Monday, January 30, 2012

Downloading Android source code on Windows

Here's the short-short version:
  1. Download and install command line Git client: msysgit.
  2. Download the root Android project using Git.exe (located in /bin folder of msysgit)
    git clone https://android.googlesource.com/platform/manifest
  3. In the target folder you'll find few XML files. Open default.xml. You can see multiple tags . Choose the project you want to download. You need the name attribute of the project. Write the following line to download:
    git clone https://android.googlesource.com/
Example:
To download the most interesting project (IMHO) frameworks/base, the GIT command is:
git clone https://android.googlesource.com/platform/frameworks/base

Projects of interest:
  • packages/apps/XXXX - The project names of the apps that comes bundled with Android (excluding proprietry Google apps such as the Android Market) such as the Gallery, Camera etc.
  • external/XXXX - 3rd party software (ping, bzip, etc).
  • frameworks/base - The sources of the Java system.

1 comment:

Affinity said...

I get it. But can you tell me how can I download version specific code? For example, I want check out camera app for Android 2.2 and Android 4.0 as well.

In that case, what command should I use?

I am currently using the following command and it downloads the source but it does not tell me which version of source code it has downloaded.

git clone https://android.googlesource.com/platform/packages/apps/Camera.git

Can you help me figure out how to download OS version specific source code?

I also checked XML files it downloaded from platform/manifest but still have no idea!

Will appreciate your help.