Look up known Android failure modes
android_pitfallsIdentify Android build and runtime failures whose symptoms mislead. Search by error text, topic, or keyword to reveal the actual cause and fix.
Instructions
Search a curated set of Android development failure modes whose symptoms point nowhere near their causes.
These are problems where the obvious interpretation is wrong: a build that fails on a JDK version rather than the code, a service killed by vendor power management rather than a bug, keystrokes ignored because they are synthetic, a GridLayout that collapses because of how weights resolve. Each entry gives the symptom, the actual cause, and the fix.
Consult this when something fails in a way that does not make sense, before spending time bisecting the app's own code.
Args:
error_text (string, optional): observed error output; returns entries whose known signatures match it
topic ('build'|'device'|'service'|'input'|'layout'|'packaging', optional): filter by area
search (string, optional): case-insensitive substring match across title, symptom, cause and fix
response_format ('markdown' | 'json')
Returns: { "count": number, "pitfalls": [ { "id": string, "topic": string, "title": string, "symptom": string, "cause": string, "fix": string } ] }
Examples:
Use when: a build failed with unfamiliar output -> error_text=""
Use when: a background service keeps dying -> topic="service"
Use when: planning tablet support and you want the known traps first -> topic="layout"
Don't use when: the error is plainly in the app's own code
Error Handling:
Returns an empty list when nothing matches; that means the problem is not a known environment trap
Input Schema
| Name | Required | Description | Default |
|---|---|---|---|
| topic | No | Restrict results to one area. | |
| search | No | Substring to search for across all fields. | |
| error_text | No | Observed error output to match against known failure signatures. | |
| response_format | No | Output format: 'markdown' for human-readable, 'json' for machine-readable. | markdown |