Apktool crashes with some folders called values-mccxxxx-mncxxxx

Question

When i'm trying to compile some apks like framework-res.apk, or FileExplorer.apk i get the same error always

invalid resource directory name: /ApkTool/Decompiladas/MiuiFramework.apk/res values-mcc9998-mnc9999 
invalid resource directory name: /ApkTool/Decompiladas/MiuiFramework.apk/res values-mcc9466-mnc9999

I know that I can fix this error rename the folder with only three numbers, but with an apk, if I compile it renaming these folders the rom don't boot.

Is there some way to build the apk without rename these folders?

Thanks.

Answer 1

Those aren't valid mnc or mcc values. You can see on the Providing Alternative Resources page that mcc ranges from 0 to 999, while mnc ranges from 1 to 999.

Based on the naming of the framework. It seems you are dealing with a MIUI framework. That means its entirely possible that MIUI modified the AOSP qualifiers to allow such values. This means that MIUI would have their own modified aapt from those changes which could handle those non-standard qualifiers.

I checked out ResourceTypes.h to see what data type mcc and mnc are.

union {
    struct {
        // Mobile country code (from SIM).  0 means "any".
        uint16_t mcc;
        // Mobile network code (from SIM).  0 means "any".
        uint16_t mnc;
    };
    uint32_t imsi;
};

As you can see they are both uint16_t. So our max value is 65535. So we could easily store 9998 and more without modifying the qualifiers themselves. This points the problem towards the aapt validation.

If we look at AaptConfig.cpp of aapt we see the parseMcc and parseMnc methods which both have a variation of this check

if (c-val == 0 || c-val > 3) return false;

So basically any value greater than 3 digits is failed, thus giving you that error.

Now I don't know how MIUI utilizes those qualifiers but you have two options.

1. Build your own aapt from source removing that check. You will need this commit, which adds support from other MIUI qualifier changes. To be safe. I would just build your aapt from my platform_frameworks_base repo. Due to the constant adapting nature of aapt, applications are becoming harder and harder to recompile correctly. My fork of aapt removes some unnecessary validations. (I do this because if you are decompiling an apk, it has already been compiled once, so its not apktool to ensure 100% compatibility like newer aapt try to enforce).

2. Delete those directories res/values-mcc9998-mnc9999 and values-mcc9466-mnc9999.