"java.exe" exited with code 2 Xamarin.Android project

Question

so I have my Xamarin.Android project which contains several libraries. When I try to build I receive an error which says "java.exe" exited with code 2.

After some hours of google research I found out that I could enable Multidex. According to the blog entry of Jon Doublas I did the steps mentioned. http://www.jon-douglas.com/2016/09/05/xamarin-android-multidex/

According to the blog entry Android API Level > 21 handles Multidex itself. Well my experience is that it does not. I am building on API Level 25 and get the same error again and again with the same information. The steps in the article do not help. It seems like Xamarin.Android does not support Multidex.

It seems like you have to handle Multidex by yourself but I haven't found any solution which is working. Dos anybody found a solution which works?

I am using Xamarin 4.6 and Visual studio 2017.

Answer 1

Found the answer after about 20 hours of searching in my project.. So here are the steps to resolve the problem "java.exe" exited with code 2

1) Change the MainDexClasses.bat as described in the link:

http://www.jon-douglas.com/2016/09/05/xamarin-android-multidex/

2) Make sure you have enabled Multidex Option in your Android Application! Have a look at the .csprj file if Multidex is set to true (in my case it wasn't even if I enabled Multidex)

3) Add the following part in your AndroidManifest file

<application android:name="android.support.multidex.MultiDexApplication"></application> 

This will tell your Android project to actually use the Multidex-Option given.

After a clean and build I was able to run my application as it is.