Few media players offer as many video and audio codecs as VLC, a playback application developed as open source by Video Lan. Frequently updated to reflect the latest changes in playback environments, Android isn’t exactly cutting-edge, at least in the Google Play version: VLC has not been updated since August 2023. According to the developers, the reasons why the software is not updated are due to Google’s requirements.

Having a video and audio file with a codec that is impossible to play so that said file appears and sounds after VLC is installed. And this This player is one of the most recommended on any platformWhether computer or mobile. In the latter case, VLC has been supporting Android since 2012, and this development has not always had its best moments. Because Google doesn’t make it very easy, at least in the developers’ opinion.

Support for older devices at risk

VLC player on Android

To publish apps on Google Play, it is important to comply with Google’s policy regarding the app store, including updates. With successive versions of Android Google raises the minimum amount for an app to stay current on the Play Store. But what if the developer wants to maintain support for older Android versions? Then you have to give the signing keys to Google; This is a really delicate thing as it means losing absolute control of the software. This is what VideoLAN claims To not update VLC on Android.

Just go to Google Play and search for VLC to discover that the last update occurred on August 27, 2023, a long time ago for an app that has never stopped evolving. In fact, the Android branch of GitHub, the repository where VideoLAN publicly publishes the code, It was updated to version 3.6 beta 2 a few weeks ago.. The latest version of Google Play is 3.5.4.

VideoLAN developers expressed their disagreement with Google’s policies regarding updating applications. Since the device fleet that VLC uses, especially Android TV, is a bit old, developers cannot update the player their own way without conflicting with Google policies. Specifically, to continue protecting older versions, VideoLAN must provide signing credentials to Google; this is a requirement that the player’s developers are unwilling to undertake.

The main problem comes from using VLC on Android 10 and below. VideoLAN wants to maintain support for older systems, but since distributing the app via Google Play would require APKs to be signed by the store instead of the developer (due to App Bundles), VideoLAN does not want to give up encryption keys. Google because think they are their own and special element.

The only solution Google offers is to forget about Android 10 and above users on both portable devices and Android TV. This means losing a large user base; It is not for nothing that Android on televisions is not fully updated. According to VideoLAN, “Tens of millions of users” will be excluded from Android TV in question.

Android is not the only operating system that VideoLAN has problems with, developers have not updated VLC in the Windows app store for a long time. And for a reason quite similar to the one used in Android: VideoLAN assures that Microsoft does not respond to requests to update the application.

Cover image | DALL-E 3 edited on ChatGPT

via | FranDroid

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