Android: What is ProGuard and when do i need to use it?

Question

I've built a news app that gets its contents from the news website using JSON, the app has GCM service (Push Notifications) so i have declared my SENDER-ID in the MainActivity and there is no user accounts. I think the only sensitive info here is the SENDER-ID.

So what exactly is ProGuard ? and do i need to use it in my app ?

(NOTE: I have read the documentations about ProGuard but i didn't quite understand when to use it).

Answer 1

A tool which reduces size of your apk, optimze your code and obfuscates(makes code unclear, so that someone who has your APK can not easily decompile your APK and read the content of your code.

It's not a must to use ProGuard, but it surely helps you, there are several Pros to using it, and all you need to enable it is just to uncomment a single line and you are all set to go.

This is one good article on it