Google announced today on their Android Developer’s Blog that over the next two weeks they’ll be rolling out an update to the Android Market for all Android devices running v1.6 and above.
The update is a fairly major one, with a major overhaul to the UI, including a new “carousel” showing off the featured apps on the front page, and a rework of the app page so that all the info is now on one page, rather than split across three tabs.
Other changes include the addition of “Live Wallpapers” and “Widgets” categories.
But it’s not all UI changes: Google have now dropped the refund window for app purchases down to 15 minutes, from the previous 24 hours. This is presumably to stop people downloading games, finishing them within 24 hours, and then refunding them.
Another change sure to please game developers is an increase in the maximum allowed size for apk’s (the format that Android applications are distributed in). Before this update, the biggest apk that could be distributed through the market was 25MB. This has now been doubled to 50MB.
Previously, developers that wanted to have an app greater than 25MB in size have had to deliver a stripped-down apk to the Market, then, after a user has downloaded it, have them download the remainder of the app from the developer’s own servers. So this really is good news for a lot of developers.
The market app will update itself automagically over the next two weeks, and you’ll immediately be able to upon opening the app if you’ve been updated or not. There is no sure-fire way to force an update, so just hang tight and be patient.
[via Android and Me]