Android error Duplicate Resources

Question

I am very new to android development and am developing my first app when I got this error

Error:Error: Duplicate resources: E:\Android\LED\app\src\main\res\drawable-hdpi\login_bg.png:drawable-hdpi-v4/login_bg, E:\Android\LED\app\src\main\res\drawable-hdpi\login_bg.9.png:drawable-hdpi-v4/login_bg Error:Execution failed for task ':app:mergeDebugResources'. > E:\Android\LED\app\src\main\res\drawable-hdpi\login_bg.png: Error: Duplicate resources: E:\Android\LED\app\src\main\res\drawable-hdpi\login_bg.png:drawable-hdpi-v4/login_bg, E:\Android\LED\app\src\main\res\drawable-hdpi\login_bg.9.png:drawable-hdpi-v4/login_bg 

I am not able to properly understand the error. What file is duplicate here? What am I supposed to do to rectify it?

P.S. The UI was developed by my frnd who is an UI developer and then he mailed me the project on which I am now supposed to add code and functionality so it becomes hard for me to try and figure out what might be the possible error.

Answer 1

That's because Android considers the following to be the same when you referenced the images in your layouts:

E:\Android\LED\app\src\main\res\drawable-hdpi\login_bg.png E:\Android\LED\app\src\main\res\drawable-hdpi\login_bg.9.png 

login_bg.9.png image tells Android that this image is a 9-patch image. Whereas, the other image, login_bg.png, is a normal image. But in terms of referencing the images, they are declared the same, as in the following examples.

Normal image:

<ImageView     android:id="@+id/normalImage"     android:background="@drawable/login_bg"/> 

Nine-patch image:

<ImageView     android:id="@+id/ninePatchImage"     android:background="@drawable/login_bg"/> 

Note: There is no difference in terms of referencing the images from your /res/drawables directory of your Android project.

See here for more info about nine-patch image, or the correct term for it is nine-patch drawable. For reference, nine-patch drawables must be declared as <name>.9.png, as in login_bg.9.png.

Answer 2

basically it will occur whenever the xml detects multiple files with same name, regardless of their extension type. e.g : mypicture.jpg can not be in same directory folder with mypicture.png

so does with your case, login_bg.9.png and login_bg.png in the same directory folder is not allowed.

hopefully this may be useful. have a good day