argent-android-emulator-setup

1. Prerequisites

The Android SDK (platform tools and emulator) and an AVD, created in Android Studio or with avdmanager create avd. If list-devices returns no Android devices and no avds, either no AVD exists or Argent can't find the SDK. Then run argent config set android.sdkRoot <sdk-path> and call list-devices again after a minute: a failed SDK lookup is cached that long. Exporting ANDROID_HOME in your shell doesn't reach the tool-server that is already running.

2. Setup

1. Find a ready device: call list-devices. Filter for entries with platform: "android". Ready devices (state: "device") come first. If the user named a device, use it. Otherwise pick the first kind: "emulator" that fits the task. Take a physical phone (kind: "device") only when the user asks for one. If the result has a hint about the adb server, prefix every adb command that you run yourself, as the hint shows.
2. Boot if needed: if no such emulator is ready, call boot-device with avdName: <name> from the same call's avds list. avds doesn't mark TV images: for a TV task, pick the AVD by its name.

3. Using the device

Pass the Android serial as udid to the same interaction tools as on iOS. See argent-device-interact for interaction tooling and the Android notes at the bottom of that skill. If a React Native app can't reach Metro, see argent-metro-debugger §1.

4. Notes

• Android TV / leanback AVDs boot through this exact flow, but list-devices tags them runtimeKind: "tv" and they are focus-driven: use the argent-tv-interact skill, not the gesture tools.
• To stop the emulator, run adb -s <serial> emu kill from a shell (clean shutdown). Never pkill -9/kill -9 qemu: a hard kill leaves the userdata image dirty, after which cold boots can hang for many minutes doing recovery (runaway writes, boot_completed never flips). If an image gets into that state, boot once with -wipe-data to reset it.