Android Needs A Simulator, Not An Emulator
jakewharton.com
Android Needs A Simulator, Not An Emulator
1–10 of 46 posts
Re: Android Needs A Simulator, Not An Emulator
#2The only thing I'd like is maybe a gradle build for ADT. I like my workflow I just hate placing required android libs on the path by hand, so time consuming. I only test on devices so the emulator thing to me is really a non issue.
That said, I would love a "simulator" since it would probably mean that Google has wrapped the JDK with an Android interface which frees me from having to every use Swing/SWT/any other java gui toolkit here ever again.
Re: Android Needs A Simulator, Not An Emulator
#3The only thing I'd like is maybe a gradle build for ADT. I like my workflow I just hate placing required android libs on the path by hand, so time consuming. I only test on devices so the emulator thing to me is really a non issue. That said, I would love a "simulator" since it would probably mean that Google has wrapped the JDK with an Android interface which frees me from having to every use Swing/SWT/ any other ja…
Are you doing your integration and instrumentation tests on actual devices as well?
Re: Android Needs A Simulator, Not An Emulator
#4For a bit of history, once upon a time Android did have one of sorts. You can still see sprinklings are references to it in AOSP but I think the simulator lunch target has been removed. It was from the early early days and allowed them run to run parts of it on the desktop. You can see some of the reasoning on why they preferred the QEMU solution here: https://groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/android-porting/fLObl9...
I guess I don't see the point of a simulator either. If the performance is that bad, why not just use hardware?
Re: Android Needs A Simulator, Not An Emulator
#5Have you guys heard of GennyMotion?
It's way faster than the actual Android Emulator.
My Professor for my Android Class in college recommended it to use for debugging for our assignments if we didn't have an Android Device.
Re: Android Needs A Simulator, Not An Emulator
#6I wonder if an Android device as a service would work. No, I don't mean loaning devices. I mean by the hour remote control of an Android device you can take over. Your end looks like the simulator, my end is a farm of Android devices which get a factory reset between every client connecting. You reserve it for as long as you want, or just do one-off testing.
Edit: I suppose I should ask a more concrete question: would you pay for a service like this? If not, what would you use instead?
Re: Android Needs A Simulator, Not An Emulator
#7For a bit of history, once upon a time Android did have one of sorts. You can still see sprinklings are references to it in AOSP but I think the simulator lunch target has been removed. It was from the early early days and allowed them run to run parts of it on the desktop. You can see some of the reasoning on why they preferred the QEMU solution here: https://groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/android-porting/fLObl9... I…
The point of a simulator is it drives deployment time to zero and increases the number of virtual devices on which you can run without adding a new AVD for each. Deploying to a phone takes maybe 40-60 seconds? Maybe less? But I'm not a very patient person. At 60 seconds per deploy, if I make a tiny tweak and then have to wait a full minute for feedback on how it feels, it has become a slow and arduous process to develop. If I deploy to device and immediately discover a null-pointer exception, then that's 120 seconds of my day gone. The amount of time is even longer for an emulator, where it can be as long as five or ten minutes.
Re: Android Needs A Simulator, Not An Emulator
#8I wonder if an Android device as a service would work. No, I don't mean loaning devices. I mean by the hour remote control of an Android device you can take over. Your end looks like the simulator, my end is a farm of Android devices which get a factory reset between every client connecting. You reserve it for as long as you want, or just do one-off testing. Edit: I suppose I should ask a more concrete question: woul…
How would you avoid/handle abuses like using it as a proxy to access extremely illegal things?
Re: Android Needs A Simulator, Not An Emulator
#9I wonder if an Android device as a service would work. No, I don't mean loaning devices. I mean by the hour remote control of an Android device you can take over. Your end looks like the simulator, my end is a farm of Android devices which get a factory reset between every client connecting. You reserve it for as long as you want, or just do one-off testing. Edit: I suppose I should ask a more concrete question: woul…
How would you avoid/handle abuses like using it as a proxy to access extremely illegal things?
How does AWS do that with their remote desktop in the cloud service? If you use this service, I have your name and credit card number.
Re: Android Needs A Simulator, Not An Emulator
#10Have you guys heard of GennyMotion? It's way faster than the actual Android Emulator. My Professor for my Android Class in college recommended it to use for debugging for our assignments if we didn't have an Android Device. http://www.genymotion.com/
Genymotion is the way to go. Google's emulator plain sucks.