API 14 Android 4.0 Support

[weitzj]

Hi,

I cannot use Timber on API 14. Is there a specific reason that minSdkVersion=15 is required?

https://github.com/JakeWharton/timber/blob/master/build.gradle#L17

Thank you,

Jan

[JakeWharton]

There are no devices running API 14.

[weitzj]

Thank you.

[dalewking]

I know that there are almost certainly no actual devices running API, this is causing us heartburn on our project and we have delayed adopting the new Timber, which we really want to do to eliminate the warnings for hardcoded strings.

The issue is that we already have printed promotional materials that say our app supports 4.0 and above, but if we set our minimum to 15 the promotional materials will be incorrect which can have legal implications.

So I agree that it is extremely unlikely that any one will ever have an API 14 device, there is also absolutely no reason to cause so much confusion among your users by stubbornly and arbitrarily choosing to set a minimum of 15 when there is no difference that matters to this library between 14 and 15.

[briangriffey]

Why not fork and set the minsdk to 14 if you really need it?

[dalewking]

Because that means we have to build it, causing us to either set up a build process to build it and deploy it for our builds or include it as a submodule and increase our build time. Currently, we are staying with 2.x versions and not able to take advantage of the actual PR that we submitted to this project due to the ramifications of switching from API 14 to 15. Many man-hours have already been spent at my company debating this. Would you really like the task of explaining to your customer that you are no longer supporting version 14 of Android for no actual valid technical reasons, just because some 3rd party developer wants to make some stupid point about the lack of API 14 devices?

If there were a valid technical reason for not supporting 14 I would support that decision. There has already been 3 issues filed on this question in addition to me commenting on it in PR #67 where the change was introduced. I am sure there will probably be more issues filed as time goes by.

[JakeWharton]

It's literally one file. Copy/paste it.

On Fri, Nov 20, 2015 at 1:42 PM Boycott Github notifications@github.com
wrote:

Because that means we have to build, it causing us to either set up a
build process to build it and deploy it for our builds or include it as a
submodule and increase our build time. Currently, we are staying with 2.x
versions and not able to take advantage of the actual PR that we submitted
to this project due to the ramifications of switching from API 14 to 15.
Many man-hours have already been spent at my company debating this. Would
you really like the task of explaining to your customer that you are no
longer supporting version 14 of Android for no actual valid technical
reasons, just because some 3rd party developer wants to make some stupid
point about the lack of API 14 devices?

If there were a valid technical reason for not supporting 14 I would
support that decision. There has already been 3 issues filed on this
question in addition to me commenting on it in PR #67
#67 where the change was
introduced. I am sure there will probably be more issues filed as time goes
by.

—
Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub
#108 (comment).

[ahmedre]

@dalewking as an alternative, you can add: <uses-sdk tools:overrideLibrary="timber.log" /> - to your AndroidManifest.xml - this will override Timber's minSdk with whatever you have set in build.gradle.

[dalewking]

Thank you very much @ahmedre! The other alternative I was looking at was using jitpack.io to build a forked version.

[dalewking]

FYI, our app, which does support API 14, just got a bug report for someone using 4.0.3 (LGE-P700 Optimus L7) so the statement, "There are no devices running API 14." is false. Our app is only available in Europe so that may have some influence on the choice of devices and people's tendency to update. The device does appear to have updates to 4.1.2.

[gabrielittner]

4.0.3 is already API 15

[dalewking]

Darn, I did a search and apparently the site I checked had misinformation on that