adb — Android Debug Bridge

command-line tool, lets you communicate with an emulator or connected Android device

adb is a client-server program that includes three components:

• client
  — Sends a command to run on an Android device.
  — The client runs on your development machine can be invoked with the adb command.
• daemon (adbd)
  — Background process which runs commands sent by the client on an Android device.
• server
  — Background process that runs on the development machine; it manages communication between the client and the daemon.

→ adb command-line utility included with Google’s Android SDK.

→ We can find adb tool in Android SDK/platform-tools or Download ADB Kits.

→ adb provides access to a Unix shell that you can use to run a variety of commands on a device such as below

• installing or uninstalling apps
• debugging apps
• push or pull files
• find connected devices
• kill & start adb server

Kill and start adb server

//Adb Server
adb kill-server
adb start-server

Reboot Device

//Adb Reboot
adb reboot
adb reboot recovery 
adb reboot-bootloader
adb root //restarts adb with root permissions

Connected Devices

adb usb
adb devices   //show devices attached
adb devices -l //devices (product/model)
adb connect ip_address_of_device

Install or uninstall Apps

adb install -t path/to/app.apk
//with all runtime permissions granted
adb install -g <path/to/app.apk>

//Uninstalling app from device
adb uninstall com.myAppPackage

adb shell pm uninstall com.example.MyApp
adb shell pm clear [package] // Deletes all data associated with a package.

//prints package names for all applications installed on your phone
adb shell pm list packages

//Get device android version
adb shell getprop ro.build.version.release

Files

adb push [source] [destination]    // Copy files from your computer to your phone.
adb pull [device file location] [local file location] // Copy files from your phone to your computer.

//App install

Logcat

adb logcat
adb logcat -c // clear // The parameter -c will clear the current logs on the device.
adb logcat -d > [path_to_file] // Save the logcat output to a file on the local system.
adb bugreport > [path_to_file] // Will dump the whole device information like dumpstate, dumpsys and logcat output.

Screenshot

#Create a temporary folder to save a screenshot.
mkdir tmp#Capture a screenshot and save to /sdcard/screen.png on your Android divice.
adb shell screencap -p /sdcard/screen.png

#Grab the screenshot from /sdcard/screen.png to /tmp/screen.png on your PC.
adb pull /sdcard/screen.png /tmp/screen.png

#Delete /sdcard/screen.png
adb shell rm /sdcard/screen.png

#open the screenshot on your PC. 
open /tmp/screen.png

Screenrecord

adb shell screenrecord /mnt/sdcard/Download/test.mp4

• AdbCommands
• adbshell