Apache Cordova development environment install on Ubuntu

Apache Cordova has very nice documentation, however as so many projects it is focused on the Windows/MacOS duopolies only. Fortunately it’s not too hard to work out the differences.

Installing dependencies

Thanks to: https://github.com/joyent/node/wiki/Installing-Node.js-via-package-manager

sudo apt-get install python-software-properties python g++ make ant openjdk-7-jre openjdk-7-jdk

Installing Android SDK

Please note: one of the problems I found was that I had some Android tools from the Ubuntu repos that were conflicting with the SDK install. It’s probably a good idea to remove them first. That might save you from a lot of headaches down the line (and time to troubleshoot).

sudo apt-get remove android-tools-adb android-tools-fastboot

Download as per http://developer.android.com/sdk/index.html

wget http://dl.google.com/android/android-sdk_r22.6.2-linux.tgz

Note: check for updated link version obviously

vim ~/.bashrc

Add the PATH variables to the top of the file

#AndroidDev PATH
export PATH=${PATH}:~/android-sdk-linux/tools
export PATH=${PATH}:~/android-sdk-linux/platform-tools

Reload bash variables without reboot / logout

source ~/.bashrc

Testing SDK

android

This command should now bring up the SDK manager.

Installing Eclipse IDE

This is obviously an optional step depending on the IDE you want to use. I have previously covered a manual Eclipse install (as opposed to the Ubuntu repositories).

Install Eclipse ADT Plugin

As per: http://developer.android.com/sdk/installing/installing-adt.html

Node.js Install

The main difficulty on Ubuntu (as with so many development tools – see Eclipse above) is that the included node.js version in the Ubuntu repositories is outdated (remove the Ubuntu version with ‘sudo apt-get remove node’).

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:chris-lea/node.js
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install python-software-properties python g++ make nodejs

Install Cordova

sudo npm install -g cordova

Check Cordova Requirements

This will check for Android SDK installation, Ant and other dependencies – saving you going through error messages later.

~/.cordova/lib/android/cordova/3.4.0/bin/check_reqs

Create Cordova Project

mkdir ~/projects/PROJECTNAME
cd ~/projects/PROJECTNAME
cordova create ~/projects/PROJECTNAME com.COMPANYNAME.PROJECTNAME PROJECTNAME
cordova -d platform add android
cordova build

Create Eclipse Project

Open Eclipse
Create New Android project from existing sources
Import ~/projects/PROJECTNAME/platforms/android
Test in emulator by right clicking the project and selecting “Run As –> Android App”