Running Applications on the Emulator

The Tizen Emulator is a tool that reduces the inconvenience of testing the application on a real device, by providing an environment similar to a real device. In other words, if you do not have the real device, you can test on a virtual device with similar features.

Using the Emulator Manager, you can create a variety of environments (different device types) and you can preview the problems during the development process. The emulator provides the actual hardware similar to real device controls, and you can check the application features, such as data processing and user scenarios.

The emulator is based on the open source QEMU project and consists of a virtual CPU, memory, and various peripherals. Currently, Tizen Studio only supports the x86 machine architecture for guest.

You can use the Emulator Manager to create and launch a Virtual Machine (emulator) instance. You can communicate with the emulator instance using the Smart Development Bridge (SDB).

The emulator provides the following main features:

• Full system emulation, including CPU, memory, and peripheral devices
• Event simulation with the Emulator Control Panel
• Guest operation acceleration using a host CPU or GPU

For more information, see Supported Features.

Running an Application in the Emulator

To use the emulator, you need the Emulator Manager. If you do not have the Emulator Manager, install it through the Tizen Studio Package Manager.

To start the emulator and run an application:

1. Open the Emulator Manager.

   If you do not have an applicable emulator instance, create one.

2. Select the emulator instance and click Launch.

3. Test your application in the emulator. You can launch your application in 2 ways:

   • In Tizen Studio, select the project and click Run As.
   • Drag an application package file (for example, the WGT file) to the emulator to install and launch the application on the emulator.

4. To close the emulator, right-click the emulator and select Close, or click and hold the Power key.

The emulator device stores the installed application so you can run it again, if needed. To remove the application, you must uninstall it. If you run the project again on the same emulator, the emulator replaces the application with the new version.

In the Emulator Manager, in addition to creating new emulator instances according to the environments you need, you can also modify and delete emulator instances.

Increasing the Application Execution Speed

The Tizen x86 Emulator exploits KVM (Kernel-based Virtual Machine in Linux) or HAX (Hardware Accelerated eXecution in Windows® and macOS) with HW virtualization support.

If the CPU VT is disabled in the Emulator Configuration view on the Emulator Manager, check the following prerequisites and install KVM or HAX:

1. Prerequisites for using HW virtualization:

   • In Ubuntu:

     To use KVM, you need a processor that supports HW virtualization. Both Intel and AMD have developed those extensions for their processors (Intel VT-x/AMD-V). Check whether the CPU supports HW virtualization with the following command:

     $egrep -c '(vmx|svm)' /proc/cpuinfo
     

     If the output of the command is 0, the CPU does not support HW virtualization. Otherwise, it does.

     The HW virtualization feature can also be disabled on the BIOS setting. Check the setting and enable it if you need the feature.

   • In Windows®:

     To use HAX, you need an Intel VT-x-supported CPU, and you must enable the NX-related setting in the PC BIOS.

   • In macOS:

     To use HAX, install EFI-related updates on your Intel-based Mac computer.

     For more information, see EFI and SMC firmware updates for Intel-based Mac computers.

2. Installing KVM or HAX:

   • In Ubuntu:

     No installation is required for KVM.

   • In Windows® and macOS:

     The HAXM driver is installed during the Tizen Studio installation. For more information on installing HAXM, see Hardware Accelerated Execution Manager.

   Note
   If the installation fails with a VT-related message, check the CPU feature and BIOS settings. If the installation fails with an NX-related message, enable NX (or PAE and DEP) -related item in the BIOS. In addition, make sure that the operating system supports the NX feature (for more information, see MSDN).

   No configuration is required for KVM or HAX.

Working with the HW Virtualization, Settings, and Help

To run the emulator with the HW virtualization support in the Emulator Manager, set the CPU VT field to ON. The field is disabled if your system cannot support HW virtualization.

You can also run the emulator with the HW virtualization support from the command line, by including the -enable-kvm (in Ubuntu) or -enable-hax (in Windows® and macOS) option in the start-up command.

Supported Features

The emulator provides various virtual HW, media formats, codecs, and OpenGL® ES acceleration. For better performance of the OpenGL® ES support, the Tizen Emulator exploits the latest feature of the graphic driver, so always install the latest vendor-provided graphic driver. The emulator, however, has some limitations and differences compared to physical target devices.

The following table lists the basic features supported in the emulator.

Table: Supported emulator features

OpenGL® ES Acceleration Support

For the emulator to support OpenGL® ES acceleration, you need:

• Graphics chipset driver that supports OpenGL® 1.4 installed on the host machine
• All chipset vendors and driver versions available to support the OpenGL® 1.4 standard

Note
The emulator supports only ES 1.1, ES 2.0, and EGL™ 1.4 versions.

Differences Between the Emulator and Target

The following tables describe the differences between a real target device and the emulator. For more information, see the detailed differences in:

• Input system
• Graphics and display
• Virtual sensor
• Telephony
• Power management
• Supported media formats and codecs

Table: Comparison summary

Input System

Table: Input differences

Graphics and Display

Table: Graphics and display differences

Virtual Sensor (Emulator Control Panel)

Table: Virtual sensor differences

Telephony

Table: Telephony differences

Power Management

Table: Power management differences

Supported Media Formats and Codecs

Table: Media format and codec differences

Related information

• Dependencies
  • Tizen Studio 1.0 and Higher