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Prepare to test Android devices

Prerequisites

Make sure you have performed the Base Setup

Download Required Tools

For running automated tests on a real physical device we need the following :

platform-tools
  • These are essential for interacting with Android devices and emulators during testing
  • The important tool here is adb (Android Debug Bridge), which allows you to install/uninstall apps, access logs, and perform other device-related tasks
build-tools
  • While not directly related to Appium, build-tools are crucial for compiling and packaging your app
  • They handle tasks like generating APKs, creating DEX files, and managing resources
cmdline-tools
  • These command-line utilities are useful for managing SDK packages and other tasks

In case we need to run on emulators will need additional tools :

  • platforms

  • emulator

  • skins

Android SDK

The easiest way to set up the Android SDK requirements is by downloading Android Studio.

We need to use its SDK manager (Settings Languages & Frameworks Android SDK) to download the following items:

  • Android SDK Platform (select whichever Android platform we want to automate, for example, API level 30)
  • Android SDK Platform-Tools

If you wish, you can also download these items without Android Studio:

Setting up ANDROID_HOME

Windows
  • Set path for the Android SDK folder (the folder containing the cmdline-tools folder) in an environment variable ANDROID_HOME
  • Also add the path until bin folder in the PATH system variable as %ANDROID_HOME%/bin
  • Run appium-doctor --android to check
Mac OS

Add the ANDROID_HOME in .bash_profile (for old MACs) or in .zshrc or .zprofile (for new MACs)

export ANDROID_HOME=$HOME/Library/Android/sdk

Additionally make sure that the following folders are added to the PATH variable

export PATH=$PATH:$ANDROID_HOME/platform-tools
export PATH=$PATH:$ANDROID_HOME/cmdline-tools
export PATH=$PATH:$ANDROID_HOME/cmdline-tools/latest/bin
export PATH=$PATH:$ANDROID_HOME/build-tools
export PATH=$PATH:$ANDROID_HOME/platforms
export PATH=$PATH:$ANDROID_HOME/emulator

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