Android: targetApi not recognized in the manifest

Question

I have the following line in my manifest:

<intent-filter  android:autoVerify="true">

but I get a lint warning:

Attribute autoVerify is only used in API 23 and higher (current min is 16)

so I changed it to look like this (as per the recommendation that android studio gives me):

<intent-filter  android:autoVerify="true" tools:targetApi="M">

and I then receive this error when building the apk:

Error:java.lang.RuntimeException: [path_to_manifest]/AndroidManifest.xml:58:13-67:29: Error: Invalid instruction 'targetApi', valid instructions are : REMOVE,REPLACE,STRICT

Caused by: java.lang.IllegalArgumentException: No enum constant com.android.manifmerger.AttributeOperationType.TARGETAPI

How can I get rid of this error while still getting rid of the lint warning?

Edit: I tried both "clean project" and "invalidate cache and restart" - neither work to solve the error.

Issue opened on the Issue Tracker:

https://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=211805

Answer 1

I found an answer here the gives a workaround for this issue.

By using the line:

<intent-filter  android:autoVerify="true"
            tools:ignore="UnusedAttribute">

The lint error is solved and the apk can be built. I'm not going to mark this as the accepted answer though - I prefer if someone can explain how targetApi can be used (if it can be used)?