Change package name (causes signature conflict with Fairphone Open OS)

[Roboe]

douwe at Fairphone Forum:

Hey all, one thing we noticed here at Fairphone: the package name of the app can not be the same as the original package for two reasons:

• it will cause a conflict with the signature of our version of the app and the installation might fail.
• people might get confused about the creator of these apps. So referencing Fairphone as the origin of this code is fine, but it should be clear it is a community (WeAreFairphone) project now.

Keep on pushing!

It has already caused troubles:
https://forum.fairphone.com/t/publishing-fairphone-specific-apps-launcher-contact-widget-on-f-droid/28008/54
https://forum.fairphone.com/t/my-contacts-widget-wont-update-wont-uninstall/28767 (related with how F-Droid manages cross-developer updates and erratic indications, though)

Steps to follow:

• Remove WeAreFairphone apps with com.fairphone package namespace from F-Droid:
  • Release new virtual versions with a What's New section for each app
  • Disable current apps (docs)
• Change package's namespace and resubmit them on F-Droid (metadata)

How should we do this? @jannispinter

[jannispinter]

Changing the package's namespace and reupload shouldn't be a problem. F-Droid says that they don't remove apps. In this case however, they might make an exception. I will open a ticket at F-Droid.

Edit: Opened here.

[Roboe]

So, steps to follow (updated above):

• Release new virtual versions with a What's New section for each app
• Disable current apps (docs)
• Change signatures of apps. Add metadata for the "new apps" (i.e. submitting them on F-Droid)

[jannispinter]

I'm a bit busy this week and might not be able to get this done until the weekend. Feel free to make the changes, if you have the spare time.

[Roboe]

Update: https://gitlab.com/fdroid/fdroiddata/issues/736#note_30848046

I created new old-package-name branches for both apps and tried to setup the changelogs.
I will create tags and update F-Droid's metadata once we ensure this will work fine.

I will change package names now on the master branch and update tags to fit real version (this shouldn't break anything on F-Droid side).

[Roboe]

New apps had hit F-Droid. Old apps had been marked with a "deprecation notice". We only need to disable them in the next F-Droid index update. Will keep this issue open until then, ;)

[Roboe]

I've submited last step needed to close this issue to F-Droid's data repo: https://gitlab.com/fdroid/fdroiddata/merge_requests/2339

[Roboe]

Closing this since it was fulfilled time ago.