AndroidHttpClient not found (when running Robolectric)

Question

I've set up a very simple project to test the integration of Robolectric + Data Binding + Retrolambda. When I run the test suit, I get the following message:

Error:(30, 30) Gradle: error: cannot access AndroidHttpClient
class file for android.net.http.AndroidHttpClient not found

This is pretty odd since I don't use AndroidHttpClient anywhere.

---

The error occurs here, on the "activity" line:

@Before
public void setup() {
    activity = Robolectric.setupActivity(MainActivity.class); // Error on this line
    textView = (TextView) shadowOf(activity).findViewById(R.id.textView);
    button = (Button) activity.findViewById(R.id.button);
    editText = (EditText) activity.findViewById(R.id.editText);
}

The program never uses AndroidHttpClient. In fact, this is the entire program:

@Override
protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
    super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);

    final ActivityMainBinding binding = DataBindingUtil.setContentView(this, R.layout.activity_main);

    binding.setUser(new User());
    binding.button.setOnClickListener((v) -> {
        binding.textView.setText(String.format("Hello, %s!", binding.editText.getText()));
        binding.editText.setText("");
    });
}

---

Ideas as to what's wrong?

Kortneykoruna

AndroidHttpClient was removed from the SDK in API Level 23, so if your compileSdkVersion is 23 or higher, that would explain why the class isn't found. As to why Robolectric is trying to access that class, that I can't say. – Melisamelisande

That fixed it! I was running the tests with: "@Config(constants = BuildConfig.class, sdk = 21)". Thanks! – Kortneykoruna

Write an answer so everyone will benefit – Randee

Answer 1

AndroidHttpClient was removed from the SDK in v23 of the build tools.

As Robolectric is running against earlier versions, it expects it to be there, which is why you're seeing this error.

For now, you can add it back in:

android {
    useLibrary 'org.apache.http.legacy'
}

As detailed here.

There is a GitHub ticket open for Robolectric to fix this. You can follow the thread/ticket here.

Update:

As some people have correctly pointed out, a better way of doing this would be to create a class android.net.http.AndroidHttpClient in your test resources. This would be a preferred method because you're only modifying the test sources, not the production code, in order to accommodate the tests.

Selle

Please don't do that. By adding obsolete library, you're bloating your app with code which is used only for testing. – Gander

Error:Execution failed for task ':app:transformClassesWithJarMergingForDebug'. > com.android.build.api.transform.TransformException: java.util.zip.ZipException: duplicate entry: org/apache/http/ConnectionClosedException.class – Donia

@DmitryZaytsev good point. As the answer was receiving quite a lot of attention, I've updated it. – Selle

Answer 2

I've just added fake class android.net.http.AndroidHttpClient in my test sources. And it solved the issue for now. Waiting for Robolectric to be updated

Randee

This solved it for me with the minimum level of impact. The use of useLibrary results in extra items being bundled into your main app whereas adding this class under src/test/java has no impact on the main app. – Corrida

Answer 3

Apparent problem and solution:

AndroidHttpClient was removed from the SDK in API Level 23, while Robolectric was set to run tests with SDK 21:

AndroidHttpClient was removed from the SDK in API Level 23

Kortneykoruna

I'm running into the same problem, what was the actual solution? For me compiling with API Level 22 probably isn't an answer. – Chimaera

As I recall, the AndroidHttpClient issue was caused by a discrepancy between the sdk version set for robolectric (21) and the compileSdkVersion (23). However, I wrote the project to evaluate the data binding library and ended up concluding there were still too many issues. – Kortneykoruna

Answer 4

I was able to solve this problem by creating a new class called AndroidHttpClient within a new package android.net.http. After that I had to annotate my Unit Test class with @Config(constants = BuildConfig.class, sdks = 21) which will run the tests against an emulated version of API 21 which is the last version of Android Robolectric supports currently.

There is currently an issue opened here, so once they release version 3.1 everything should be fine and you won't have to use this workaround.

Synodic

Answer 5

If target SDK is 28 or greater then according to this, we have to put following line in AndroidManifest.xml

<uses-library android:name="org.apache.http.legacy" android:required="false"/>

Fancywork

Thanks Naveed! Been fighting with this for a few hours. Edit: (My error was Caused by: java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: android.net.http.AndroidHttpClient to hopefully point some extra folks to this page via crawlers since the full trace is not in the question.) – Electrometallurgy