The context¶

Work on PyLMS has proved that the approach is viable enough to continue.

However, a CLI or a Desktop GUI are not the best to access the information I may store in the tool. Only my phone is (almost) always at reach when a "Lacune Mémorielle Sociale" (aka LMS) hits me.

I need an Android App, but I have never programmed one (I only looked at Android programming quickly many years ago).

Last Monday (today is Friday), I decided to create one, with the following goals and constraints:

• create a UI that demonstrates the feasibility of listing persons and filtering them by inputting text
• use state-of-the-art Android programming
• my phone is the only target
• demonstrate deployment on it
• demonstrate building APKs with Github Actions
• setup minimal quality control (with SonarCloud)
• refactor PyLMS repository to hold both PyLMS and the Android App

Install Android Studio¶

Android Studio (Koala Feature Drop at the moment) is THE IDE for Android Development.

I followed these steps to install it:

1. download from Android Developers (direct link, skips the licence to skip the licence agreement screen)
2. Unpack the .tar.gz to an appropriate location (~/DEV/Android_Studio in my case)

   tar xvfz android-studio-2024.1.2.12-linux.tar.gz
   mv android-studio 2024.1.2.12
   ln -s 2024.1.2.12
   

3. Install i386 libraries because I run a 64-bit version of Linux

   sudo apt-get install libc6:i386 libncurses5:i386 libstdc++6:i386 lib32z1 libbz2-1.0:i386
   

4. Open terminal and launch Android Studio

   ~/DEV/Android_Studio/current/bin/studio.sh
   

5. Do not import previous Android Studio settings

6. Complete the Android Studio Setup Wizard

   • I selected "custom install" but it would not let me install any other SDK than 35
   • I selected ~/DEV/Android_Studio/android as destination

   

   

7. Wizard advised configuring hardware acceleration for the emulator (see Install Emulator Acceleration)

   

8. Create Desktop entry with Tools > Create Desktop Entry...

9. Search Android Studio in Gnome's application hub and add it to favorites

Install Android SDK¶

I checked Settings > About my phone > About software in phone, it runs Android 14.

I need to install Android SDK Platform 34 package for Android 14.0 ("UpsideDownCake") and remove SDK 35.

1. Open Settings with File > Settings and go to Android SDKs
2. Untick Android API 35 and tick Android 14.0 ("UpsideDownCake") with API Level 34

Bootstrap an application¶

Use Android Studio File > New > New Project...:

• select template Empty Activity
• Name: AndroLMS
• Package: fr.javatronic.lms.android

Run on an emulator¶

Create a device¶

1. Open the Device Manager

   

2. Open Create a new Hardware Profile

   

3. Create Galaxy S23 profile

   (S23 data comes from Samsung's skin website (see Use a phone skin))

Install Emulator Acceleration¶

1. Install and run cpu-checker

   $ sudo apt-get install cpu-checker
   $ sudo sudo kvm-ok
   INFO: /dev/kvm exists
   KVM acceleration can be used
   $ sudo apt-get remove cpu-checker
   

2. Install KVM

   sudo apt-get install qemu-kvm libvirt-daemon-system libvirt-clients bridge-utils
   

3. verify with

   $ ~/DEV/Android_Studio/android/sdk/emulator/emulator -accel-check
   INFO    | Storing crashdata in: /tmp/android-lesaint/emu-crash-35.1.20.db, detection is enabled for process: 711988
   accel:
   0
   KVM (version 12) is installed and usable.
   accel
   

Run the app¶

To run the app in Emulator:

1. Make sure the device created earlier is selected
2. Maks sure app is selected
   • app is the name of Gradle submodule that contains the Android App in the Gradle project generated by Android Studio

3. Click on the 'Run' icon

   • if the icon is disabled, make sure the Gradle configuration is synchronized. If so you may be seeing this banner. Click on Sync.

   

4. The emulated device's screen appears in a panel on the right-hand side of the IDE (screenshot of AndroLMS MVP UI, not of the generated application)

Stop the emulator¶

Closing the tab with the device screen is not enough. To make sure the emulator is stopped, go to the Device Manager and click on the square icon.

Use a phone skin¶

A "skin" can be used to better visualize the application's look on the screen with the device's borders around it and the whole shape of the device.

I googled and found a Samsung page where I can download a skin for the S23, with the specification of the S23's screen.

1. Download the skin's zip file from the website to ~/DEV/Android_Studio/android/skin/
2. Unzip it

3. Open the Device Manager and edit the S23 device

   

4. Display advanced settings

   

5. Scroll to the very bottom, tick "Enable device frame" and select the directory where the skin is stored ~/DEV/Android_Studio/android/skin/Galaxy_S23

   

6. Stop the emulator (see Stop the emulator) and run the app again (see Run the app)

   

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