How To Install Cordova and Create App Projects

How To Install Cordova and Create App Projects


.

Create your first Cordova app

This guide shows you how to create a JS/HTML Cordova application and deploy them to various native mobile platforms using the cordova command-line interface (CLI). For detailed reference on Cordova command-line, review the CLI reference

Installing the Cordova CLI

The Cordova command-line tool is distributed as an npm package.
To install the cordova command-line tool, follow these steps:
  1. Download and install Node.js. On installation you should be able to invoke node and npm on your command line.
  2. (Optional) Download and install a git client, if you dont already have one. Following installation, you should be able to invoke giton your command line. The CLI uses it to download assets when they are referenced using a url to a git repo.
  3. Install the cordova module using npm utility of Node.js. The cordova module will automatically be downloaded by the npm utility.
  • on OS X and Linux:
     $ sudo npm install -g cordova
    On OS X and Linux, prefixing the npm command with sudo may be necessary to install this development utility in otherwise restricted directories such as /usr/local/share. If you are using the optional nvm/nave tool or have write access to the install directory, you may be able to omit the sudo prefix. There are more tips available on using npm without sudo, if you desire to do that.
  • on Windows:
     C:>npm install -g cordova
The -g flag above tells npm to install cordova globally. Otherwise it will be installed in the node_modules subdirectory of the current working directory.
Following installation, you should be able to run cordova on the command line with no arguments and it should print help text.

Create the App

Go to the directory where you maintain your source code, and create a cordova project:
$ cordova create hello com.example.hello HelloWorld
This creates the required directory structure for your cordova app. By default, the cordova create script generates a skeletal web-based application whose home page is the projects www/index.html file.

See Also

  • Cordova create command reference documentation
  • Cordova project directory structure
  • Cordova project templates

Add Platforms

All subsequent commands need to be run within the projects directory, or any subdirectories:
$ cd hello
Add the platforms that you want to target your app. We will add the ios and android platform and ensure they get saved to config.xmland package.json:
$ cordova platform add ios
$ cordova platform add android
To check your current set of platforms:
$ cordova platform ls
Running commands to add or remove platforms affects the contents of the projects platforms directory, where each specified platform appears as a subdirectory.
Note: When using the CLI to build your application, you should not edit any files in the /platforms/directory. The files in this directory are routinely overwritten when preparing applications for building, or when plugins are re-installed.

See Also

  • Cordova platform command reference documentation

Install pre-requisites for building

To build and run apps, you need to install SDKs for each platform you wish to target. Alternatively, if you are using browser for development you can use browser platform which does not require any platform SDKs.
To check if you satisfy requirements for building the platform:
$ cordova requirements
Requirements check results for android:
Java JDK: installed .
Android SDK: installed
Android target: installed android-19,android-21,android-22,android-23,Google Inc.:Google APIs:19,Google Inc.:Google APIs (x86 System Image):19,Google Inc.:Google APIs:23
Gradle: installed

Requirements check results for ios:
Apple OS X: not installed
Cordova tooling for iOS requires Apple OS X
Error: Some of requirements check failed

See Also

  • Android platform requirements
  • iOS platform requirements
  • Windows platform requirements

Build the App

By default, cordova create script generates a skeletal web-based application whose start page is the projects www/index.html file. Any initialization should be specified as part of the deviceready event handler defined in www/js/index.js.
Run the following command to build the project for all platforms:
$ cordova build
You can optionally limit the scope of each build to specific platforms - ios in this case:
$ cordova build ios

See Also

  • Cordova build command reference documentation

Test the App

SDKs for mobile platforms often come bundled with emulators that execute a device image, so that you can launch the app from the home screen and see how it interacts with many platform features. Run a command such as the following to rebuild the app and view it within a specific platforms emulator:
$ cordova emulate android
Following up with the cordova emulate command refreshes the emulator image to display the latest application, which is now available for launch from the home screen:
Alternately, you can plug the handset into your computer and test the app directly:

go to link download