I am trying to run an app from android studio onto my phone after doing some updates, and am receiving the message:
"The device already has an application with the same package but a different signature.
In order to proceed, you will have to uninstall the existing application
WARNING: Uninstalling will remove the application data!
Do you want to uninstall the existing application?"
I really do not want to uninstall because the app has months of data entered - I do not want to loose this.
Note that this app has never been published to the play store, so it doesn't seem that is the problem
Please can someone help me with this dilemma
Thanks
I suggest one solution that you don't have to remove the installed applicaiton.
You can change application id then it's gonna be installed like another application.
You should change applicationId in build.gradle(app)
Related
I am developing two android apps with android studio and for some reason I want just one of these apps can be installed on a device. I think I should check the package name of second app and prevent it from installing. Is there any way to do that? thanks.
You can not prevent any app from being installation. Instead you can stop your app from being running. I mean, when your app starts, check if specific application is installed, and if so stop your application.
An ordinary app cannot prevent another app from being installed. Malware authors would think that such a "feature" would be wonderful.
Device owner apps — mostly for IT departments at larger organizations — have some abilities here, though I forget whether they can block installation by package name.
I am developing 2 android applications, which are clients for my server. I cannot install both applications on my android phone. I install the first app to phone, everything is ok. Then when I try to install the second app on the phone, I get the message that the application will replace another application (the first one), and then I get following error:
Application not installed: an existing package by the same name with a conflicting signature is already installed.
I mention that I have created one separate keystore file for every application, export them as in the android official signing application guide, then zipaligned them.
So the OS thinks that it is a single application? But in fact there are 2 different apps.
What am I doing wrong?
I think you are using the same package, which is not allowed for two different apps.
But for anyone who have the same error for installing another version on top of previously installed app:
I wanted to test released version of my app when the problem occured. I've had the app previously installed using eclipse, and than I wanted to install the same app but with released signature. I have even uninstalled the app using apps gallery, but the problem persisted.
The solution for me was to unistall the app using Settings->Apps->"the app"->top right corner menu->Uninstall for all users
I had the same error message, but these answers did not help. On a 4.3 nexus 7, I was using a user who was NOT the owner. I had uninstalled the older version but I kept getting the same message.
Solution: I had to login as the owner and go to the settings->apps... Scroll down to the end of the list where my old version was listed with a mark 'not installed'. Select it and press the 'settings' button in the top right corner and finally 'uninstall for all users'
Not sure what happens when you use the same signing key, because in all honesty, I never really tried it.
That being said, as Anand Tiwari, in his comment, has already simplified the answer, you cannot install two different applications with the same package name on one device. They, logically speaking, may be different to you, but for the OS, they are in fact, the same.
The problem also manifests itself when you try to upload the applications to the Android Market (Google Play). Google Play will simply not accept the second application. There is a short and simple explanation by Warren Faith here: https://stackoverflow.com/a/5788664/450534
As an example of how similar applications with a few changes are published to the Google Play store:
The free version of FriendCaster is: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=uk.co.senab.blueNotifyFree
The paid version if the same app is: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=uk.co.senab.blueNotify
Notice the ending of the package names. In this case, you will be able to install both the apps simultaneously on one device.
I think your problem is that both your files have the same package name. You can name both apps with similar packages, but they can't be identical. In fact, using the same package base can be used to communicate between applications ie. App1: com.mypkg.app1 and App2: com.mypkg.app2. However, they both can't be called com.mypkg.app - the package name is how Android identifies apps, and can't be identical.
You should be able to sign as many different apps (assuming their package is different) with the same key.
Make sure not to lose your signing certificate, if you lose it, you will not be able to upload a new app with the same package name. If you lose your signing certificate, you will be in big trouble.
Good luck.
I guess this could be a common problem for new android developer like myself so I thought to ask it even so it is not a big deal.
I would like to have both the current published stable version of an app and the under development version on my device. Yet when I want to install both I get
Re-installation failed due to different application signatures.
You must perform a full uninstall of the application.
I understand it technically yet I was wondering how I could have an easy way around this so I can have both application on my phone. I could change the package name for the time being but I hope there is an even more straight forward way to get it done.
Thanks
UPDATE
Solution as given by "Marc Bernstein" in the following post - thx Algo for posting the link to it
How to change package name of an Android Application
There is a way to change the package name easily in Eclipse. Right click on your project, scroll down to Android Tools, and then click on Rename Application Package.
Just change package name of your published and development version Application. Changing Package name is really very simple and easy, follow that post
https://stackoverflow.com/a/9171773/185022
The "published" version should be signed using a release keystore.
The "development" version should be signed using a debug keystore.
At installation time, Android will complain that the two applications (having the same package name) have different signatures, and won't install the latest one (Re-installation failed due to different application signatures.).
To fix this (normal) behavior, change the package name of your application while developing it (ex: com.example.myapp-dev).
I have created a application and released it with out signing it. also i have updated my application few times after the first release.
After few months , now would like to give a another update. if i install my application in mobile , its not getting install, its installed only after i uninstalled the existing application from the mobile.
in console its showing , "Change in application signature"
I know i made a mistake by not signing the application with private key at first time. But please any one tell me How my default debug key has changed now.. so that i can roll back.
is there any way to solve the issue? or i should ask my users to uninstall the app.
Thanks.
Several things can cause the debug key to change, such as reinstalling the SDK or building the APK from a different system. The only way to upload a new version of your app now is to delete the old one and upload the new one, e.g. adb uninstall com.example.appPackageName first.
We develop an app for android. When we installed the app for the first time, the app works. When we do some changes on the source, we can't install the app again without deleting it from the phone.
Is there any known workaround? When we install the app the second time, the phone shows "App not installed".
Any ideas?
It sounds like you are having some kind of namespace collision. I get this sometimes when I duplicate a project. You need to preserve a unique mapping of APK signing key to package name. See the Things That Cannot Change blog post for more details about preventing package confusion.