skymap.deploy-play-store

Sky Map Play Store Deployment

Manages the full release pipeline: build → internal → alpha → beta → production.

Prerequisites

• fastlane/play-store-credentials.json — service account key (never commit changes to this file)
• fastlane installed: bundle exec fastlane --version or fastlane --version
• no-checkin.properties in app/ (required for release signing)
• Environment: export JAVA_HOME=$(/usr/libexec/java_home -v 17)

Run fastlane commands from the repo root with bundle exec fastlane android <lane> (or plain fastlane android <lane> if not using Bundler).

Release Pipeline

The standard path is: internal → alpha → beta → production. Always start at internal and promote rather than uploading directly to later tracks.

Internal → Alpha (Closed Testing) → Beta (Open Testing, 10%) → Production (10% rollout)

Step 0 — Pre-release checklist

Before deploying, confirm these are done:

1. Splash screen updated if this is a named planetary release (/release-splash)
2. Sponsors synced (/skymap-sponsors)
3. Contributors synced — ask the user: "Would you like to refresh the contributors list before deploying?" If yes, invoke the /skymap-contributors skill now before continuing.
4. Changelog written (/whats-new <last-tag>) — both whatsnew_content.xml and fastlane/metadata/android/en-US/changelogs/default.txt
5. Version name bumped if needed (see Version Management below)
6. All changes committed and on master

Step 1 — Deploy to Internal Testing

This increments the version code, builds the release AAB, and uploads to the internal track.

bundle exec fastlane android internal

The build output is app/build/outputs/bundle/gmsRelease/app-gms-release.aab. Metadata and screenshots are not uploaded by this lane — use upload_metadata separately.

Step 2 — Upload metadata (optional but recommended)

Upload store listing text, changelogs, and/or images independently of a binary upload.

# Store text only (descriptions, title)
bundle exec fastlane android upload_metadata

# Include changelogs (whatsnew)
bundle exec fastlane android upload_metadata whatsnew:true

# Include screenshots/images
bundle exec fastlane android upload_metadata imgs:true

# Everything
bundle exec fastlane android upload_metadata all:true

# Skip store text, changelogs only
bundle exec fastlane android upload_metadata store:false whatsnew:true

To attach changelogs to a specific already-uploaded version code:

bundle exec fastlane android upload_metadata whatsnew:true version_code:1234

Step 3 — Promote to Alpha (Closed Testing)

After verifying the internal build is stable:

bundle exec fastlane android promote_to_alpha

Step 4 — Promote to Beta (Open Testing, 10% rollout)

bundle exec fastlane android promote_to_beta

Step 5 — Promote to Production (10% rollout)

bundle exec fastlane android promote_to_production

Production starts at 10%. Increase the rollout percentage manually in the Play Console as confidence grows.

Version Management

# Bump version name (e.g., for a named release). No spaces in name.
bundle exec fastlane android bump_version name:"1.5.0:Earth"

# Increment version code only (done automatically by the `internal` lane)
bundle exec fastlane android increment_version_code

Version name and code live in app/build.gradle. Commit the bump before deploying.

Screenshots

Capture Play Store screenshots using a connected device or emulator:

bundle exec fastlane android screenshots

Add --device_type=sevenInch for tablet screenshots. Results land in fastlane/metadata/android/en-US/images/.

Direct-track Lanes (use sparingly)

These upload directly without going through internal first. Prefer the promote lanes above.

bundle exec fastlane android alpha              # Direct to alpha
bundle exec fastlane android beta_yes_im_sure  # Direct to beta
bundle exec fastlane android production_yes_im_sure  # Direct to production

Troubleshooting

• Authentication error: check fastlane/play-store-credentials.json is present and the service account has the correct Play Console permissions.
• Build fails: ensure no-checkin.properties exists in app/ and JAVA_HOME points to Java 17.
• Version code conflict: the internal lane auto-increments; if a manual upload already used the next code, increment again.
• INSTALL_FAILED_UPDATE_INCOMPATIBLE on device: uninstall the Play Store version first with adb uninstall com.google.android.stardroid.

Key Files