How to populate AndroidManifest meta-data value programatically?

Question

I understand the AndroidManifest.xml is prepared at compile time and not runtime, is there any other way to populate metadata in the manifest without relying on hard coded strings? Maybe populating it somehow at compile time?

I currently have the following on my AndroidManifest.xml

<application
    android:allowBackup="true"
    android:icon="@drawable/dt_icon"
    android:label="@string/app_name"
    android:theme="@style/AppTheme">

    <meta-data
        android:name="DataPath"
        android:value=""
     /> ...

I don't want to hard code the value and instead populate it somehow with the results from:

Environment.getExternalStorageDirectory()

Another application will later retrieve the value of DataPath by utilizing the ApplicationInfo's metaData property.

@Shubham The first thing i wrote "I understand the AndroidManifest.xml is prepared at compile time and not runtime," I'm looking for an alternative, I believe i read somewhere that its possible to assign the value at compile time but still not hard coding it... — Dayan
– Dayan, Commented Mar 29, 2017 at 20:17

azizbekian · Accepted Answer · 2017-03-29 20:20:40Z

3

I believe i read somewhere that its possible to assign the value at compile time but still not hard coding it

The best you can do is to assign a value from gradle via manifest placeholders.

Example:

android {
    defaultConfig {
        manifestPlaceholders = [hostName:"www.example.com"]
    }
    ...
}

<intent-filter ... >
    <data android:scheme="http" android:host="${hostName}" ... />
    ...
</intent-filter>

answered Mar 29, 2017 at 20:20

azizbekian

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