Understanding the Archive

The core concept of Raccoon is the "archive". An archive is a download folder that is able to store multiple versions of the same app and, as far as Google Play is concerned, represents a single phone/tablet.

It is entirely possible and sometimes even desirable to maintain several different archives:

  • In case you own multiple devices and want/need "installation masters"
  • In case you often flash ROMs and need different working sets of apps.
  • In case you want/need to differentiate between free and paid apps.
  • ...

In principle, archives can live anywhere on your hard drive, but it is suggested to keep them in the designated folder (Raccoon/archives) within your personal directory.

Archives are self contained. That is, besides apps, they also store their own configuration data, making it possible to simply zip the directory and moving it to another computer if needed.