Develop Reference

Android studio missing ARM image for gingerbread and honeycomb?

I want to create a AVD to test my app which uses google APIs in gingerbread 2.3 and honeycomb 3.2,
SO posts said that basically 2 choices exist
x86 image ->faster
ARM v7->slower but most actual devices run it
and the the two images also come with a Google API version which can help test apps using G-Maps etc
I use a Intel 64 bit process with HMAX installed ,vt-x and working fine
For API 21(Lollipop) I created an AVD with googleAPIx86 and x86-system-image and its fine and fast
(cause it seems for the googleAPI image need the corresponding system image should be there,for API 21 I could get both images for x86)
For API 19(Kitkat) also I icreated AVD with googleAPIx86 and x86-system-image and it works
For API 18(Jelly Bean ) the google-api is available only in the ARM version, so i cannot use the x86 system image even though it is faster , so i created AVD with google-api(ARM version) and corresponding ARM-system-image
For API 15(Icecream sandwich ) Also the same as API 18 ,Used ARM for both
The problem now is
For API 13(Honey Comb) and API10(GingerbBread) the Google-API is available only in the ARM Version but the system image is present only in the x86 version.
So is there anyway to run my app using google APIs in these two emeulators ?
(NOTE:AVD Shows error and doesn't if i use a googleAPI-arm with x86system-image)
See screenshot below:
API 10 and 13 have only x86system image but only google-api-ARM

For API 13(Honey Comb) and API10(GingerbBread) the Google-API is available only in the ARM Version but the system image is present only in the x86 version.
ARM images exist for all Android versions. However, it was only starting with API Level 14 were they called out into a separate installable item in the SDK Manager. In prior API levels, the ARM image comes as part of the "SDK Platform" item.

How to get more target platform options for Eclipse AVD?

Using Eclipse, trying to create a new virtual device to test app on older Android versions, but when I go to create a new Android Virtual Device I only get one option - 4.4.2 API Level 19. How do I get other versions to show here? Last night I was a bit tired and tried to if using the SDK Manager to grab 4.0.3 SDK and Google API would work to test on older version, but it seemed to mess up Eclipse as I got an ADT needs update error (which would find no updates). So starting back from scratch and figured I'd ask instead of trial and error. Thanks!

Open the Android SD Manager, check Show: Updates/New
Select SDK Platform and ARM EABI v7a System Image (also Google APIs if you are unsing them) for all Versions you want to test and download them. You need the source of the Android-Version to create an AVD for it.
Updating your Android SDK build-tools and Android SDK Platform-tools is always recommanded because newer Android versions need a newer build tool setup.

Test app with android system image

I have downloaded Android 4.4 (KITKAT). There is an android-19 system image in folder called system-images in android installed location in my pc.
I need to use this Android 4.4 system image to test my app on the Android emulator.
How can I use this ? How can I create an AVD using this ?

Finally I am able to run AVD with android-19.
Previously I was edit the existing AVD and changed Target to Android 4.4 - API Level 19. It's not loaded the AVD.
Now I created a new AVD with Target Android 4.4 - API Level 19. It takes a few minutes to display the android kitkat home screen. But it worked as charm.

Android 2.3 API is not available as a target option for AVD

I am new to android development, and I am trying to create an AVD for testing an app before pushing it to my phone (htc desire running android 2.3.5).
I am using the ADT bundle, and with SDK manager I have downloaded these:
4.2.2 (API 17)
4.1.2 (API 16)
2.3.3 (API 10)
2.2 (API 8)
But when trying to select target of the AVD, the only available options are API 17,16 and 8.
What is wrong?
Update:
I've already tried deleting and redownloading the API and it shows up in the android-sdk/platforms dir.

Restart eclipse after install packages i also have same problem and after restart eclipse i got all api levels in drop down list

I had the same problem because I had downloaded the sdk twice and my SDK manager kept updating first SDK while my IDE was working with the other one. SO check the preferences of your IDE and see if it points to the correct one. (in Eclipse go to windows> preferences> SDK location)

For Android 2.3.3, there will be three entries of relevance in the SDK Manager:
"SDK Platform", which for older API levels like 10 will contain the ARM emulator image
"Google APIs", which will contain an emulator image that has Google Maps in it
"Intel Atom x86 System Image", which will contain an emulator image that runs x86 opcodes instead of ARM opcodes (and, with the proper setup of your development machine, can run the emulator much faster)
If you install one or more of these, you should get API Level 10 appearing an an option for setting up an AVD.
If that does not work, you might consider editing your question and posting screenshots of your SDK Manager (specifically the 2.3.3 portion) and the AVD Manager (specifically your drop-down of available API levels).

Try updating the 2.3.3 API.
And you can also try to use BlueStacks if you wish to first test your app before trying it on your device.

Delete that api from SDK Manager and download it again.

Android -- selecting API from SDK Manager

I have downloaded the Android SDK(which i think has no version, it is standard). After installing Android SDK, Android SDK Manager comes which by default selects 3 things to be downloaded (1)Android SDK tools(2)Android 4.0.3 (API 15) and the things under it like documentation, samples etc (3)Google USB driver But at present i am having book on Android 3, so should i deselect the second option i.e. Android 4.0.3 (API 15) and select all things under Android 3.0 (API 11) or keeping Android 4.0.3 will be OK for Android 3.I know there are tutorials for Android 4.0.3 on Web so why should i go for Android 3 because i find it easy through books and i got Android 3 here in my place and still no Android 4. So what should i do?

You can install everything. I would recommend to install the API level you want to develop for. But it doesn't hurt (but wastes disk space) to install everything.
Sidenote: Android 3.0 is for tablets, 2.x for older and 4.x for the latest Android Smartphone devices.

You should select the API level that you will target. For example, I am writing an application for API level 7 (Android 2.1.x), so I've got that version installed on my machine. Of course, you can have more than one API level installed, so it is safe to install any combination (for example 3.0.x and 4.0.4 simultaneously - see last paragraph for the reason).
Once you've got a few API levels installed, Eclipse will allow you to change the target API for your project to any of the versions you have installed. The same applies for the command-line project creation.
There is actually one good use-case for installing a version newer than the one you are targeting in addition to the one you use: testing. You can create an emulation environment for a newer version of the API to ensure that your application does not crash and burn when the API levels do not match. If we were to extend my above example, a sensible set of levels to install is 3.0.x, 3.2, and 4.0.4. You can target the initial release of Honeycomb (unless you need anything from the later versions), and test with both the latest Honeycomb and Ice Cream Sandwitch.