How to take logs for Android application

There are many open source development applications which help us to take the log in order to test the crashing/unknown behavior of Android apps APK. But I figure out some issue in many open source application like you can’t save log, or you may not able to take log for whole case. I worked a lot to get it done on easy way.

So in this blog, I will try to explain you in two ways i.e (1. For Developer people who are quite technical and 2. For tester who are not quite technical) for taking logs for Android application.

1. For Non-Technical People:

a. Download a tool named as Log collector application from the following link and install on your device:

http://code.google.com/p/android-log-collector/downloads/detail?name=android-log-collector-1.2.0.apk

b. Once you install it, you can run application which you want to take log.

c. After application crashes, then you can open the application Log Collector.

d. Then, it will give you an option to send the log on specified address. Better to use Gmail (You know why :D).

e. Provide email address and send the log to the specified reception.

2. For Technical People:

This is the best practice to take log for Android application in my view.

a. Download Android SDK from developer.android.com (Click here to download). Unzip it and install Android SDK Manager.

Note: If you computer is 64 bit, then I strongly suggest you to download 64 bit.

b. In addition, you need to download Java Run time Environment (JRE) and if you are using Android SDK 64 bit then please download 64 bit.  You can download from the Oracle.com (Click here to download)

Note: while installing it, change the destination folder and locate it under the unzipped SDK folder (In my case, it is like: (C:\adt-bundle-windows-x86_64-20131030\adt-bundle-windows-x86_64-20131030\eclipse\jre)

c. Once you install, JRE then you can open the application Eclipse.exe ( In My case, C:\adt-bundle-windows-x86_64-20131030\adt-bundle-windows-x86_64-20131030\eclipse).

d. You need to click on DDMS as show in figure below:

e. Now as you use your device, the DDMS tool with the help of Logcat it will start taking log.  To save LogCat to a text file open up a terminal window (run it in administrator mode) and type:

adb logcat -d > logcat.txt

This will create a file named “logcat.txt” in your current directory. In my case as refering to the above screenshot it is on C:\adt-bundle-windows-x86_64-20131030\adt-bundle-windows-x86_64-20131030\sdk\platform-tools under the name logcat.txt

Hope this blog also help you to take a log for your or other android .apk application.

Feel free to raise your queries on comment section.

Thank you

Cheers,

Udhyan.