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Is it possible to develop Android apps using only the Android SDK, without any IDE like Android Studio?

user253751
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Avra Neel
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  • http://developer.android.com/tools/building/building-cmdline.html – Gaël Barbin Mar 26 '15 at 23:19
  • have you tried vs? [FREE community edition](https://www.visualstudio.com/en-us/downloads/download-visual-studio-vs.aspx) ==> [Cross-Platform Development in Visual Studio](https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn771552.aspx) -- i've not tried it; just something you might wish to investigate. – gerryLowry Dec 24 '15 at 22:06
  • it is possible with java sdk, so l guess is possible too for android sdk – vincent thorpe Apr 21 '19 at 21:42
  • Some time has passed since the original question and the most upvoted answer have been posted, e.g. the `android` tool is now obsolete. On another occasion I gave an overview about the current state of things (May 2023) in "Command-Line based Development Environments for Building and Debugging Android Applications" (https://stackoverflow.com/a/76150499/19980636) on desktop systems (Linux, Windows, MacOS) as well as on mobile (Android) in another SO thread on "How to make an Android app without using Android Studio". – Krokomot May 03 '23 at 10:26

4 Answers4

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Yes, see the Google SDK documentation.

However, with the current toolchain and documentation it'll be an uphill struggle. I'm trying to do this too (for a dev who lives in Vim and Unix tools, Android Studio is needlessly slow and bloated).

The main issues I've found so far:

  1. The SDK documentation gives instructions to create an Ant-driven project, but the SDK is now geared towards using Gradle. If you're working through the Google documentation in a linear fashion, you'll find subsequent lessons have you issue Gradle build instructions. For your Ant-built project.

  2. There is very little documentation on how to actually create a Gradle-built project from the command line. The command line I use is:

    android create project --target android-22 --name MyProjectName --path my_project/ --activity MyProject --package com.example.android.myproject --gradle --gradle-version 1.2.2

    The --gradle-version actually refers to the Gradle Android plugin version, not the version of Gradle itself. Finding this out wasn't easy.

  3. Even if you get it to create a project properly, it probably won't build without further manipulation. One of the generated files (project/build.gradle) has an invalid directive name (runProguard - I'm guessing it's now deprecated). That must be changed to minifyEnabled before the project will build. And using the Gradle plugin 1.2.2, the file project/gradle/wrapper/gradle-wrapper.properties has the Gradle distribution incorrectly listed as gradle-1.2.2-all.zip. This should be gradle-2.2.1-all.zip.

    These are files generated by the SDK with errors.

  4. The documentation is focussed on IDE-based development. Once you get past the initial few pages on creating and managing a project using the command line, it's very IDE-focussed.

    Instructions on things like changing an app Theme are difficult or impossible to follow as they omit steps that the IDE performs for you.

In general, fully IDE-less development for Android (at least in Java, using the official SDK) is very painful. And my personal opinion is that IDE-based development is equally painful (slow, bloated, ugly on high-DPI screens under Linux and evidently full of magic that's a pain to replicate on the command line).

Edit: I should add that the above refers to using SDK tools v24.2, SDK Platform-tools v22, SDK Build-tools v22.01 and Android API 22 (5.1.1).

Dave B
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    You still need an IDE to design the UI part. Yes of course, you can use design UI in XML, but you still need a preview how it looks like. Java based IDEs are heavy and slow, but you still are better of using a Vi plugin like Vrapper for Eclipse or IdeaVim for Android Studio. – AndaluZ Mar 23 '16 at 10:50
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    PLEASE for all of us following your intrepid footsteps, write a blog of your journey into the black and green. – baash05 Feb 26 '17 at 08:29
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    @AndaluZ, you don't need to load a full integrated environment for just one UI editor. – Yuri Syro Jan 11 '18 at 10:37
  • Some time has passed, e.g. the `android` tool has become obsolete. So I tried to give an overview about the current, year 2023, state of things. It can be found in a post in another SO thread on "How to make an Android app without using Android Studio" -- https://stackoverflow.com/a/76150499/19980636 – Krokomot May 03 '23 at 10:10
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Writing an Android app on Notepad is what I do on my Windows Laptop.

First you configure your laptop as follows:

  1. Download development Kits: Download a Java Development Kit 1.6 for Windows and an Android Development Kit . Similarly try downloading older version of Android kit GUI version of Kit Manager so that you can download essentials. Using kit Manager download Android-23 platform build tools. Android Studio may have slower performance, so try to avoid it.

  2. Configure Kits: Set Windows PATH variable by right clicking My Computer -> Properties -> Advanced System Settings or change the appropriate settings in your Control Panel. PATH should include the Java's compiler executable file in Java directory, and the android.bat file of Android Kit.

  3. Download Build-Tool: (recommended, but Ant can be used too.) These programs configure the command-line tools for easy usage for our convenience. I downloaded version 2.2.1 as it can use old Java & old Android.

I've also written about these instructions on my GitHub Page.

Laurel
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Animesh Shrivastav
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For the development of Android apps one doesn't even need a PC, and not even the Android SDK. One can develop them completely on a mobile Android device, so an emulator isn't necessary either.

For that one needs to the app Termux on the device, and the toolchain script apkbuilder, which stitches together all APK building programs that come with the Termux packages aapt, apksigner, clang, cmake, d8, ecj and unzip, including the OpenJDK.

Edit: Some time has passed since the original question and the most upvoted answer have been posted, e.g. the android tool is now obsolete. On another occasion I gave an overview about the current state of things (May 2023) in Command-Line based Development Environments for Building and Debugging Android Applications on desktop systems (Linux, Windows, MacOS) as well as on mobile (Android) in another SO thread on "How to make an Android app without using Android Studio".

Krokomot
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0

For android the basic debugging environments are: ADB DDMS Java Debugger

You can try with them. More details are here : http://developer.android.com/tools/debugging/debugging-projects-cmdline.html

MaxGreen
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