aricwang88 / gstreamer_android_tutorials

This is a modified version of android tutorials from gst_docs that was tested to work with Android Studio 2.1/ Android Studio 3.0 and Gstreamer Binaries version 1.4.4 in Ubuntu 16.04 LTS

Gstreamer_Android_Tutorials

This is a modified version of android tutorials from gst_docs (Jni and Java) that was tested to work with Android Studio 3.0, NDK 15c and Gstreamer Binaries version 1.12.3 in Ubuntu 16.04 LTS

Pre-requisites

1. Willingness to experiment.
2. Java JRE or JDK.

OS

Tested On Ubuntu 16.04 LTS (but should be OS independent)

Compiled with Android Studio 3.0

Download the files from the following URL

Hosted at:

https://developer.android.com/studio/archive.html

Download and install the Gstreamer binary 1.4.4 (Update - Now also tested with version 1.12.3)

cd /opt
mkdir GST_ANDROID_SDK_1_4_4
cd GST_ANDROID_SDK_1_4_4
wget https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/data/pkg/android/1.4.4/gstreamer-1.0-android-arm-debug-1.4.4.tar.bz2
sudo tar xvf gstreamer-1.0-android-arm-debug-1.4.4.tar.bz2 
sudo ln -sf GST_ANDROID_SDK_1_4_4 GST_ANDROID_SDK

If using Linux open and modify

vim /opt/GST_ANDROID_SDK/share/gst-android/ndk-build/gstreamer-1.0.mk

Modify to the following lines (Make should be aware of sed command's presence)

ifeq ($(HOST_OS),windows)
    HOST_SED := $(GSTREAMER_NDK_BUILD_PATH)/tools/windows/sed
    GSTREAMER_LD :=
else
    HOST_SED := sed
endif

In the same file gstreamer-1.0.mk modify the following

#GSTREAMER_LD                  := -fuse-ld=gold  #<---------- comment out this line

#Add the following line instead
GSTREAMER_LD                  := -fuse-ld=gold -Wl,-soname,lib$(GSTREAMER_ANDROID_MODULE_NAME).so

Then modify to the following

vim /opt/GST_ANDROID_SDK/share/gst-android/ndk-build/gstreamer_android-1.0.c.in

and ensure the line is updated as follows

   __android_log_print (ANDROID_LOG_ERROR, "GStreamer","%s", message);

Installation For Android Studio see.

https://developer.android.com/studio/install.html

SDK, NDK and JRE paths

File > Project Structure > SDK Location

SDK path

/home/<username>/Android/Sdk

JRE path (Assuming jdk1.8.0_92) Note: One may also leave this to default Android Studio's embedded JDK

/usr/local/java/jdk1.8.0_92

NDK path

/home/<username>/Android/Sdk/ndk-bundle

For every Project's local.properties file update the following information (or to appropriate installation directories if not default location)

ndk.dir=/home/<your home directory username>/Android/Sdk/ndk-bundle
sdk.dir=/home/<your home directory username>/Android/Sdk

Settings > Appearance and Behavior > System Settings > Android SDK > SDK Platforms

Check everything from Android 2.3 -> Android N and click Apply

Settings > Appearance and Behavior > System Settings > Android SDK > SDK Tools

Check CMake, Check NDK, Check LLDB (all versions for all 3 packages if allowed) and click Apply.

Add PATH in /etc/bash.bashrc

export GSTREAMER_ROOT_ANDROID=/opt/GST_ANDROID_SDK

Settings > Appearance and Behavior > System Settings > Path Variables

GSTREAMER_ROOT_ANDROID (In the Name Field)  /opt/GST_ANDROID_SDK (In the Value Field)

Update:

Changes to get the examples to work in Android Studio 3.0

Update build.gradle (app) as follows

//def ndkDir = project.plugins.findPlugin('com.android.application').getNdkFolder()
//def ndkDir = plugins.getPlugin('com.android.application').sdkHandler.ndkFolder
def ndkDir = project.android.ndkDirectory

as well as the following lines in build.gradle (app)

 //println(project.plugins.findPlugin('com.android.application').getNdkFolder())
 //println(plugins.getPlugin('com.android.application').sdkHandler.ndkFolder)
 println(project.android.ndkDirectory)

Ensure the following line is present in gradle-wrapper.properties

distributionUrl=https\://services.gradle.org/distributions/gradle-4.1-all.zip

Ensure the following line is present in build.gradle(Project: android-tutorial-)

jcenter()
google() #<--------- Add this to the list of repositories

dependencies {
    classpath 'com.android.tools.build:gradle:3.0.0'
}

Trouble-shooting

One can check error from the project's parent directory using the tool gradlew especially for ndk build files.

./gradlew  tasks app:ndkLibsToJar app:ndkBuild app:assembleDebug --stacktrace

Android Studio caching mechanism is weird. I have tried to always perform "sync" wherever recommended after running the above command. I have also ended up "File > Synchronize" and "File > Invalidate Caches/ Restart" depending on the version of Android Studio.

I have been having trouble with ndk 16 (r16) (jni.h not found) so I reverted to ndk 15 (r15c)

I read the announcements in r16 which I replicate below

    The deprecated headers have been removed. Unified Headers are now simply "The Headers". For migration tips, see Unified Headers Migration Notes.
    
    GCC is no longer supported. It will not be removed from the NDK just yet, but is no longer receiving backports. It cannot be removed until after libc++ has become stable enough to be the default, as some parts of gnustl are still incompatible with Clang. It will be removed when the other STLs are removed in r18.
    
    libc++ is out of beta and is now the preferred STL in the NDK. Starting in r17, libc++ is the default STL for CMake and standalone toolchains. If you manually selected a different STL, we strongly encourage you to move to libc++. For more details, see this blog post.
    
    Support for ARM5 (armeabi), MIPS, and MIPS64 are deprecated. They will no longer build by default with ndk-build, but are still buildable if they are explicitly named, and will be included by "all", "all32", and "all64". Support for each of these has been removed in r17. Both CMake and ndk-build will issue a warning if you target any of these ABIs.

To make it work with r15

I simply did the following steps

First download the ndk 15c

https://developer.android.com/ndk/downloads/older_releases.html#ndk-15c-downloads

cd ~/Android/Sdk
mv ndk-bundle ndk-bundle.orig
mv ~/Downloads/android-ndk-r15c-linux-x86_64.zip .
unzip android-ndk-r15c-linux-x86_64.zip
ln -sf android-ndk-r15c ndk-bundle

Then from the parent directory of the project folder

./gradlew  tasks app:ndkLibsToJar app:ndkBuild app:assembleDebug --stacktrace