Gboard update and Private Space apps

mythodical

I updated Gboard this morning to take advantage of the new comma key toggle, and I'm left wondering how app updates are managed between Owner and Private Space.

I use Google Play Services and Store on my Owner profile, but not in Private Space. I installed Gboard to the owner profile, and have also copied it to Private Space, using Settings > Security & privacy > Private space > Install available apps. I assumed that updating the app under the Owner profile would also update the app under Private Space.

Gboard displays the new comma options under the Owner profile's app settings, but not under the Private Space's app settings. I've removed/reinstalled Gboard under Private Space, force quit and restarted the Private Space instance of Gboard, and cleared its cache and storage, and rebooted the device, but the new options are still missing under the Private Space instance.

Can anyone explain what's going on here? Could the latest update features somehow be part of a Play-only update?

Delaney

mythodical Some Google apps use Play Services to download features that are not bundled with the app. I know that Google Photos has a lot of photo/video editing features that are locked until it can download the features via Play Services. This is likely the same scenario with Gboard.

mythodical It has me wondering if Google is taking further steps to make Play Services a hard dependency for their apps, similar to the recent Google Camera app changes.

Maybe. I think it's more likely they did it this way for convenience purposes.

mythodical

Just to clarify, both apps are of course the same version (16.2.4.815623744) but the app instance under Private Space, which does not have Google Play Services installed, does not display the newly updated options.

It has me wondering if Google is taking further steps to make Play Services a hard dependency for their apps, similar to the recent Google Camera app changes.