Recently, I switched my projects, to Android Studio.
Two years ago when Google announced the new IDE, I was skeptic: android studio was buggy and gradle a new complicated tool to learn.
Today I'm an happy user of android studio.
In this tutorial, I will talk about my experience with gradle and some useful customization I made on the build process of my app, called Qoffee.
The problem
Qoffee is available on Play Store and Amazon App Store and allows users to find the best coffee in town.
One of the last features I added, it was the support for Android Wear: now it is possible to search coffees from the smartwatch!
With the new features:
- the new apk is passed from 1.2 mb to 3.9 mb
- the new apk contains also the apk to install into the smartwatch
- there is a new Service, precisely a WearableListenerService. This service is the one that talks with the watch.
New classes/features were not useful on the apk for other app store (eg. amazon).
In the new solution, it is now possible to automatically build 2 separate apk:
- one for play store: with all the features (size: 3.9 mb)
- one for other store: without android wear and google play services support (size: 1.2 mb)
Remove unused files: Separate the Code and merge manifests
I searched a way to create 2 different builds for my app, in order to create a custom Manifest and to remove the WearableListenerService from the non-play store apk.
In the src folder of my project on android studio I created 2 new “Java Folder”:
- playstore
- genericstore
 |
| Create a new Java Folder |
 |
| New project tree |
The original folder for my project was called “main”.
I created 2 other AndroidManifest.xml files, and placed them in the new folder playstore and genericstore like this:
- AndroidManifest.xml in main folder contains common data for both apk: eg. all the common activities
- AndroidManifest.xml in playstore folder contains only informations specific to the play store apk: eg. reference to the WearableServices class, keys for playstore services
- AndroidManifest.xml in genericstore folder contains information for non-playstore apk: mainly, empty
See the differences in the following image:
 |
| Differences between Manifest |
android {
compileSdkVersion 20
buildToolsVersion '20.0.0'
productFlavors {
playstore{
applicationId "com.andrea.degaetano.coffelover.playstore"
}
genericstore{
applicationId "com.andrea.degaetano.coffelover.genericstore"
}
}
… … (other unchanged configurations here..)
}
The new build.gradle file generated 4 new “Build Variants” in Android Studio.
This new menu allows the developer to select which kind of build generate:
 |
| All my modules.. and the selected variant |
 | |
| you can change the selected variant on any module |
Not only, but the genericstore apk is always 3.9mb.
In order to remove the dependency from android wear in the generic apk, I have changed the dependencies of my application from:
dependencies {
compile project(':parseLoginUI')
compile 'com.android.support:support-v4:20.0.0'
compile 'com.google.android.gms:play-services-wearable:7.5.0'
compile 'com.android.support:appcompat-v7:20.0.0'
compile files('libs/android-async-http-1.4.6.jar')
WearApp project(':qoffeewear')
}
to
dependencies {
compile project(':parseLoginUI')
compile 'com.android.support:support-v4:20.0.0'
playstoreCompile 'com.google.android.gms:play-services-wearable:7.5.0'
compile 'com.android.support:appcompat-v7:20.0.0'
compile files('libs/android-async-http-1.4.6.jar')
playstoreWearApp project(':qoffeewear')
}
Important: The package of the android wear app is the same of the playstore variant: com.andrea.degaetano.coffelover.playstore
