Reuse expansion files on android developer console

Question

How do I re-use an expansion file when updating an APK in developer console?

When I upload a new apk with a higher versionCode, I can't select a previously used main expansion file...

And if I upload the same expansion file again with the new apk, it get assigned a new expansion-version, which isn't the expected behavior.

APK Expansion Files documentation:

...the Developer Console allows you to re-use an uploaded expansion file with a new APK, the expansion file's name does not change—it retains the version applied to it when you first uploaded the file.

How can I achieve this on developer console?

Answer 1

I got an answer from Google Play Developer Support.

The behavior you are describing is intended. You can only reuse OBBs that were associated with APKs that have been published. Neither APK has ever been published, so we don't give the option to reuse the OBBs he's uploaded so far.

So, it seems that i can't test my app's obb files behaviour when updating, without actually publishing a previous version of the app.

Answer 2

If you observe the name format [main|patch].<expansion-version>.<package-name>.obb having expansion-version which need to be same when you download expansion file manually through Google Downloader Activity.

Sometime it happens that your expansion file is remain same and you have only modify the apk so you need not to create again expansion file with new name, you have to keep the version code same and map the same code in Downloader Activity and resue it.

http://developer.android.com/guide/market/expansion-files.html#Download