Docker Android Build Box

Introduction

An optimized docker image includes Android, Kotlin, Flutter sdk.

What Is Inside

It includes the following components:

• Ubuntu 18.04
• Android SDKs
  • 25
  • 26
  • 27
  • 28
  • 29
  • 30
• Android build tools:
  • 25.0.0 25.0.1 25.0.2 25.0.3
  • 26.0.0 26.0.1 26.0.2
  • 27.0.1 27.0.2 27.0.3
  • 28.0.1 28.0.2 28.0.3
  • 29.0.2 29.0.3
  • 30.0.0
• Android NDK r21
• Android Emulator
• TestNG
• Python 2, Python 3
• Node.js, npm, React Native
• Ruby, RubyGems
• fastlane
• Kotlin 1.3
• Flutter 1.22.0

Pull Docker Image

The docker image is publicly automated build on Docker Hub based on the Dockerfile in this repo, so there is no hidden stuff in it. To pull the latest docker image:

docker pull mingc/android-build-box:latest

Hint: You can use a tag to a specific stable version, rather than latest of docker image, to avoid breaking your build. e.g. mingc/android-build-box:1.19.0. Checkout Tags (bottom of this page) to see all the available tags.

Usage

Use the image to build an Android project

You can use this docker image to build your Android project with a single docker command:

cd <android project directory>  # change working directory to your project root directory.
docker run --rm -v `pwd`:/project mingc/android-build-box bash -c 'cd /project; ./gradlew build'

Run docker image with interactive bash shell:

docker run -v `pwd`:/project -it mingc/android-build-box bash

Build an Android project with Bitbucket Pipelines

If you have an Android project in a Bitbucket repository and want to use the pipeline feature to build it, you can simply specify this docker image. Here is an example of bitbucket-pipelines.yml:

image: mingc/android-build-box:latest

pipelines:
  default:
    - step:
        caches:
          - gradle
          - gradle-wrapper
          - android-emulator
        script:
          - bash ./gradlew assemble
definitions:
  caches:
    gradle-wrapper: ~/.gradle/wrapper
    android-emulator: $ANDROID_HOME/system-images/android-21

The caches are used to store downloaded dependencies from previous builds, to speed up the next builds.

Build a Flutter project with Github Actions

Here is an example .github/workflows/main.yml to build a Flutter project with this docker image:

name: CI

on: [push]

jobs:
  build:

    runs-on: ubuntu-18.04
    container: mingc/android-build-box:latest

    steps:
    - uses: actions/[email protected]
    - uses: actions/[email protected]
      with:
        path: /root/.gradle/caches
        key: ${{ runner.os }}-gradle-${{ hashFiles('**/*.gradle') }}
        restore-keys: |
          ${{ runner.os }}-gradle-
    - name: Build
      run: |
        echo "Work dir: $(pwd)"
        echo "User: $(whoami)"
        flutter --version
        flutter analyze
        flutter build apk
    - name: Archive apk
      uses: actions/[email protected]
      with:
        name: apk
        path: build/app/outputs/apk
    - name: Test
      run: flutter test
    - name: Clean build to avoid action/cache error
      run: rm -fr build

Run an Android emulator in the Docker build machine

Using guidelines from...

• https://medium.com/@AndreSand/android-emulator-on-docker-container-f20c49b129ef
• https://spin.atomicobject.com/2016/03/10/android-test-script/
• https://paulemtz.blogspot.com/2013/05/android-testing-in-headless-emulator.html

...You can write a script to create and launch an ARM emulator, which can be used for running integration tests or instrumentation tests or unit tests:

#!/bin/bash

# Arm emulators can be quite slow. For this reason it is convenient
# to increase the adb timeout to avoid errors.
export ADB_INSTALL_TIMEOUT=30

# Download an ARM system image to create an ARM emulator.
sdkmanager "system-images;android-16;default;armeabi-v7a"

# Create an ARM AVD emulator, with a 100 MB SD card storage space. Echo "no"
# because it will ask if you want to use a custom hardware profile, and you don't.
# https://medium.com/@AndreSand/android-emulator-on-docker-container-f20c49b129ef
echo "no" | avdmanager create avd \
    -n Android_4.1_API_16 \
    -k "system-images;android-16;default;armeabi-v7a" \
    -c 100M \
    --force

# Launch the emulator in the background
$ANDROID_HOME/emulator/emulator -avd Android_4.1_API_16 -no-skin -no-audio -no-window -no-boot-anim -gpu off &

# Note: You will have to add a suitable time delay, to wait for the emulator to launch.

Note that x86_64 emulators are not currently supported. See Issue #18 for details.

Docker Build Image

If you want to build the docker image by yourself, you can use following command. The image itself is around 5 GB, so check your free disk space before building it.

docker build -t android-build-box .

Tags

You can use a tag to a specific stable version, rather than latest of docker image, to avoid breaking your build. For example mingc/android-build-box:1.19.0

Note: versions 1.0.0 up to 1.17.0 included every single Build Tool version and every Android Platform version available. This generated large Docker images, around 5 GB. Newer versions of android-build-box only include a subset of the newest Android Tools, so the Docker images are smaller.

1.20.0

• Upgrade Flutter to 1.22.0
• Upgrade NDK to r21d

1.19.0

• PR #50: Remove all the "extras" items of local libraries in the Android SDK @ozmium
• Fix #48: Add timezone setting

1.18.0

• Add platform sdk 30 and build build 30.0.0
• PR #47: Remove old Build Tools (versions 24-17), and old Android Platform versions (versions 24-16), and old Google APIs (versions 24-16) @ozmium

1.17.0

• Add build-tools;29.0.3

1.16.0

• Upgrade Flutter to 1.17.1.

1.15.0

• PR #41: Update Dockerfile to install Yarn, fastlane using bundler. @mayankkapoor

1.14.0

• Upgrade NDK to r21.
• Upgrade nodejs to 12.x.

1.13.0

• Upgrade flutter to v1.12.13+hotfix.8.

1.12.0

• Add bundler for fastlane.

1.11.2

• Fix #34: Add android sdk level 29 license.

1.11.1

• Add file, less and tiny-vim

1.11.0

• Upgrade NDK from r19 to r20.

1.10.0

• Upgrade Flutter from 1.2.1 to 1.5.4.

1.9.0

• Upgrade Ubuntu from 17.10 to 18.04.

1.8.0

• Upgrade Flutter from 1.0.0 to 1.2.1.

1.7.0

• Upgrade ndk from 18b to 19.

1.6.0

• Upgrade nodejs from 8.x to 10.x

1.5.1

• Do not send flutter analytics

1.5.0

• Add Flutter 1.0

1.4.0

• Add kotlin 1.3 support.

1.3.0

• PR #21: Update sdk to 28.

1.2.0

• PR #17: Update sdk to 27.
• PR #20: Fix issue #18 Remove pre-installed x86_64 emulator. Explain how to create and launch an ARM emulator.

1.1.2

• Fix License for package not accepted issue

1.1.1

• Fix environment variable concatenation

1.1.0

• Update to latest sdk 25.2.3 and ndk 13b; add build tools 21.1.2 22.0.1 23.0.1 23.0.2 23.0.3 24 24.0.1 24.0.2 24.0.3 25 25.0.1 25.0.2 25.2.3
• nodejs 7.x and react-native support
• fastlane support

1.0.0

• Initial release
• Android SDK 16,17,18,19.20,21,22,23,24
• Android build tool 24.0.2
• Android NDK r13
• extra-android-m2repository
• extra-google-google_play_services
• extra-google-m2repository

Contribution

If you want to enhance this docker image or fix something, feel free to send pull request.

References

• Dockerfile reference
• Best practices for writing Dockerfiles
• Build your own image
• uber android build environment
• Refactoring a Dockerfile for image size
• Label Schema