Thanks to all the response we received to our request for beta testers, we’re excited to release our latest update of the HipChat Android app to Google Play.

Some major features included in the update:

• Improved connection handling (and detection of disconnects)
• Loading previous chat history
• Hiding archived rooms in the Lobby
• Lobby search
• Support for s/// replacement

We hope that the update solves many of the issues reported by our users running the Android app. Give it a try! If you have any feedback, please let us know at support@hipchat.com

Since we released the Android app a few months ago back in June, we’ve heard both good and bad things from our users. After going through feedback (and a whole lot of crash reports), we’ve pushed out an update which we hope fixes the most flagrant issues people complained about. A quick list of the top fixes:

• Improved detection of connectivity (this should help avoid the “forever loading” chats that many people reported)
• Fixed a crashing issue when coming from a notification
• Various fixes to avoid crashes when opening the app and signing in
• Messages will now display instantly instead of waiting for a server response. Unconfirmed messages will be indicated by a warning symbol.

The update is live on the Android Market now: https://market.android.com/details?id=com.hipchat&hl=en – try it out and let us know what you think. We still have lots of improvements we want to make and user feedback helps us figure out what is most important.

Today we’re announcing the release of our native Android app. A big thanks goes out our beta testers and customers who have been waiting patiently and not-so-patiently. The app is free and available in the Android Market. Note to all beta testers: Uninstall the current app before installing the real version.

The app has everything you’d expect:

• Group chat and 1-to-1 messaging
• Inline previews for images, Twitter, and YouTube, etc.
• Receive push notifications for 1-to-1 chats, room invites, and when you’re mentioned in a room
• A launch icon that follows Google’s strict guidelines despite the fact that most of their own icons do not.

If you have any bugs or feedback please contact us.

We also added a new emoticon: (android) . Happy chatting!

One of the main projects we’re working on these days is our Android app. We know a lot of you have requested it (especially after the release of the iOS app) and we’ve made some pretty good progress on it over the past few weeks. We wanted to announce that it’s now available for beta testing!

The app can be downloaded from http://downloads.hipchat.com/android-beta/hipchat_dev.apk and installed directly to your phone. The app includes C2DM notifications, which requires a phone with at least version 2.2 of the OS (Froyo). It also includes some automatic crash reporting built in, which should trigger a notification if your app stops unexpectedly.

Most of the functionality for our first version is implemented, save a few minor things. Please give it a download and see what you think. If you encounter any problems, please let us know by emailing us at support@hipchat.com. Development is progressing pretty quickly and we plan to have a relatively short beta for the app, so barring any major roadblocks, you should be able to download the official app from the Market fairly soon.

Thanks! We look forward to hearing your feedback.

UPDATE: The app is now on the Market! (v. 1.0.6) – Please uninstall the beta app before installing the app from the Market