Build Android Apps using LDC in a Container

Using Docker it is easy to create Android Applications. Although this page shows you how to create Android Apps on a Windows system, it also works for Linux and Mac operation systems. You have to adapt the directory paths according to your operation system. You need to have following software installed on your host operation system:

- Docker (Docker for Windows)

You have to share your C drive in Docker settings.

- Java Development Kit (JDK)

- Android SDK [1]

Create an environment variable SDK which points to the installation/extraction directory of the Android SDK. Also either create a virtual Android device or connect your mobile device.

- Ant [2]

Add the ...\ant\bin\ path to your PATH environment variable

1. Clone Android Headers / Demos

Clone the repository https://github.com/joakim-noah/android into folder c:\D\projects.

git clone https://github.com/joakim-noah/android

2. Start docker

This command will pull the image andre2007/ldc-android from the docker hub and starts a shell within the container. Also the path c:\D\projects will be mounted as \projects.

docker run --rm -it -v c:/D/projects:/projects andre2007/ldc-android sh

3. Compile the demo (Within container)

Within the container shell execute following commands:

cd /projects/android/samples/native-activity/

ldc2 -I../../ -c jni/main.d

ldc2 -I../../ -c ../../android/sensor.d

ldc2 -I../../ -c ../../android_native_app_glue.d

mkdir -p libs/armeabi-v7a/

$NDK/toolchains/llvm/prebuilt/linux-x86_64/bin/clang -Wl,-soname,libnative-activity.so -shared --sysroot=$NDK/platforms/android-9/arch-arm main.o sensor.o $LDC/lib/libphobos2-ldc.a $LDC/lib/libdruntime-ldc.a android_native_app_glue.o -lgcc -gcc-toolchain $NDK/toolchains/arm-linux-androideabi-4.9/prebuilt/linux-x86_64 -no-canonical-prefixes -fuse-ld=bfd -target armv7-none-linux-androideabi -Wl,--fix-cortex-a8 -Wl,--no-undefined -Wl,-z,noexecstack -Wl,-z,relro -Wl,-z,now -mthumb -L$NDK/platforms/android-9/arch-arm/usr/lib -llog -landroid -lEGL -lGLESv1_CM -lc -lm -o libs/armeabi-v7a/libnative-activity.so

exit

4. Build Android APK (Within host operation system)

cd C:\D\projects\android\samples\native-activity

%SDK%\tools\android update project -p . -s --target 1

ant debug