How to get Android application id?

Question

In Android, how do I get the application\'s id programatically (or by some other method), and how can I communicate with other applications using that id?

Answer 1

If you are using the new** Gradle build system then getPackageName will oddly return application Id, not package name. So MasterGaurav's answer is correct but he doesn't need to start off with ++

If by application id, you're referring to package name...

See more about the differences here.

** not so new at this point

++ I realize that his answer made perfect sense in 2011

Answer 2

I am not sure what you need the app/installation ID for, but you can review the existing possibilities in a great article from Android developers:

• http://android-developers.blogspot.com/2011/03/identifying-app-installations.html

To sum up:

• UUID.randomUUID() for creating id on the first time an app runs after installation and simple retrieval afterwards
• TelephonyManager.getDeviceId() for actual device identifier
• Settings.Secure.ANDROID_ID on relatively modern devices

Answer 3

For getting AppId (or package name, how some says), just call this:

But be sure that you importing BuildConfig with your app id packages path

BuildConfig.APPLICATION_ID 

Answer 4

To track installations, you could for example use a UUID as an identifier, and simply create a new one the first time an app runs after installation. Here is a sketch of a class named “Installation” with one static method Installation.id(Context context). You could imagine writing more installation-specific data into the INSTALLATION file.

public class Installation {
private static String sID = null;
private static final String INSTALLATION = "INSTALLATION";
public synchronized static String id(Context context) {

    if (sID == null) {  
       File installation = new File(context.getFilesDir(), INSTALLATION);
       try {
           if (!installation.exists())
               writeInstallationFile(installation);
           sID = readInstallationFile(installation);
       } catch (Exception e) {
           throw new RuntimeException(e);
       }
    }
   return sID;
}

private static String readInstallationFile(File installation) throws IOException {
   RandomAccessFile f = new RandomAccessFile(installation, "r");
   byte[] bytes = new byte[(int) f.length()];
   f.readFully(bytes);
   f.close();
   return new String(bytes);
}

private static void writeInstallationFile(File installation) throws IOException {
   FileOutputStream out = new FileOutputStream(installation);
   String id = UUID.randomUUID().toString();
   out.write(id.getBytes());
   out.close();
}

}

Yon can see more at https://github.com/MShoaibAkram/Android-Unique-Application-ID

Answer 5

If your are looking for the value defined by applicationId in gradle, you can simply use

BuildConfig.APPLICATION_ID 

Answer 6

Package name is your android app id .

String appId = BuildConfig.APPLICATION_ID

Or

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.whatsapp

App Id = com.whatsapp