Firebase Analytics - NPE in CrashReport

Question

I've just migrated to Firebase Analytics 9.0.0 and when tried to launch the app on emulator api10/x86, then the following exception is thrown by the services. Any ideas how to work around that?

05-23 15:36:44.371 1280-1280/? E/AndroidRuntime: FATAL EXCEPTION: main
 java.lang.RuntimeException: Unable to start activity ComponentInfo{com.szyk.myheart/com.szyk.myheart.MyHeartActivity}: java.lang.NullPointerException
     at android.app.ActivityThread.performLaunchActivity(ActivityThread.java:1647)
     at android.app.ActivityThread.handleLaunchActivity(ActivityThread.java:1663)
     at android.app.ActivityThread.access$1500(ActivityThread.java:117)
     at android.app.ActivityThread$H.handleMessage(ActivityThread.java:931)
     at android.os.Handler.dispatchMessage(Handler.java:99)
     at android.os.Looper.loop(Looper.java:130)
     at android.app.ActivityThread.main(ActivityThread.java:3683)
     at java.lang.reflect.Method.invokeNative(Native Method)
     at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:507)
     at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit$MethodAndArgsCaller.run(ZygoteInit.java:839)
     at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit.main(ZygoteInit.java:597)
     at dalvik.system.NativeStart.main(Native Method)
  Caused by: java.lang.NullPointerException
     at com.google.android.gms.flags.impl.FlagProviderImpl.getBooleanFlagValue(Unknown Source)
     at com.google.android.gms.internal.zzsd$zza.zzb(Unknown Source)
     at com.google.android.gms.internal.zzsd$zza.zza(Unknown Source)
     at com.google.android.gms.internal.zzsf.zzb(Unknown Source)
     at com.google.android.gms.internal.zzsd.get(Unknown Source)
     at com.google.firebase.crash.FirebaseCrash.getInstance(Unknown Source)
     at com.google.firebase.crash.FirebaseCrash.zzOW(Unknown Source)
     at com.google.firebase.crash.FirebaseCrash.log(Unknown Source)
     at com.szyk.extras.activities.UniversalActionBarActivity.onCreate(UniversalActionBarActivity.java:46)
     at com.szyk.myheart.MyHeartActivity.onCreate(MyHeartActivity.java:99)
     at android.app.Instrumentation.callActivityOnCreate(Instrumentation.java:1047)
     at android.app.ActivityThread.performLaunchActivity(ActivityThread.java:1611)
     at android.app.ActivityThread.handleLaunchActivity(ActivityThread.java:1663) 
     at android.app.ActivityThread.access$1500(ActivityThread.java:117) 
     at android.app.ActivityThread$H.handleMessage(ActivityThread.java:931) 
     at android.os.Handler.dispatchMessage(Handler.java:99) 
     at android.os.Looper.loop(Looper.java:130) 
     at android.app.ActivityThread.main(ActivityThread.java:3683) 
     at java.lang.reflect.Method.invokeNative(Native Method) 
     at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:507) 
     at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit$MethodAndArgsCaller.run(ZygoteInit.java:839) 
     at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit.main(ZygoteInit.java:597) 
     at dalvik.system.NativeStart.main(Native Method) 

The code is nothing more than activity with:

@Override
protected void onCreate(@Nullable Bundle savedInstanceState) {
    super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
    FirebaseCrash.log("onCreate: " + getClass().getSimpleName());
}

Answer 1

Unfortunately, using Firebase on devices or emulators without Play Services isn't a supported use case. Crash Reporting will fail to initialize, and you will see a message to that effect in logcat when the app launches. However, if you are also seeing a crash when calling a method after failed init, that seems like a problem we should correct.

It sounds like you are doing the best thing you can by suppressing the exception, but I'd rather not make you go through that, so I'll pass it on as feedback to the team.