Watch your Manifest

Watch your Manifest

摘要

It’s a well-known fact for Android developers that an app’s manifest (AndroidManifest.xml) holds crucial application declarations. It is rarely monitored after being set up because we assume it hardly ever changes. At Pinterest, however, we have been actively monitoring the manifest after realizing it does change every so often.

While building an app, Gradle downloads all the dependent libraries to compile and link them with the app. These dependent libraries each have their own mini manifest. During the build process, Android Gradle Plugin (AGP) merges them with the app’s main manifest to form the final manifest. Because of this merging process, the final manifest often looks quite different from the original one and contains additional declarations. In most cases, these extra declarations are necessary for dependent libraries to function. However, sometimes they can have unintended behaviors.