GNU Linux -> Debian -> Setup Android Studio for App development -> WORK IN PROGRESS

15.Jun.2015

This is an unfinished article… it seems like Android Studio is focusing a lot on Windows and not on Linux. (strange enough Android is a Linux operation system)

If you run Android Studio Device Emulation (which you will want to to test your Apps) you will have to unload any other virtualization technology before doing that… (can not run two at once).

This is all pissing me off.

CAN SOMEONE TRY TO SET IT UP INSIDE VMWARE? (thats what i will try next)

Requirements: A Linux host with atleast 30GB of harddisk space on /dev/sda

First of all:

Android Studio seems to be NOT anymore based on ECLIPSE.

but on JetBrain’s IntelliJ IDEA.

Which might make all eclipse-savy Java gurus mourn... just look at Windows 8… it’s not easy getting used to a new GUI. DAMN IT! 😀

Furthermore:

OpenJDK seems to be NOT recommended/tested by Google – they want you to use the “original” Oracle JDK.

I thought about setting this up inside a Linux (!) VirtualBox Machine, but you would have to run KVM-Virtualization inside VirtualBox, which does not work:

“KVM needs VT, because you are in a virtual machine this is not possible to get to. Hence it is not possible to run KVM in virtualbox.”

But you could have KVM inside KVM:

sudo modinfo kvm_intel | grep -i nested; # test if your system is capable of nested-virtualization
parm:           nested:bool

so this could work but was not tested.

Second thought: Maybe it could work inside a Windows VirtualBox! -> NOPE! Also not. (Missing Hardware-Accleration)

If your host is running VirtualBox, you might need shutdown all running VMs and might need disable the driver/kernel-modules temporarily:

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/16168799/android-emulator-and-virtualbox-cannot-run-at-same-time

but it might also work without it… (just shutdown all VMs)

if you try to start a VM while the Android-Device-Emulator is running you get:

so i am curious how this is gonna play out 😀 (oh Gosh! 😀 is there a SIMPLE way to move ALL VirtualboxVMs to KVM? :-D)

or maybe i just keep switching 🙂 (see links at very bottom)

lets go:

1. download android studio into that folder

direct link: https://dl.google.com/dl/android/studio/ide-zips/1.2.2.0/android-studio-ide-141.1980579-linux.zip

2. Install JDK

apt-get update; # update package list

apt-get install openjdk-7-jdk; # install jdk

3. test run: unzip android-studio-ide-141.1980579-linux.zip

unzip unzip android-studio-ide-141.1980579-linux.zip; # unzip the android studio ./android-studio/bin/studio.sh; # try to run studio startup script

now you should get those screens: (where you usually windows-like just hit NEXT) 🙂

http://developer.android.com/tools/devices/emulator.html#vm-linux

aptitude install qemu-kvm libvirt-bin; # setup kvm on debian

Great!

Now Android Studio should run already!

But the Device Emulator is not working properly yet.

Click this icon:

Scroll to the very bottom and check Intel x86 Emulator Acllerator (HAXM)

then hit install 15 packages button on the bottom right… this might take a while (BIG! FILES :-D)

then the “install 15 packages” button might change to a “install 7 packages” button…

hit it again.

AND HAVE 20GB OF HARDDISK AVAILABLE 😀

/home/username/Android# du -hsx * | sort -rh | head -10; # will output the 10 largest folders/files in current directory
20G    Sdk; # this is quiet a lot of harddisk space required

/home/username/Android/Sdk# du -hsx * | sort -rh | head -10; #
19G    system-images
612M    tools
254M    platforms
171M    extras
140M    sources
73M    build-tools
6.5M    platform-tools
920K    add-ons
4.0K    temp
4.0K    SDK Readme.txt

/home/username/Android/Sdk/system-images# du -hsx * | sort -rh | head -10; #
9.9G    android-22
8.5G    android-MNC