Android Studio 2 Essentials: A fast-paced guide to get you up and running with Android application development using Android Studio 2, Second Edition

A prerequisite to start working with Android Studio is to have Java installed on your system. The system must also be able to find the Java installation. This can be achieved by installing the Java Development Kit (JDK) on your system and then setting an environment variable named JAVA_HOME, which points to the JDK folder in your system. Check this environment variable to avoid issues during the installation of Android Studio.

The Android Studio package can be downloaded from the Android developer tools web page at http://developer.android.com/sdk/index.html by clicking on the download button, as is shown in the next screenshot. This package will be an EXE file for Windows systems, a DMG file for Mac OS X systems, or a TGZ file for Linux systems:

In Windows, launch the EXE file. The default installation directory is \Users\<your_user_name>\AppData\Local\Android\android-studio. The AppData directory is usually a hidden directory.

In Mac OS X, open the DMG file and drop Android Studio into your Applications folder. The default installation directory is /Applications/Android\ Studio.app.

In Linux systems, unzip the TGZ file and execute the studio.sh script located at the android-studio/bin/ directory.

If you have any problem in the installation process or in the following steps, you can get help about it and the known issues by checking Appendix, Getting Help.

Execute Android Studio and wait until it loads completely. This may take a few minutes the first time. The first time you execute Android Studio, you will be prompted by a welcome screen. As shown in the following screenshot, the welcome screen provides options to start a new project, open a project, import a project, or even perform more advanced actions, such as checking out a project from a version control system or modifying the configuration options:

Let's have a look at the various options available on the welcome screen:

The welcome screen, in addition to the main actions, also contains a configuration menu and a help menu, as described in the following:

The essential feature that has to be correctly configured is the Android SDK. Although, Android Studio automatically installs the latest Android SDK available, so you should already have everything you need to create your first application. It is important to check it and learn how we can change it.

In the Android Studio welcome screen, navigate to Configure | Project Defaults | Project Structure. In SDK Location, you should have a selected Android SDK location as shown in the following screenshot. This selected SDK location is the default that will be used in our Android projects; however, we can change it later for specific projects that require special settings.

If you do not have an Android SDK configured in Android Studio, then we have to add it manually.

To accomplish this task, click on the ellipsis (...) button to add an Android SDK and then select the home directory for the SDK. Check whether you have it in your system by navigating to your Android Studio installation directory. You should find a folder named sdk, which contains the Android SDK and its tools. The Android Studio installation directory may be in a hidden folder; so, click on the button highlighted in the following screenshot to Show Hidden Files and Directories:

If you wish to use another Android SDK location that is different from the one included with Android Studio, select this instead. For example, if you previously used the Android Development Tools (ADT) plugin for Eclipse, you already have an Android SDK installation in your system.

We have successfully prepared the system for Android Studio and installed our Android Studio instance. We ran Android Studio for the first time, and now we know the options available in the welcome screen. You have also learned how to configure our Android SDK and to install it manually, in case you wish to use a different version. Completing these tasks will leave your system with Android Studio running and configured to create your first project.

In the next chapter, you will learn about the concept of a project and how it includes everything the application requires, from classes to libraries. We will create our first project and discuss the different kinds of activities available in the wizard.