Android development 101: Preparing your windows environment

This is the first tutorial on Android development! In this tutorial I want to start with setting up the environment for starting with developing in Android. Because the environment setup will require alot of steps I decided to divide it in 2 posts.

What do we need:

• A pc / laptop
• Internet access

Contents:

The "Preparing your environment" posts you will help you setup the following.

• Installing the Java JDK
• Downloading the SDK Starter Package
• Installing the right Ecplise package
• Configuring Eclipse for Android development ( in part 2)
• Install the latest Android SDK's versions ( in part 2)
• Making a Virtual Android device ( in part 2)
• Making a "Hello World" application

Ok lets get started!

Installing the Java JDK

One of the perquisites is the JDK. Click on 1 of the following links to download the JDK

• Download JDK here

After downloading the file, open it and follow the setup instructions to install it. You may have to restart your system to make sure the JDK is loaded correctly.

Downloading the SDK Starter Package

We will need the SDK Starter Package so lets download it. Now install it. If you have no installer, but a zip file. Extract it and remember the location.  On Windows we have to put the location to the Android SDK in the Enviroment variables.  This is how we do that.

• Right click on "Computer"
• Goto properties
• (On Win 7 click on "Advanced system properties")
• Click on the tab "Advanced"
• Click on "Enviroment variables"
• In the bottom half scroll to "PATH"
• Click it and the click the button "Edit"
• Type a semicolon ";" the type in the path to your SDK installation
• after that type "\sdk\tools"

So if your install path is "C:\Program Files\Android" type "C:\Program Files\Android\tools"

Click on OK on all screens . Now lets test if it all went well. Goto start, type cmd ( a command prompt will open ). In the prompt type: android. If configured correct the AVD ( Andoid Virtual Device ) Manager will start.

Installing Ecplise

Download Eclipse and extract the contents.

• Windows 32
• Windows 64

Pff soo must installing ...

After extracting Eclipse, navigate to the folder and open Eclipse by double clicking eclipse.exe

Eclipse will open. O'rly? Y'rly !

So now we have all the needed software to develop Android apps! But.. before we can get to the code we need to configure the pieces so that they work together. In the next post we will add Android to Eclipse + make an AVD. When we have the we can start coding our first tutorial