Porting Adobe AIR Applications To The Intel® X86 Platform

Intel® Developer Zone offers tools and how-to information for cross-platform app development, platform and technology information, code samples, and peer expertise to help developers innovate and succeed. Join our communities for Android, Internet of Things, Intel® RealSense™ Technology, and Windows to download tools, access dev kits, share ideas with like-minded developers, and participate in hackathon’s, contests, roadshows, and local events.

If you have an Adobe AIR*-based application you can easily port it to the Intel® x86 platform. Support for porting Android AIR applications to the x86 platform started with the Adobe AIR SDK version 14.

Here are the steps:

1. Download the latest Adobe AIR SDK.
2. Extract the SDK and navigate to the bin folder.
3. Set the system path for the bin folder. We are going to run the ADT command from the command prompt.

   Starting with Adobe SDK version 14, an ADT command-line option (-arch) has been added to create the package for x86 platform.

   The -arch command is optional and by default it creates an armv7 package.

4. Once you have all the required files to build the AIR app, such as the HTML and SWF files, icons, any SWC libraries or action script files, the application descriptor file, and the certificate file to sign your Adobe AIR app, arrange everything in a folder.
5. If your application uses any ANE files, follow the process in the given link to also package the ANEs specific to x86.
6. Open the command prompt and navigate to the folder where the AIR application-specific files exist.
7. After the command prompt, type the following command:
   
   adt -package -target apk-captive-runtime -arch x86 -storetype pkcs12 –keystore ../mycert.pfx sample.apk sample-app.xmlsample.swficons
   • adt – AIR SDK command.
   • arch – to target for x86 set the arch command as x86. If this command is not given the armv7a package is created by default.
   • Keystore – Give the path to your certificate file to sign the AIR application.
   • Sample-app.xml – Your AIR application descriptor file.
   • Sample.swf – Your application SWF files if any.

Porting an Adobe Flash* Professional CS6 Project (.FLA ) to Android on x86

If you are using Adobe Flash Professional CS6 and you want to port to x86 please follow these steps:

1. Support for x86 processors is available since the Flash Professional CC 2014.1 release. Please go through this article on how you can publish an AIR application for Android on x86 if you are using Flash * CC 2014.
2. Open the .FLA file using the Adobe Flash Professional CS6.
3. Using the Publish feature, publish the application with the final output as a .SWF file. (Target – AIR 3.2 or greater for Android, Script – ActionScript 3.0, Output File - YourSWFname.swf).
4. Copy the application descriptor file and the .SWF file into a folder.
5. Download the latest Adobe AIR SDK.
6. Navigate to the bin folder of the SDK.
7. To create the final APK, run the below command with the application descriptor file, the .SWF file, icons, and any other necessary resources.
8. Make sure you add the ICONS and other resources in the command line.
   
   adt -package -target apk-captive-runtime -arch x86 -storetype pkcs12 –keystore ../mycert.pfx sample.apk sample-app.xmlsample.swficons
   • adt – AIR SDK command.
   • arch – To target for x86, set the arch command as x86. If this command is not given armv7a package is created by default.
   • Keystore – Give the path to your certificate file to sign the AIR application.
   • Sample-app.xml – Your AIR application descriptor file.
   • Sample.swf – Your application SWF files, if any.

You cannot create a FAT binary but can only generate multiple APKs through this process. Once your APK is ready, please go to this link to learn how you can submit the multiple APKs to the Google Play* store.

About the Author

Praveen Kundurthy works in the Intel® Software and Services Group. He has a master’s degree in Computer Engineering. His main interests are mobile technologies, Microsoft Windows*, and game development.