Proguard configuration for Android Support v4 22.2.0

Question

After updating dependencies on Gradle Android build to use com.android.support:support-v4:22.2.0 from local Maven extras repository (within SDK), Proguard started throwing these problems.

Warning: android.support.v4.app.DialogFragment: can't find referenced class android.support.v4.app.DialogFragment$DialogStyle
Warning: android.support.v4.app.FragmentTransaction: can't find referenced class android.support.v4.app.FragmentTransaction$Transit
Warning: android.support.v4.view.ViewCompat: can't find referenced class android.support.v4.view.ViewCompat$ResolvedLayoutDirectionMode
Warning: android.support.v4.view.ViewCompat: can't find referenced class android.support.v4.view.ViewCompat$LayoutDirectionMode
Warning: android.support.v4.view.ViewCompat: can't find referenced class android.support.v4.view.ViewCompat$LayerType
Warning: android.support.v4.view.ViewCompat: can't find referenced class android.support.v4.view.ViewCompat$AccessibilityLiveRegion
Warning: android.support.v4.view.ViewCompat: can't find referenced class android.support.v4.view.ViewCompat$ImportantForAccessibility
Warning: android.support.v4.view.ViewCompat: can't find referenced class android.support.v4.view.ViewCompat$OverScroll
Warning: android.support.v4.widget.DrawerLayout: can't find referenced class android.support.v4.widget.DrawerLayout$EdgeGravity
Warning: android.support.v4.widget.DrawerLayout: can't find referenced class android.support.v4.widget.DrawerLayout$LockMode
Warning: android.support.v4.widget.DrawerLayout: can't find referenced class android.support.v4.widget.DrawerLayout$State
Warning: there were 11 unresolved references to classes or interfaces.
         You may need to add missing library jars or update their versions.
         If your code works fine without the missing classes, you can suppress
         the warnings with '-dontwarn' options.
         (http://proguard.sourceforge.net/manual/troubleshooting.html#unresolvedclass)

Simply adding -dontwarn android.support.v4.** solves the problem, but I'd like an more specific/elegant solution, than ignoring all problems on support.v4 package

Can anybody tell what rules should be added, so these classes/@interfaces are correctly processed by Proguard?

Answer 1

It is safe to set don't warn for the support library classes according to the Android team. You can do this via:

## Support library
-dontwarn android.support.**

Answer 2

The only solution is what you have mentioned, i.e -dontwarn android.support.v4.**. This is actually taken from the <path-to-android-sdk>/tools/proguard/proguard-android.txt, where it says:

# The support library contains references to newer platform versions.
# Don't warn about those in case this app is linking against an older
# platform version.  We know about them, and they are safe.
-dontwarn android.support.**