Several years ago I was doing some Android development. One of the things I appreciated the most about Android was the relative simplicity of being able to install apps to a device, unlike iOS which requires jumping through numerous hoops (although it is getting better with Xcode 9).
As a refresher for myself (and good documentation in the case I need to repeat these steps sometime in the future), here are the steps to take to install an APK app bundle onto an Android device.
- Install the platform tools (such as
adb). Download the platform tools from Google's website. - Unzip the downloaded file.
- On the Mac, copy any wanted utilities to the
/usr/local/binfolder (create the folder if necessary). For this purpose,adbneeds to be copied over. - On an Android device, make sure the Developer mode is enabled. If not, go to Settings > About Phone/Tablet, then tap on the Build Number seven times to enable the Developer mode (otherwise,
adbwon't be able to see the device). - Verify that the device is visible with the command:
adb devices - To install the apk file onto the device:
adb install -r path/to/apk_file - If needed, uninstall the app with the command:
adb uninstall com.example.appname