Migrate from the HockeySDK to App Center SDK for Unity

Important

Visual Studio App Center is scheduled for retirement on March 31, 2025. While you can continue to use Visual Studio App Center until it is fully retired, there are several recommended alternatives that you may consider migrating to.

Learn more about support timelines and alternatives.

Follow this documentation if you're looking to update your application to use App Center SDK instead of HockeySDK.

1. Update the libraries

1.1 Remove old HockeySDK

  1. Choose the game object that you'd created for the SDK and remove HockeyAppAndroid / HockeyAppiOS component by clicking the Settings icon > Remove Component.

  2. Remove HockeyAppUnityAndroid / HockeyAppUnityiOS folder(s) from the Assets folder inside your Unity project.

1.2 Add new App Center SDK

The App Center SDK is integrated by importing Unity Packages into your project. To do so, first install the App Center Unity Editor Extensions plugin. Open the Editor Extensions via the Unity menu: Window > App Center > Editor Extensions and select Install App Center SDK.

The App Center SDK is designed with a modular approach – you can integrate only those services that you're interested in. See the equivalences in the next table:

HockeyApp module App Center module
Crashes and Exceptions Crashes
Metrics Analytics
Version Updates Distribute

To install the services separately, you can select Install SDK in each tab.

Note

The App Center Unity SDK is one for all three platforms: Android, iOS and UWP. You don't have to install each SDK separately.

The recommended way to integrate the App Center Unity SDK is to use App Center Editor Extension, but we support other scenarios. For more info, refer to the App Center Unity Documentation.

2. Setup the SDK

2.1 Convert the application identifier

The App Center SDK uses application identifiers in the globally unique identifier (GUID) format. Your HockeyApp App ID can be used by App Center but you need to convert it to a different format. To convert the identifier you must add four hyphens to get an 8-4-4-4-12 representation.

Before (HockeyApp): 00112233445566778899aabbccddeeff

After (App Center): 00112233-4455-6677-8899-aabbccddeeff

2.2 Configure the SDK

Attach App Center script

In the Project window, navigate to the AppCenter folder that was added to your project. Locate the script with the App Center logo as its icon, named AppCenterBehavior, and drag it onto the game object you used previously for HockeySDK.

Configure App Center settings

Click on this game object and in the Inspector window, you'll see the App Center configuration.

App Center script configuration

Fill in the additional information using the detailed configuration mapping table, which is given below.

3. Services and feature comparison

HockeyApp Setting App Center Setting Notes
App ID Android/iOS App Secret Use the App ID that you've converted in the previous step
Server URL Custom Log URL, Other Setup section Check Use Custom Log URL
Restricted in-app updates NA Distribute.UpdateTrack
Crashes and Exceptions (enabled by default) Use Crashes Crashes module
Auto Upload Crashes NA (enabled by default) Documentation (enabled by default, can be configured)
Exception Logging Initial Log level, Other Setup section If you want more detailed logging, use Verbose
User Metrics Use Analytics Analytics module
Version Updates (enabled by default) Use Distribute Distribute module
Update Alert NA Documentation (has to be configured)

Note

If your project doesn't support one of the three platforms listed in the settings, leave the app secret field as-is; it will have no effect. If your project supports platforms that App Center doesn't support, the APIs and configuration will have no effect for those platforms.

If your project has the HockeySDK API calls throughout the application, replace them using the detailed API mapping table given below.

Feature HockeyApp App Center
Custom events with properties HockeyAppIOS.TrackEvent or HockeyAppAndroid.TrackEvent Analytics.TrackEvent
Explicitly check for updates HockeyAppIOS.CheckForUpdate or HockeyAppAndroid.CheckForUpdate Distribute.CheckforUpdate
Display a feedback form HockeyAppIOS.ShowFeedbackForm or HockeyAppAndroid.ShowFeedbackForm NA (see the section below)

Feedback Service

The feedback service won't be supported in App Center. See HockeyApp feedback.