{"id":12124,"date":"2010-12-15T12:43:51","date_gmt":"2010-12-15T12:43:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/masabidev.wpengine.com\/news\/experiences-rapidly-porting-j2me-apps-to-android\/"},"modified":"2014-11-25T15:22:02","modified_gmt":"2014-11-25T15:22:02","slug":"experiences-rapidly-porting-j2me-apps-to-android","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.masabi.com\/it\/news\/experiences-rapidly-porting-j2me-apps-to-android\/","title":{"rendered":"Experiences Rapidly Porting J2ME Apps to Android"},"content":{"rendered":"
Masabi has a fully integrated Android app launching early next year, with a UI carefully crafted to fit the current best interface guidelines for the platform, adapting to different device form factors (just as we do with our MIDP apps) and integrating into the OS and other apps using carefully designed intents, content providers etc.
\nWe have always believed in tailoring an app\u2019s UI to the platform, following the expectations of the user rather than seeking a consistent brand experience across devices \u2013 because the user only uses the app on one platform and is entirely geared to understanding how their own phone works. Any app that breaks those conventions risks annoyance by being awkward to use.<\/p>\n

However, with Christmas rapidly approaching, and our BlackBerry and Nokia apps proving extremely popular, we realised it made sense to offer a high quality interim Android app to meet the immediate needs of this rapidly growing user base. <\/p>\n

While it would lack the complete integration of our native Android app launching in a month or so it was essential that the app provide a simple, quick, attractive and above all user friendly means for looking up train times and buying tickets. But how could this be done?<\/p>\n

MicroEmu To The Rescue<\/h2>\n

If you have a working touch-screen app in MIDP, it is remarkably easy these days to get that code running on Android \u2013 it\u2019s by no means a standard \u201cAndroid app\u201d, but it is an app that users can use and as an interim measure that can be very attractive.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

This is achieved using an automated Jar-to-APK conversion tool built into the open source MicroEmu project<\/a>. The steps for a basic conversion go something like this:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Check out the entire microemu project from Subversion: https:\/\/microemu.googlecode.com\/svn\/trunk\/microemulator<\/code><\/li>\n
  2. Build the entire microemu project using Maven \u2013 for me, this worked from the command line (default target \u2013 so just type \u201cmvn\u201d in the root), but did not work from the Eclipse M2 plugin (no idea why\u2026)<\/li>\n
  3. Point the microemu-android\/build.xml<\/em> Ant file at your jad and jar, and run the package-apk<\/em> target.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    At this point, you should be able to install the APK through a cable (eg. using HTC Sync<\/a> on a Desire) or via e-mail or a web server. Remember that you may need to visit the Settings<\/em> app, go to the Applications<\/em> section and check \u201cUnknown sources \u2013 allow installation of non-Market applications\u201d<\/em>:
    \n\"\"<\/p>\n

    Picking The Right MIDP Jar<\/h2>\n

    Our Nokia<\/a> and Blackberry<\/a> MIDP app runs using our own custom application framework inside a Canvas<\/code>, which brings advantages and disadvantages. Therefore converting LCDUI components using MicroEmu was a new approach; however, if you have your own Canvas based framework here are the considerations for making the conversion work well:<\/p>\n