The manifest of your Android app provides essential information about the app to the Amazon Appstore for Android. Your app must include an “AndroidManifest.xml” file in the root directory.

The Amazon Appstore uses the app manifest file to ensure we merchandise apps appropriately. Prior to submitting your app to Amazon, please ensure the manifest is packaged with your app and includes the following elements and data:

• VersionName: A string value that represents the release version of the application code, as it should be shown to users. The value is a string so that you can describe the application version as a <major>.<minor>.<point> string, or as any other type of absolute or relative version identifier. There is a hundred-character maximum on the length of the version name string.

• Uses-sdk: Tells us which OS the app runs on.

• Uses-configuration: Tells us which configuration is required by the app. (This element may be left empty if nothing is required.)

• Uses-feature: Tells us which features of the phone are used, such as the camera. (This section may be left empty if there are no required features.)

• Supports-screens: Tells us if the app supports large and/or high-intensity screens

• Uses-permissions: These are Android permissions and are required by the platform. (This should NOT be present if your app does not require permissions.)

Below is an example manifest structure with required elements in red:

<manifest versionName="string">

    <uses-permission />

    <permission />

    <permission-tree />

    <permission-group />

    <instrumentation />

    <uses-sdk />

    <uses-configuration />

    <uses-feature />

    <supports-screens />

     <application>

        <activity>

            <intent-filter>

                <action />

                <category />

                <data />

            </intent-filter>

            <meta-data />

        </activity>

         <activity-alias>

            <intent-filter> . . . </intent-filter>

            <meta-data />

        </activity-alias>

         <service>

            <intent-filter> . . . </intent-filter>

            <meta-data/>

        </service>

         <receiver>

            <intent-filter> . . . </intent-filter>

            <meta-data />

        </receiver>

        <provider>

            <grant-uri-permission />

            <meta-data />

        </provider>

         <uses-library />

    </application>

</manifest>
 

If you do not have any data for a certain element--for instance, if your app does not utilize any permission--you should remove that element entirely instead of leaving it empty.  Empty elements can cause issues in the ingestion process.  Also, make sure your app only requests permissions that it actually needs to function properly.  Unnecessary permission requests can cause a spyware or malware concern from a customer’s perspective.

If your manifest does not comply with this set of rules, it may be rejected directly by the Developer Portal or in the app approval phase.

You can find more information about the AndroidManifest.xml File on the Android Dev Guide:

http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/manifest/manifest-intro.html