Google’s Developer Program Policy Center received a visual makeover along with a few minor changes in its policies on Tuesday. The new look aims to make it easier for developers to locate, absorb and implement the company’s guidelines. The company has also updated its rules, as well as expanded information on policy enforcement to help resolve violations along with a few splotches of change here and there.
The new look has been derived from the company’s popular Material Design. All the policies are now organised according to their type and displayed to the developer as colourful cards arranged in a grid-like pattern. Along with this, the company is providing visual examples and detailed guidelines for the most common violations.
The aim of the tech giant is to make it easier for developers to understand what is and what isn’t acceptable in the apps uploaded to the Play Store. The company has recently been more vigilant about the apps being uploaded on its app store, checking for policy violations, malware, content problems etc. The new look and feel of the Developer Policy Center is Google’s way to make it simpler for developers to follow guidelines and prevent unwanted problems.
This is surely a great improvement from the older text-based policy listings Google used until now. You can now easily select where your query lies and even get visual demonstrations along with detailed explanations in most cases.
The Enforcement section of the service has also gotten an update. What was just a short paragraph until today that described how the company’s policies are enforced along with a URL which allowed developers to contact Google about a removal of an app, a concerning rating or comment from a user, has now become a full blown separate section in the Developer Policy Program Center.
The update brings in three separate tabs which include Policy Coverage, Enforcement Process and Managing and Reporting Policy Violations. All of these provide developers with detailed insight about how Google implements its policies, what happens in case of a violation and over a half-dozen help pages on related topics ranging from the app verification and appeals process to understanding account terminations.
Along with these visual changes, the company has made a few invisible changes to the service, too. The most important is the addition of a few new policies in accordance with current practices. Some of the more stand-out policies include an updated ads policy to restrict inappropriate ads, a new policy that imposes cutbacks on apps that bypass the system power management features under its Device and Network Abuse and a few others.
You can visit the new policy center right here, and share your feedback if you are a developer.
