docs/html/guide/developing/tools/othertools.jd

page.title=Other Tools
@jd:body

<p>The sections below describe other tools that you can use when building 
Android applications. </p>

<p>All of the tools are included in the Android SDK and are accessible from the 
<code>&lt;sdk&gt;/tools/</code> directory.</p>

<h2>Contents</h2>

<dl>
    <dt><a href="#android">android</a></dd>
    <dt><a href="#mksdcard">mksdcard</a></dt>
    <dt><a href="#dx">dx</a></dt>
</dl>

<a name="activitycreator"></a>
<h2 id="android">android</h2>

<p>{@code android} is an important development tool that lets you:</p>

<ul>
  <li>Create, delete, and view Android Virtual Devices (AVDs). See 
  <a href="{@docRoot}guide/developing/tools/avd.html">Android Virtual Devices</a>.</li>
  <li>Create and update Android projects. See
  <a href="{@docRoot}guide/developing/other-ide.html">Developing in Other IDEs</a>.</li>
  <li>Update your Android SDK with new platforms, add-ons, and documentation. See
  <a href="{@docRoot}sdk/adding-components.html">Adding SDK Components</a>.</li>
</ul>

<p>If you develop in Eclipse with the ADT plugin, you can perform
these tasks directly from the IDE. To create
Android projects and AVDs from Eclipse, see <a href="{@docRoot}guide/developing/eclipse-adt.html">Developing
In Eclipse</a>. To update your SDK from Eclipse, see
<a href="{@docRoot}sdk/adding-components.html">Adding SDK Components</a>. 
</p>


<a name="mksdcard"></a>

<h2>mksdcard</h2>

<p>The mksdcard tool lets you quickly create a FAT32 disk image that you can 
load in the emulator, to simulate the presence of an SD card in the device. 
Here is the usage for mksdcard:</p>

<pre>mksdcard [-l label] &lt;size&gt;[K|M] &lt;file&gt;</pre>

<p>The table below lists the available options/arguments</p>

<table>
<tr>
	<th>Argument</th>
	<th>Description</th>
</tr>

<tr>
	<td><code>-l</code></td>
	<td>A volume label for the disk image to create. </td>
</tr>

<tr>
	<td><code>size</code></td>
	<td>An integer that specifies the size (in bytes) of disk image to create. 
You can also specify size in kilobytes or megabytes, by appending a "K" or "M" to 
&lt;size&gt;. For example, <code>1048576K</code>, <code>1024M</code>.</td>
</tr>

<tr>
	<td><code>file</code></td>
	<td>The path/filename of the disk image to create. </td>
</tr>

</table>

<p>Once you have created the disk image file, you can load it in the emulator at 
startup using the emulator's -sdcard option. For more information, see 
<a href="{@docRoot}guide/developing/tools/emulator.html">Android Emulator</a>.</p>

<pre>emulator -sdcard &lt;file&gt;</pre>

<a name="dx"></a>

<h2>dx</h2>

<p>The dx tool lets you generate Android bytecode from .class files. The tool 
converts target files and/or directories to Dalvik executable format (.dex) files, 
so that they can run in the Android environment. It can also dump the class files 
in a human-readable format and run a target unit test. You can get the usage and 
options for this tool by using <code>dx --help</code>.</p>