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Highlights

The Android Manifest Validator‘s primary use is to be invoked as a post-build step to help ensure that user-defined rules regarding the manifest of APK files are maintained. A database of particular devices can also be collected and validated against to ensure that the app will show up on the Play store.

Usage: AndManVal <subcmd> [cmd opts]

Valid subcommands

makeconfigs — make config .txt files from any attached devices
addconfigs — pull config files from local directory into database file used by this utility
validate [-r <filename>] [–no-device-validation] [–no-rules] : validate listed apks against the database. Files may be specified as input, but if none are, the local directory is searched for *.apk files

Options:

-r <filename> — validate following listed apks vs the rules in the file named filename
–no-device-validation — skip “device database” validation
–no-rules — skip rules validation

OS process exit/return value: 0 if no errors, 1 if errors

Dependencies: This tool depends on adb and aapt from the Android SDK.

If the command is executed with no parameters, the tool print the command help and then perform all of the sub commands in the order shown above.

The validation step checks each APK found or specified explicitly as follows:

against all devices in the database to help ensure that the apk(s) will show up in Google Play searches.
valid lines in the rules.txt file will also be checked.

The configuration file must be called rules.txt or referenced using the -r flag.

An example of the format is shown here:

# each line of this file can consist of:
# - a blank line
# - a comment line starting with #
# - a rule
#
# rules consist of an action, a key and an optional value
#
# values are only used for the keys supports-screens and supports-any-density
# allowed values:
#    supports-any density can have the value true or false
#    supports-screens can have any one value defined by Android { 'small' 'medium' 'large' 'xlarge' }
#    NOTE: multiple statements are required to test for inclusion of all values
#
# valid actions:
# - require
#   - require will cause an error to be emitted if the corresponding key is not in the manifest
# - exclude
#   - exclude will cause an error to be emitted if the corresponding key is in the manifest
# - want
#   - want will emit a warning if the key is not in the manifest
# - want!
#   - want! will emit a warning if the key is in the manifest
#
# sample content:
#
#require   android.hardware.bluetooth            # must have this
#exclude   android.hardware.microphone           # must not have this
#want      android.hardware.nfc                  # warn if this is in the manifest
#want!     android.hardware.faketouch            # warn if no faketouch
#
#suggested settings for supports-screens and supports-any-density:
#require   supports-any-density          true
#require   supports-screens              small
#require   supports-screens              medium
#require   supports-screens              large
#require   supports-screens              xlarge