Info" tab.
dev.imranr.obtainium "Installer App" not listed
org.woheller69.weather "Installer App" F-Droid Basic
eu.faircode.netguard "Installer App" Package Installer
com.whatsapp "Installer App" not listed
com.android.location.fused "Installer App" not listed

Do those real-world examples tell you how they were installed?

W 27 Feb 2024 18:30:09 +0000 (GMT), Theo napisal:

> (I don't know how to read out the key signature from the .apk, but there
> must be a way)

Try this "APK Signature Checker" app.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.casraq.android.apksignaturechecker

What I use it for is to lump apps with the same signature all together.

Nick Cine <nickcine@is.invalid> wrote:
> There is also a "Installer App" section of the "App Info" tab.
> dev.imranr.obtainium "Installer App" not listed
> org.woheller69.weather "Installer App" F-Droid Basic
> eu.faircode.netguard "Installer App" Package Installer
> com.whatsapp "Installer App" not listed
> com.android.location.fused "Installer App" not listed
>
> Do those real-world examples tell you how they were installed?

It does seem to record how apps were installed in that place (I have
'Obtainium', 'Droid-ify', 'Google Play', 'Aurora Store' and others in there)
so it does seem to do what you suggest. I don't have anything for system
apps. Maybe 'adb sideload' or opening the .apk from the filesystem don't
record an installer app?

Theo

On 28 Feb 2024 09:12:41 +0000 (GMT), Theo wrote:

>> Do those real-world examples tell you how they were installed?
>
> It does seem to record how apps were installed in that place (I have
> 'Obtainium', 'Droid-ify', 'Google Play', 'Aurora Store' and others in there)
> so it does seem to do what you suggest. I don't have anything for system
> apps. Maybe 'adb sideload' or opening the .apk from the filesystem don't
> record an installer app?

Like you seem to be aware, it doesn't record where a lot of apps came from.
But it does record where some apps came from. So it's at least a start.

I went looking for a better noad app for telling WHERE something came from.
I just tested these two. They're not perfect. But you might like one.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.madness.collision
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.app.detail

The Boundo app api checker will sort by apps installed from
Google Play Store
Github
Sourceforge
F-Droid
Package Installer

And whether it uses any of the following
Kotlin
Jetpack
Flutter
React
Xamarin
Android App Bundle
System app
System core app
Modular system component
Instant app
Runtime resource overlay
Progressive web app
and so on

It can sort apps by target APK.
It can show the version of the system modules.
It can tell you if they're APEX or APKs too.

But I'm still working on understanding the output sort order.

Using <news:url5ia$3al7o$1@dont-email.me>, The Real Bev wrote:

> And a variant problem: I have over 150 apps, most of which I rarely
> use, and do not update them automatically -- I'd rather do them all at
> once when the process won't interfere with my actual usage. Almost all
> are genuine playstore apps.

I don't think the Google PlayStore updates *all* the apps you've installed
from the Google Play Store. It only updates *some* of the apps you've
installed from the Google Play Store.

You can easily prove this to yourself by running a *real* app updater app.
And then comparing it against what the Google Play Store update found.

> It generally takes several days. I plug in the charger and tell the
> phone to UPDATE ALL (via my home wifi) and it starts chugging. At some
> point it simply stops updating while there are still un-updated apps.

See above. The Google Play Store was never intended to update all the apps
you've installed using the Google Play Store. It only updates some of them.

To update *all* your installed apps, you need a *real* app updater app.
https://play.google.com/store/search?q=apk%20update%20checker&c=apps

> This happens repeatedly during each update session and for all update
> sessions. I don't notice because I'm not watching the process. Our
> wifi connection is good 24/7.
> WTF is happening?

I don't know but sometimes apk updaters have two things that can be the
problem. One is they have a queue. The other is they have parallel streams.

Let's say you set the app updater to only one stream at a time.
And let's say you have a queue but one app in the queue is hung up.

In that case, nothing will update while that one app is hung up.

On 27 Feb 2024 13:14:13 +0000 (GMT), Theo wrote:
> (If you're getting apps from Github etc, I can recommend Obtainium as a tool
> for managing updates for you)

I wonder how Obtainium compares with the other Android apk app updaters?
https://github.com/ImranR98/Obtainium
"Obtainium allows you to install and update Apps directly from their
releases pages, and receive notifications when new releases are made
available."

https://f-droid.org/en/packages/net.xzos.upgradeall/
UpgradeAll is a free and open source software which simplifies the process
of finding updates for Android apps (even if you didn't install them),
Magisk modules from Github, Gitlab, F-Droid, Play Store, Coolapk and more"

https://github.com/rumboalla/apkupdater
"APKUpdater is an open source tool that simplifies the process of finding
updates for your installed apps. It aggregates the results from APKMirror,
Aptoide, F-Droid, IzzyOnDroid, APKPure, GitLab and GitHub."

https://github.com/javiersantos/AppUpdater
"checks for updates on Google Play, GitHub, Amazon, F-Droid or your own
server."

https://github.com/JusticeRage/ApkTrack
"ApkTrack checks, if updates for installed apps are available. It can query
F-Droid, PlayStore, Xposed, plus many other sources of APKs via the
ApkTrack Proxy."

Patrick <patrick@oleary.com> wrote:
> On 27 Feb 2024 13:14:13 +0000 (GMT), Theo wrote:
> > (If you're getting apps from Github etc, I can recommend Obtainium as a tool
> > for managing updates for you)
>
> I wonder how Obtainium compares with the other Android apk app updaters?

No experience with the others, but Obtainium is an app installer, not just an
updater. The descriptions of the below suggests they search your system for
installed apps and then go hunting for updates. It's not clear if they will
install apps you don't already have. Can you ask them to find and install
an app you don't currently have?

I don't think Obtainium will search your device for currently installed
apps - it just looks after apps you have installed via it.

Theo

On 2/28/24 2:08 AM, david wrote:
> Using <news:url5ia$3al7o$1@dont-email.me>, The Real Bev wrote:
>
>> And a variant problem: I have over 150 apps, most of which I rarely
>> use, and do not update them automatically -- I'd rather do them all at
>> once when the process won't interfere with my actual usage. Almost all
>> are genuine playstore apps.
>
> I don't think the Google PlayStore updates *all* the apps you've installed
> from the Google Play Store. It only updates *some* of the apps you've
> installed from the Google Play Store.

That seems stupid. Why not?

> You can easily prove this to yourself by running a *real* app updater app.
> And then comparing it against what the Google Play Store update found.

Still makes no sense. Why would google limit the number of apps it
would update in a single queue?

>> It generally takes several days. I plug in the charger and tell the
>> phone to UPDATE ALL (via my home wifi) and it starts chugging. At some
>> point it simply stops updating while there are still un-updated apps.
>
> See above. The Google Play Store was never intended to update all the apps
> you've installed using the Google Play Store. It only updates some of them.

Again, why? And why would google not make its own update app better
than a third-party app it provides to update the apps it provides?

> To update *all* your installed apps, you need a *real* app updater app.
> https://play.google.com/store/search?q=apk%20update%20checker&c=apps
>
>> This happens repeatedly during each update session and for all update
>> sessions. I don't notice because I'm not watching the process. Our
>> wifi connection is good 24/7.
>> WTF is happening?
>
> I don't know but sometimes apk updaters have two things that can be the
> problem. One is they have a queue. The other is they have parallel streams.
>
> Let's say you set the app updater to only one stream at a time.
> And let's say you have a queue but one app in the queue is hung up.
>
> In that case, nothing will update while that one app is hung up.

Not arguing, exactly, but it makes no sense that google would just
randomly stop updating while there are still apps in the queue. If it
decides that 100 need updating, it must know that there are 100 updates
available. Why would it arbitrarily stop -- especially without
notifying the user that only nn will be updated without restarting the
process?

--
Cheers, Bev
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
"With sufficient thrust, pigs fly just fine. However,
this is not necessarily a good idea...."

Using <news:urqfvn$nple$1@dont-email.me>, The Real Bev wrote:

>> I don't think the Google PlayStore updates *all* the apps you've installed
>> from the Google Play Store. It only updates *some* of the apps you've
>> installed from the Google Play Store.
>
> That seems stupid. Why not?

Do you know that most people who buy stuff fall for what they "assume" the
stuff does (for example, drinking beer gets you all the cute chicks)?

Advertising does funny things to people's brains.
They "assume" the product has magical powers that it simply does not have.

And the manufacturer certainly isn't going to be advertising that the
Michelin tire is made by the same company that makes the no-brand tire.

They want you to "assume" all sorts of magical powers for their product.

One of those magically "assumed" powers is Google Play Store updating all
the apps that you installed on the phone using the Google Play Store app.

It doesn't.
It never did.

In my experiments, admittedly from long ago, it updated something like one
tenth or one twentieth of the apps that had updates on the Google Play
Store. This is easy to prove yourself.

1. Run the Google Play Store app updater.
2. Run a real app updater.

The difference is astounding.

>> You can easily prove this to yourself by running a *real* app updater app.
>> And then comparing it against what the Google Play Store update found.
>
> Still makes no sense. Why would google limit the number of apps it
> would update in a single queue?

Why would Mobil sell expensive gasoline that they call "premium" if it's no
better than the cheapest top tier gasoline called "regular" at Costco?

If people are dumb enough to ascribe "magical powers" to Google's Play
Store app, then Google isn't going to be the first one to inform them that
it only updates a small minority of the apps that have updates available.

Don't believe me.
Run your own tests.

But what you need to learn from me is nowhere does Google ever say anywhere
that the Google Play Store update does what you are "assuming" it does.

It doesn't.

>>> It generally takes several days. I plug in the charger and tell the
>>> phone to UPDATE ALL (via my home wifi) and it starts chugging. At some
>>> point it simply stops updating while there are still un-updated apps.
>>
>> See above. The Google Play Store was never intended to update all the apps
>> you've installed using the Google Play Store. It only updates some of them.
>
> Again, why? And why would google not make its own update app better
> than a third-party app it provides to update the apps it provides?

This is the third time you are asking *ME* where I don't know what is the
reason as all I know is that Google never said what you "assumed" they did.

I also know full well that the app updaters easily show apps that are
installed on your system that have updates in the Google Play Store that
the Google Play Store update doesn't even bother checking to see.

In addition, I've seen (long ago) that Google specifically says it only
updates apps that it feels like updating (as I recall, they called them
"Google apps", but you can check for yourself as it's inside the app).

I don't have the Google Play Store app installed on my phone but you can
run the test that I ran many years ago which "says" what I'm telling you.
1. Run the Google Play Store update.
2. Look at what it says for the apps it updates.

It will say something like "Updates only Google apps" or similar.

>> I don't know but sometimes apk updaters have two things that can be the
>> problem. One is they have a queue. The other is they have parallel streams.
>>
>> Let's say you set the app updater to only one stream at a time.
>> And let's say you have a queue but one app in the queue is hung up.
>>
>> In that case, nothing will update while that one app is hung up.
>
> Not arguing, exactly, but it makes no sense that google would just
> randomly stop updating while there are still apps in the queue.
> If it decides that 100 need updating, it must know that there are 100
> updates available. Why would it arbitrarily stop -- especially without
> notifying the user that only nn will be updated without restarting the
> process?

Why does a printer "just randomly stop printing while there are still pages
in the queue"? Something screwed up and it's not smart enough to skip it.

Even if it did finish updating, it only updates a small minority of the
apps that have updated versions available in the Google Play Store anyway.

On 2/29/24 8:50 PM, david wrote:
> Using <news:urqfvn$nple$1@dont-email.me>, The Real Bev wrote:
>
>>> I don't think the Google PlayStore updates *all* the apps you've installed
>>> from the Google Play Store. It only updates *some* of the apps you've
>>> installed from the Google Play Store.
>>
>> That seems stupid. Why not?
>
> Do you know that most people who buy stuff fall for what they "assume" the
> stuff does (for example, drinking beer gets you all the cute chicks)?
>
> Advertising does funny things to people's brains.
> They "assume" the product has magical powers that it simply does not have.
>
> And the manufacturer certainly isn't going to be advertising that the
> Michelin tire is made by the same company that makes the no-brand tire.
>
> They want you to "assume" all sorts of magical powers for their product.
>
> One of those magically "assumed" powers is Google Play Store updating all
> the apps that you installed on the phone using the Google Play Store app.
>
> It doesn't.
> It never did.
>
> In my experiments, admittedly from long ago, it updated something like one
> tenth or one twentieth of the apps that had updates on the Google Play
> Store. This is easy to prove yourself.
>
> 1. Run the Google Play Store app updater.
> 2. Run a real app updater.
>
> The difference is astounding.
>
>>> You can easily prove this to yourself by running a *real* app updater app.
>>> And then comparing it against what the Google Play Store update found.
>>
>> Still makes no sense. Why would google limit the number of apps it
>> would update in a single queue?
>
> Why would Mobil sell expensive gasoline that they call "premium" if it's no
> better than the cheapest top tier gasoline called "regular" at Costco?
>
> If people are dumb enough to ascribe "magical powers" to Google's Play
> Store app, then Google isn't going to be the first one to inform them that
> it only updates a small minority of the apps that have updates available.
>
> Don't believe me.
> Run your own tests.
>
> But what you need to learn from me is nowhere does Google ever say anywhere
> that the Google Play Store update does what you are "assuming" it does.
>
> It doesn't.
>
>>>> It generally takes several days. I plug in the charger and tell the
>>>> phone to UPDATE ALL (via my home wifi) and it starts chugging. At some
>>>> point it simply stops updating while there are still un-updated apps.
>>>
>>> See above. The Google Play Store was never intended to update all the apps
>>> you've installed using the Google Play Store. It only updates some of them.
>>
>> Again, why? And why would google not make its own update app better
>> than a third-party app it provides to update the apps it provides?
>
> This is the third time you are asking *ME* where I don't know what is the
> reason as all I know is that Google never said what you "assumed" they did.
>
> I also know full well that the app updaters easily show apps that are
> installed on your system that have updates in the Google Play Store that
> the Google Play Store update doesn't even bother checking to see.
>
> In addition, I've seen (long ago) that Google specifically says it only
> updates apps that it feels like updating (as I recall, they called them
> "Google apps", but you can check for yourself as it's inside the app).
>
> I don't have the Google Play Store app installed on my phone but you can
> run the test that I ran many years ago which "says" what I'm telling you.
> 1. Run the Google Play Store update.
> 2. Look at what it says for the apps it updates.
>
> It will say something like "Updates only Google apps" or similar.

No conflict. I don't expect it to update F-Droid stuff.

Neither do I expect google to outright lie. Mistakes, annoyances, other
shit sure, but not actually lie. "Update all" ought to mean exactly
that. OTOH, Bard/Gemini wasn't above lying, and neither was openai.

So what updater do you recommend?

>>> I don't know but sometimes apk updaters have two things that can be the
>>> problem. One is they have a queue. The other is they have parallel streams.
>>>
>>> Let's say you set the app updater to only one stream at a time.
>>> And let's say you have a queue but one app in the queue is hung up.
>>>
>>> In that case, nothing will update while that one app is hung up.
>>
>> Not arguing, exactly, but it makes no sense that google would just
>> randomly stop updating while there are still apps in the queue.
>> If it decides that 100 need updating, it must know that there are 100
>> updates available. Why would it arbitrarily stop -- especially without
>> notifying the user that only nn will be updated without restarting the
>> process?
>
> Why does a printer "just randomly stop printing while there are still pages
> in the queue"? Something screwed up and it's not smart enough to skip it.
>
> Even if it did finish updating, it only updates a small minority of the
> apps that have updated versions available in the Google Play Store anyway.

OK, so the answer is "Because it's a lying bastard." I can accept than.

--
Cheers, Bev
When cryptography is outlawed, only outlaws will
qwertzuio asdfghjk pyxcvbnml -- M. O'Dorney

Using <news:urro6u$130jm$1@dont-email.me>, The Real Bev wrote:

>> It will say something like "Updates only Google apps" or similar.
>
> No conflict. I don't expect it to update F-Droid stuff.

I never once mentioned F-Droid nor any other place to get apps.
We're talking only about apps installed from the Google Play Store.

It's not clear to me what Google means by "Google apps" but it's very clear
that the Google Play Store updater updates about 10 out of 100 apps even
when ALL of the apps are "google apps" and even when all have updates.

> Neither do I expect google to outright lie. Mistakes, annoyances, other
> shit sure, but not actually lie. "Update all" ought to mean exactly
> that. OTOH, Bard/Gemini wasn't above lying, and neither was openai.

I'm not going to defend Google other than to say they must keep a very
short list (like 10 out of 100) apps that they feel like updating.

Nothing else gets updated.
Even when there are updates available.

> So what updater do you recommend?

For you, I wouldn't recommend the APK updater I use as I can tell that you
want something that is mainstream and not something that requires effort.
https://i.postimg.cc/7b8w6v5D/appupdate.jpg

For you I'd recommend any of the updaters you find when you search here.
https://play.google.com/store/search?q=apk%20update%20checker&c=apps

These are the top three based on the highest recommendation & most reviews.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=app.quantum.supdate
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.update.software.updateallapps
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.softwareupdate.appupdates.updatephone

Run one of those against the Google Play Store updater & write back how
many apps it found with updates compared to what Google Play update found.

>> Even if it did finish updating, it only updates a small minority of the
>> apps that have updated versions available in the Google Play Store anyway.
>
> OK, so the answer is "Because it's a lying bastard." I can accept than.

Nobody lied.
You assumed wrong.

Did Chevron lie when they said that Techron is only in their gasoline?
It was up to you to "assume" that "Techron" meant something important.

It doesn't mean anything.
It's what Chevron puts on many of their petroleum products.

Not just gasoline.
Anything they want to put it on.

It's up to you to assume what "Techron" means.
When it actually means nothing.

You assumed the Google Play Store updated all apps that it installed that
have updates but it never said that it does that. And it doesn't do that.

I'm not defending Google. I'm only explaining to you how it works.

You can easily prove this by running the Google Play Store updater,
and then run any of the real apk updaters and comparing the results.

david, 2024-02-28 11:08:

> Using <news:url5ia$3al7o$1@dont-email.me>, The Real Bev wrote:
>
>> And a variant problem: I have over 150 apps, most of which I rarely
>> use, and do not update them automatically -- I'd rather do them all at
>> once when the process won't interfere with my actual usage. Almost all
>> are genuine playstore apps.
>
> I don't think the Google PlayStore updates *all* the apps you've installed
> from the Google Play Store. It only updates *some* of the apps you've
> installed from the Google Play Store.

Google Play *will* update all apps which got installed from there.

However app publishers can decide wether they want to make an update
available for all users (all countries, all device types etc.) at once
or if they want to check first, if an app runs properly before releasing
it to all users.

> You can easily prove this to yourself by running a *real* app updater app.
> And then comparing it against what the Google Play Store update found.

The "real" updater app will just ignore what the publisher intended and
tries to download the app in other ways. This does not mean, that an app
will *never* get updated in Google Play just because some "real" updater
app does this earlier.

--
Arno Welzel
https://arnowelzel.de

david, 2024-03-01 05:50:

[...]
> In my experiments, admittedly from long ago, it updated something like one
> tenth or one twentieth of the apps that had updates on the Google Play
> Store. This is easy to prove yourself.

I never experienced this. And I work in a company which develops Android
apps as well and know how publishing apps in Google Play works and how
the update mechanisms work.

> 1. Run the Google Play Store app updater.
> 2. Run a real app updater.
>
> The difference is astounding.

The difference is just *when* an app will be updated and not *if* this
will happen.

--
Arno Welzel
https://arnowelzel.de

Arno Welzel wrote on Sat, 2 Mar 2024 22:27:08 +0100 :

>> In my experiments, admittedly from long ago, it updated something like one
>> tenth or one twentieth of the apps that had updates on the Google Play
>> Store. This is easy to prove yourself.
>
> I never experienced this. And I work in a company which develops Android
> apps as well and know how publishing apps in Google Play works and how
> the update mechanisms work.
>
>> 1. Run the Google Play Store app updater.
>> 2. Run a real app updater.
>>
>> The difference is astounding.
>
> The difference is just *when* an app will be updated and not *if* this
> will happen.

The main difference between smart people and dumb people is that dumb
people say dumb things that they believe to be right which are wrong.

Before Galileo rolled balls down an incline, people assumed a bowling ball
would fall faster than a marble and yet they both fall at the same rate.

Galileo was smart.
But most people are stupid.

Because most people are intuitive.
They guess.

And intuitive people guess wrong almost all the time.
What Galileo did was run a test - and that was why he was smart.

If he didn't run the test, he would have been wrong like everyone else was.

Before Einstein realized that if electromagnetic waves propagated at the
same speed no matter the velocity of the emitting object, that means that
either space or time (or both) have to fluctuate - people assumed that
electromagnetic waves would move faster if thrown out of a faster object.

Einstein was smart.
But most people are stupid.

Because most people are intuitive.
They guess.

And intuitive people guess wrong almost all the time.
What Eddington did was run a test - and that showed Einstein was smart.

If Eddington's solar eclipse test didn't show Einstein to be right,
Einstein would have been wrong like everyone else was.

In the same way you are as wrong as everyone else is who just guesses.
If you ran the test, you'd suddenly be smart.

Because you'd realize that everything you think of how it works,
is wrong such that everything you say about how it works, is wrong.

It would take you less time to run the test, than to complain
that I told you that you're wrong - and yes - I have run the test.

Andrew, 2024-03-03 03:41:

> Arno Welzel wrote on Sat, 2 Mar 2024 22:27:08 +0100 :
>
>>> In my experiments, admittedly from long ago, it updated something like one
>>> tenth or one twentieth of the apps that had updates on the Google Play
>>> Store. This is easy to prove yourself.
>>
>> I never experienced this. And I work in a company which develops Android
>> apps as well and know how publishing apps in Google Play works and how
>> the update mechanisms work.
>>
>>> 1. Run the Google Play Store app updater.
>>> 2. Run a real app updater.
>>>
>>> The difference is astounding.
>>
>> The difference is just *when* an app will be updated and not *if* this
>> will happen.

[...]

> It would take you less time to run the test, than to complain
> that I told you that you're wrong - and yes - I have run the test.

And I develop Android software and I *know* how Google Play Services
work. Recently the company I work for, published an update for one of
their apps - and you would not see this in Google Play as update since
you are not in the user group for that. However a "real" update tool may
still show this by ignoring the intendend limitations like region or
language specific updates.

--
Arno Welzel
https://arnowelzel.de

Arno Welzel wrote on Sun, 3 Mar 2024 15:10:44 +0100 :

> And I develop Android software and I *know* how Google Play Services
> work. Recently the company I work for, published an update for one of
> their apps - and you would not see this in Google Play as update since
> you are not in the user group for that. However a "real" update tool may
> still show this by ignoring the intendend limitations like region or
> language specific updates.

If you claim to be a developer Android software, then I can claim to be the
Queen of England even though neither of us has the qualifications for each.

You're simply guessing.

The fact remains that out of x updates that are available for your device,
for your OS version, for your API, for your region, etc., the Google Play
Store update will show about 1/10th of x out of those x available updates.

Run the test.

Andrew, 2024-03-03 17:51:

> Arno Welzel wrote on Sun, 3 Mar 2024 15:10:44 +0100 :
>
>> And I develop Android software and I *know* how Google Play Services
>> work. Recently the company I work for, published an update for one of
>> their apps - and you would not see this in Google Play as update since
>> you are not in the user group for that. However a "real" update tool may
>> still show this by ignoring the intendend limitations like region or
>> language specific updates.
>
> If you claim to be a developer Android software, then I can claim to be the
> Queen of England even though neither of us has the qualifications for each.

That is one of my open source projects:

<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=de.arnowelzel.android.periodical>

The commercial apps are of course not available for free and not open
source.

> You're simply guessing.

No.

> The fact remains that out of x updates that are available for your device,
> for your OS version, for your API, for your region, etc., the Google Play
> Store update will show about 1/10th of x out of those x available updates.

I already explained how this happens. If you don't believe that, I can't
help you.

> Run the test.

I don't have to - I *know* that there is a difference. But you fail to
understand *why* this is so.

--
Arno Welzel
https://arnowelzel.de

Arno Welzel wrote on Mon, 4 Mar 2024 10:52:34 +0100 :

> I don't have to - I *know* that there is a difference. But you fail to
> understand *why* this is so.

OK. Good. I just wanted everyone to know that if they run the Google Play
Store app updater, it will find something like 1/10th the number of apps
that have updates available at that very moment on the Google Play Store.

Andrew, 2024-03-04 20:05:

> Arno Welzel wrote on Mon, 4 Mar 2024 10:52:34 +0100 :
>
>> I don't have to - I *know* that there is a difference. But you fail to
>> understand *why* this is so.
>
> OK. Good. I just wanted everyone to know that if they run the Google Play
> Store app updater, it will find something like 1/10th the number of apps
> that have updates available at that very moment on the Google Play Store.

Correct. But this what the app publishers *want* and not a bug in Google
Play.

--
Arno Welzel
https://arnowelzel.de

Arno Welzel wrote on Tue, 5 Mar 2024 20:19:53 +0100 :

>> Arno Welzel wrote on Mon, 4 Mar 2024 10:52:34 +0100 :
>>
>>> I don't have to - I *know* that there is a difference. But you fail to
>>> understand *why* this is so.
>>
>> OK. Good. I just wanted everyone to know that if they run the Google Play
>> Store app updater, it will find something like 1/10th the number of apps
>> that have updates available at that very moment on the Google Play Store.
>
> Correct. But this what the app publishers *want* and not a bug in Google
> Play.

Thanks for explaining the reason, as I was reporting to others the simple
fact you get far fewer updates listed by the Google Play Store update than
you get when you run the updater apps which look for updates on the repo.

I appreciate that you backed up your claim that you've developed code also.

I've gone through about a dozen tutorials, so I've "published" test apps on
my own phone (using Android Studio of course) but I haven't written any.

There are other issues with the Google Play Store updater (which affects
most, but not all the other APK updaters on the Google Play Store repo),
which is it doesn't look at updated apps that came from elsewhere.

For that, in case lurkers are interested, the following updaters are ok.
1. Obtainium <https://github.com/ImranR98/Obtainium>
GitHub, GitLab, SourceForge, F-Droid, IzzyOnDroid,
APKPure, Aptoide, Uptodown, APKMirror (Track-Only), etc.
2. APK Updater <https://github.com/rumboalla/apkupdater>
GitHub, GitLab, F-Droid, APKPure, Aptoide, APKMirror, IzzyOnDroid, etc.
3. App Updater <com.update.software.updateallapps> (has ads)
Google Play Store repository

In addition, the FOSS Google Play Store replacement clients also run
their own update mechanism which also results in far more available
updates than the proprietary Google Play Store updater shows.