You can use an android emulator to help you develop your GDSL tests. It is usefull if you do not have a real device or if you want to test on a device with the same resolution as a device on the Test Bench. Do not use emulator if you want measures, the metrics (energy, data …) are not available.

1. Prerequisite

1.1 Prerequisite to use an android emulator without Greenspector tools

• 16 GB of RAM memory

• Install Android Studio

• Install Java on Linux

# Update the repositories
sudo apt-get update

# Check if Java is already installed
java -version

# Install Java Runtime Environment (JRE) and verify the installation
sudo apt-get install openjdk-8-jre
java -version

# To change the java version used
sudo update-alternatives --config java

• Install Java on Windows:

  • Go to https://www.java.com/fr/download/help/windows_manual_download.html and install the Java executable

  • Click on the Java executable and follow the instructions

  • Add JAVA_HOME to your path / environment variables: Windows start menu > Settings > System > About > Advanced settings > Environment variables > Path > Modify > Add the path C:\Program Files (x86)\Java\jre-1.8

• Install sdkmanager from Android Studio:

  • Open Android Studio

  • Click on More Actions > SDK Manager (or Tools > SDK Manager if a project is open)

  • Click on the SDK Tools tab, uncheck "Hide Obsolete Packages"

  • Check Android SDK Tools and install version 26.1.1

• Add sdkmanager to your path / environment variables:

  • On Linux: add the line export PATH=$HOME/Android/Sdk/tools/bin:$PATH in the .bashrc file and run the command "source ~/.bashrc"

  • On Mac: add the line export PATH=$HOME/Library/Android/sdk/tools/bin:$PATH in the .bash_profile file and run the command "source ~/.bash_profile"

  • On Windows: Windows start menu > Settings > System > About > Advanced settings > Environment variables > Path > Modify > Add the path C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Local\Android\Sdk\tools\bin

• On Windows only, turn vulkan off to be able to load web pages (only if you want to test web pages) :

  • Open Windows start menu

  • Select Notepad

  • Add the following text :

    Code Block
    language bash
    Vulkan = off GLDirectMem = on

  • Click on File > Save as : go to C:\Users\[username]\.android and name the file advancedFeatures.ini

1.2. Prerequisite to use an android emulator with Greenspector tools

• Follow the first part of the prerequisite (part 1.1)

• Add ADB (Android Debug Bridge) to your path / environment variables:

  • On Linux: add the line export PATH=$HOME/Android/Sdk/platform-tools:$PATH in the .bashrc file and run the command "source ~/.bashrc"

  • On Mac: add the line export PATH=$HOME/Library/Android/sdk/platform-tools:$PATH in the .bash_profile file and run the command "source ~/.bash_profile"

  • On Windows: Windows start menu > Settings > System > About > Advanced settings > Environment variables > Path > Modify > Add the path C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Local\Android\Sdk\platform-tools

• Get the testrunner from https://app.greenspector.com/ in the Modules tab, and put it in a folder (for example “testrunner_files”)

• Add in this folder the configuration files config.yml and job.yml, and a script with the testgb extension. An example of these files is available at the following location:

  • configuration files: https://app.greenspector.com/download > Test Runner: Download > “Config - Android” and “Job - Android”

  • testgb file: https://app.greenspector.com/download > GDSL Templates: Download (you can choose between a test file for an Android application, a website, or an iOS application)

• You can find the documentation about the gdsl functions here: https://dsl.greenspector.com/

2. Use an android emulator without Greenspector tools

2.1. Create an emulator

• Open Android Studio

• Click on the three dots button

• Select Virtual Device Manager

If you already have a project open on Android Studio, click on Tools > Device Manager.

• On the Device Manager window, click on “Create Device”

• On the Virtual Device Configuration window, click on “New Hardware Profile”

• Fill in the form with the properties of the device you want to create. In the example below, you can find the properties of the Samsung Galaxy S9. If you want to use an other device, see the next part “Emulators tested”.

Click on “Finish” then on “Next”.

• Select a System Image, for example Android 10.0 (Google APIs). Click on “Next”.

• Check the configuration and click on “Finish”. Be careful, the configuration might be different than the one you chose. Make sure to click on “Show Advanced Settings” and check each property.

• Your device is now created. You can launch it by clicking on the triangle.

2.2. Emulators tested

2.3. Add Google Play Store to a custom emulator

• Open the configuration file of your emulator. Replace [device_id] by the id of your device.

  • On Linux and macOS: $HOME/.android/avd/[device_id]/config.ini

  • On Windows: C:\Users\[username]\.android\avd\[device_id]\config.ini

• Make the following changes:

  • PlayStore.enabled: change from “false” to “true”

  • image.sysdir.1: change “google_apis” to “google_apis_playstore”

  • tag.display: change “Google APIs” to “Google Play”

  • tag.id: change “google_apis” to “google_apis_playstore”

• Save your changes

• On the Device Manager window, select the three dots button and click on “Wipe Data”. It will load the new configuration.

• We expect the following error message:

• Install the system image with Google Play Store:

# For Android 10.0
sdkmanager --install "system-images;android-29;google_apis_playstore;x86"
# For Android 11.0
sdkmanager --install "system-images;android-30;google_apis_playstore;x86"
# For Android 13.0
sdkmanager --install "system-images;android-33;google_apis_playstore;x86_64"

• On the Device Manager window, select the three dots button and click on “Wipe Data”. It will load the new configuration. Then, you can launch the device with Google Play Store.

2.4. Update Google Play Store and Google Chrome

• Start the emulator

• Open Google Play Store

• Sign in with your account

• Click on your profile at the top right of the emulator screen

• Click on Settings > About > Update Play Store

• Wait for the update to complete. It takes several minutes.

• If you want to test a website, search for the Google Chrome app and update it

2.5. Start an emulator from the command line (optional)

• On Linux: Update ~/.bashrc or ~/.zshrc

# For newer version of Android SDK
export PATH=$HOME/Android/Sdk/emulator:$PATH

# For older version of Android SDK
export PATH=$HOME/Android/Sdk/tools:$PATH

• On macOS: Update ~/.bashrc or ~/.bash_profile

export PATH=$HOME/Library/Android/Sdk/emulator:$PATH

• On Windows:

  • Windows start menu > Settings > System > System Information > Advanced system settings

  • Add “C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Local\Android\Sdk\emulator” to your PATH environment variables

• To see the list of emulators

emulator -list-avds

• To start en emulator

emulator -avd [avd_name]

3. Use an android emulator with Greenspector tools

3.1. Change the job.yml file

job:
  extras:
    config-skipsetupphone: true

To be able to run an application with the applicationStart gdsl function, there are 2 choices :

• Install the app manually through the Play Store application

• In the job.yml file, add an url field with the name of the application package. Example :

job:
   url: com.google.android.youtube

In the second case, it installs the app at the beginning of the test and uninstalls it at the end.

3.2. Change the config.yml file

target:
  connection: usb
  serial: xxxx

The target.serial field corresponds to the emulator id. You can find it by running “adb devices”.

3.3. Run the testrunner

• Launch an android emulator

  • Option 1: open the Device Manager window of Android Studio and click on the triangle

  • Option 2: start an emulator from the command line (part 2.5)

• If you run the testrunner for the first time, you have to run it once without the --no-update option:

  • On Linux and macOS: ./testrunner -jobFile job.yml -config config.yml

  • On Windows: testrunner -jobFile job.yml -config config.yml

• Download the android-service executable in 32 bits and its version file : https://dl.greenspector.com/emulator/android-service-files.tar.gz

• Go to your greenspector cache:

  • On Linux and macOS: $HOME/.greenspector

  • On Windows: C:\Users\[username]\.greenspector

• Replace the android-service and android-service.version files with the downloaded files. You will have to decompress the tar.gz file.

• You can now run the testrunner with the --no-update option:

  • On Linux and macOS: ./testrunner -jobFile job.yml -config config.yml --no-update

  • On Windows: testrunner -jobFile job.yml -config config.yml --no-update