Android Package Name From APK Java Code Sample

public String getPackageNameByAPK(String _strAPKPath, Context _activityORservice)

Java Source Code
The Java language source code with android.content.pm.PackageManager to get the package name from an .apk file is shown in this post for online learning purposes.

Android apps are supplied in .apk files(even if you download from Play store) which contain all information needed to install an app to an Android smart phone.
Once an app is installed on a phone it is identified by a unique package name, the package name format is:

1. com.usrax.ca
2. com.honestitconsultancy.patric
3. mysymphony.pmi.com

This value is taken from the Manifest.xml file which is already present inside the .apk file of an Android application(app).

If we search "get package name from .apk" on Google we won't be able to find the source code to do this on the first page, almost everyone tries to tell us that this will be done through command line.

This post will answer the following question:
Android, get package name from apk file in your program

Package Archive files

There is a little twist behind these search results, is there another name for .apk files?
Yes sir, the full name of .apk files is "Package Archive". You can say that's the legal name .apk is only a nick name used by the Linux OS (Android is a Linux) and developer community.



It is possible to retrieve various nuggets of information Android package archive or .apk files using Android PackageManager class programatically in Java language.

The class android.content.pm.PackageManager will return the information about your package (or .apk) in a android.content.pm.PackageInfo object.










Java Source Code Example

The Java programming language source code to get the package name from an .apk file is given below.
I have created a convenience method for you which you can utilize in your Java app code easily.

public String getPackageNameByAPK(String _strAPKPath, Context _activityORservice){
 String strRetVal = "";
 PackageManager packMan = null;
 PackageInfo packInfo = null;

  try{

  if(_strAPKPath == null) return "";

  Log.d(K.ATAG, "getPackageNameByAPK(): " + _strAPKPath);
  if(_activityORservice == null) {
   Log.e(K.ATAG, "Context is null");
    return "";   
  }

 packMan = _activityORservice.getPackageManager();  
 packInfo = packMan.getPackageArchiveInfo(_strAPKPath, 0);
 strRetVal = packInfo.packageName;
   
 }catch(Exception e){
  Log.e(K.ATAG, e.toString() + "" );
 }

  Log.d(K.ATAG, "RetVal: " + strRetVal);
 return strRetVal;
}//Beautify code with tohtml.com/java

Note, this is actually WORKING CODE, copied straight from one of my already deployed apps.

All you need is some common sense and a mug of coffee before performing the magical copy/paste operation.

An instance of the Package Manager can be acquired by calling getPackageManager() method of android.content.Context class, which actually represents the activity or service from which you are making the method call.

The details about PackageManager and the method getPackageArchiveInfo can be found on the URL given below:
http://developer.android.com/reference/android/content/pm/PackageManager.html