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subtracks/signing/README.md
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austinried 368f53d589 release: attach the signed AAB to the GitHub release
Publish the exact bundle sent to Play alongside the APK, cover both in
SHA256SUMS and the release notes, and document verifying the AAB.
2026-10-08 18:52:44 +00:00

2.6 KiB

Verifying a subtracks download

subtracks ships through four channels:

  • GitHub releases — the APK and the AAB are signed with the release key. The public certificate is committed here as release-certificate.pem and attached to each release, along with a SHA256SUMS.
  • Google Play — uses Play App Signing, so Google re-signs the app it delivers. The release key is only the upload key there: it signs the AAB we send to Play, not the APK users install. The installed app verifies against Google's app signing certificate (Play Console → App integrity), and the upload key only proves the AAB we uploaded.
  • nightly builds (the subtracks-nightly artifact from CI) — signed with the public debug key committed here as nightly-certificate.pem.
  • F-Droid — re-signed by F-Droid with its own key; see F-Droid's published signing key.

nightly builds

Certificate SHA-256:

DF:31:3F:18:58:E9:AD:F4:7F:44:65:B2:80:8F:DC:E5:B9:F8:8A:48:35:DC:D0:79:95:19:61:C3:05:05:08:37

To check a nightly APK:

apksigner verify --print-certs subtracks-nightly.apk

The SHA-256 digest line must equal the fingerprint above (the certificate is committed at nightly-certificate.pem).

GitHub releases

The APK is signed with the release key. Certificate SHA-256:

02:DA:2C:B7:B8:21:4E:53:BD:BF:B4:55:69:8D:CB:96:52:22:F9:1C:95:4B:52:10:AE:AC:96:FE:32:9C:8F:01

Each release attaches the APK, the AAB, the checksums and the certificate (committed here as release-certificate.pem):

sha256sum -c SHA256SUMS
apksigner verify --print-certs subtracks.apk              # compare with the .pem
keytool -printcert -jarfile subtracks.aab                 # the AAB
keytool -printcert -file release-certificate.pem          # prints its SHA-256

The .aab is the exact bundle uploaded to Google Play (install it by generating device APKs with bundletool); the .apk is the universal APK for sideloading. The signing certificate SHA-256 is also listed in the release notes.

Google Play

The AAB we upload is signed with the release (upload) key, and that is what Play checks; Google then re-signs the delivered APKs with its own app signing key. So a Play-installed app is verified against Play's app signing certificate (shown in Play Console → App integrity), not release-certificate.pem.

To check the AAB that was sent:

keytool -printcert -jarfile app-release.aab