Database - Add the extension

The simplest way to install and manage your AIR native extensions and libraries is to use the AIR Package Manager (apm). We highly recommend using apm, as it will handle downloading all required dependencies and manage your application descriptor (Android manifest additions, iOS info additions etc).

However you can choose to install it manually, as you would have done in the past.

Add the Extension

APM

info

Note: All of the commands below should be run in a terminal / command prompt in the root directory of your application, generally the level above your source directory.

If you don't have an APM project setup, expand the guide below to setup an APM project before installing the extension.

Setup APM

Install APM

If you haven't installed apm follow the install guide on airsdk.dev.

Setup an APM project

You will need an APM project for your application.

There are many ways to do this and for more options see the APM documentation. Here we will just initialise a new empty project:

apm init

Check your github token

We use github to secure our extensions so you must have created a github personal access token and configured apm to use it.

To do this create a token using this guide from github and then set it in your apm config using:

apm config set github_token ghp_XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

If you don't do this correctly you may find the install will fail.

Install the extension

Install the extension by running:

apm install com.distriqt.firebase.Database

This will download and install the extension, required assets, and all dependencies.

Once complete apm will have created something like the following file structure:

.
|____ ane
| |____ com.distriqt.firebase.Database.ane  # Firebase Database extension
| |____ com.distriqt.Firebase.ane           # Firebase extension
| |____ [dependencies]
|____ apm_packages                          # cache directory - ignore
|____ project.apm                           # apm project file

• Add the ane directory to your IDE. See the tutorials located here on adding an extension to your IDE.

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We suggest you use the locations directly in your builds rather than copying the files elsewhere. The reason for this is if you ever go to update the extensions using apm that these updates will be pulled into your build automatically.

Manual

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The following guide is used to manually install the extension, download dependencies and update the application descriptor. We highly recommend installing extensions using apm. Using apm will automate the installation and automatically handle updates and dependencies along with greatly simplifying the application descriptor generation.

First step is always to add the extension to your development environment.

Firebase Core

You must have gone through the setup of the Firebase Core extension before attempting to proceed with this extension.

Make sure you have added all the extensions required for the Firebase Core extension as outlined here.

Firebase Realtime Database

The main additional extension is the Realtime Database ANE, however you must add the Auth extension:

• com.distriqt.firebase.Database

Download the extension from the repository and then follow the tutorial located here to add the extension to your development environment.

Android Support

The Android Support libraries encompass the Android Support, Android X and common Google libraries.

These libraries are specific to Android. There are no issues including these on all platforms, they are just required for Android.

This extension requires the following extensions:

• com.google.guava

You can access these extensions here: https://github.com/distriqt/ANE-AndroidSupport.

Application Descriptor

APM

Updating your application descriptor will insert the required extensionID's and generate the manifest and info additions for your application.

You update your application descriptor by running:

apm generate app-descriptor src/MyApp-app.xml

Change the path (src/MyApp-app.xml) to point to your application descriptor.

caution

This will modify your application descriptor replacing the manifest additions and info additions with the ones generated from apm.

You should backup your application descriptor before running this command to ensure you don't lose any information.

If you need to insert custom data into these sections see the guides for Android and iOS

Manual

Extension IDs

The following should be added to your extensions node in your application descriptor to identify all the required ANEs in your application:

<extensions>
    <extensionID>com.distriqt.firebase.Database</extensionID>
    <extensionID>com.google.guava</extensionID>

    <!-- Firebase Auth -->
    <extensionID>com.distriqt.firebase.Auth</extensionID>
    <extensionID>androidx.browser</extensionID>
    <extensionID>com.distriqt.playservices.Auth</extensionID>
    <extensionID>com.google.android.recaptcha</extensionID>

    <!-- Firebase Core -->
    <extensionID>androidx.core</extensionID>
    <extensionID>com.distriqt.Core</extensionID>
    <extensionID>com.distriqt.Firebase</extensionID>
    <extensionID>com.distriqt.playservices.AdsIdentifier</extensionID>
    <extensionID>com.distriqt.playservices.Base</extensionID>
    <extensionID>com.distriqt.playservices.CloudMessaging</extensionID>
    <extensionID>com.google.android.datatransport</extensionID>
    <extensionID>com.google.firebase.core</extensionID>
    <extensionID>com.jetbrains.kotlin</extensionID>

</extensions>

Android

Manifest Additions

Add the following additions to the manifest additions.

Component Discovery Service

Then locate the ComponentDiscoveryService service you added as part of the core Firebase manifest additions and add the following meta data tag:

<!-- DATABASE -->
<meta-data android:name="com.google.firebase.components:com.google.firebase.database.FirebaseDatabaseKtxRegistrar" android:value="com.google.firebase.components.ComponentRegistrar" />
<meta-data android:name="com.google.firebase.components:com.google.firebase.database.DatabaseRegistrar" android:value="com.google.firebase.components.ComponentRegistrar" />

It should now appear like the following at a minimum (it may have other meta-data tags from other components):

<service android:name="com.google.firebase.components.ComponentDiscoveryService" android:directBootAware="true" android:exported="false">
    <meta-data android:name="com.google.firebase.components:com.google.firebase.auth.FirebaseAuthRegistrar" android:value="com.google.firebase.components.ComponentRegistrar"/>
    <meta-data android:name="com.google.firebase.components:com.google.firebase.analytics.connector.internal.AnalyticsConnectorRegistrar" android:value="com.google.firebase.components.ComponentRegistrar"/>
    <meta-data android:name="com.google.firebase.components:com.google.firebase.installations.FirebaseInstallationsKtxRegistrar" android:value="com.google.firebase.components.ComponentRegistrar" />
    <meta-data android:name="com.google.firebase.components:com.google.firebase.installations.FirebaseInstallationsRegistrar" android:value="com.google.firebase.components.ComponentRegistrar"/>
    <meta-data android:name="com.google.firebase.components:com.google.firebase.datatransport.TransportRegistrar" android:value="com.google.firebase.components.ComponentRegistrar"/>
    <meta-data android:name="com.google.firebase.components:com.google.firebase.abt.component.AbtRegistrar" android:value="com.google.firebase.components.ComponentRegistrar"/>
    <meta-data android:name="com.google.firebase.components:com.google.firebase.FirebaseCommonKtxRegistrar" android:value="com.google.firebase.components.ComponentRegistrar" />
    <meta-data android:name="com.google.firebase.components:com.google.firebase.ktx.FirebaseCommonLegacyRegistrar" android:value="com.google.firebase.components.ComponentRegistrar" />

    <!-- DATABASE -->
    <meta-data android:name="com.google.firebase.components:com.google.firebase.database.FirebaseDatabaseKtxRegistrar" android:value="com.google.firebase.components.ComponentRegistrar" />
    <meta-data android:name="com.google.firebase.components:com.google.firebase.database.DatabaseRegistrar" android:value="com.google.firebase.components.ComponentRegistrar" />

</service>

iOS

Info Additions

You must add the following flag to your info additions node. This will delay initialisation of crashlytics until you call enableCollection allowing us to setup Crashlytics correctly.

<key>FirebaseCrashlyticsCollectionEnabled</key>
<false/>