Is it possible to install packages in a zip file without recovery?

Question

I have downloaded "Google Apps" for my device (using CyanogenMod) from this link: Google Apps for CyanogenMod

It is a zip file which includes some folders and files:

Archive:  gapps-kk-20140606-signed.zip
signed by SignApk
  Length      Date    Time    Name
---------  ---------- -----   ----
   283576  2008-02-28 18:33   META-INF/com/google/android/update-binary
     2538  2008-02-28 18:33   META-INF/com/google/android/updater-script
      733  2008-02-28 18:33   install-optional.sh
     1293  2008-02-28 18:33   optional/face/addon.d/71-gapps-faceunlock.sh
  1509607  2008-02-28 18:33   optional/face/app/FaceLock.apk
  1267168  2008-02-28 18:33   optional/face/lib/libfacelock_jni.so
   242204  2008-02-28 18:33   optional/face/vendor/pittpatt/models/detection/multi_pose_face_landmark_detectors.7/left_eye-y0-yi45-p0-pi45-r0-ri20.lg_32.bin
   239032  2008-02-28 18:33   optional/face/vendor/pittpatt/models/detection/multi_pose_face_landmark_detectors.7/nose_base-y0-yi45-p0-pi45-r0-ri20.lg_32.bin
   227880  2008-02-28 18:33   optional/face/vendor/pittpatt/models/detection/multi_pose_face_landmark_detectors.7/right_eye-y0-yi45-p0-pi45-r0-ri20.lg_32-2.bin
   437148  2008-02-28 18:33   optional/face/vendor/pittpatt/models/detection/yaw_roll_face_detectors.6/head-y0-yi45-p0-pi45-r0-ri30.4a-v24.bin
   395904  2008-02-28 18:33   optional/face/vendor/pittpatt/models/detection/yaw_roll_face_detectors.6/head-y0-yi45-p0-pi45-rn30-ri30.5-v24.bin
   403000  2008-02-28 18:33   optional/face/vendor/pittpatt/models/detection/yaw_roll_face_detectors.6/head-y0-yi45-p0-pi45-rp30-ri30.5-v24.bin
 11981284  2008-02-28 18:33   optional/face/vendor/pittpatt/models/recognition/face.face.y0-y0-22-b-N.bin
     2679  2008-02-28 18:33   system/addon.d/70-gapps.sh
  7329839  2008-02-28 18:33   system/app/Books.apk
  1504849  2008-02-28 18:33   system/app/GenieWidget.apk
  4904345  2008-02-28 18:33   system/app/Gmail2.apk
   502096  2008-02-28 18:33   system/app/GoogleCalendarSyncAdapter.apk
   206543  2008-02-28 18:33   system/app/GoogleContactsSyncAdapter.apk
   820454  2008-02-28 18:33   system/app/GoogleEars.apk
 10949624  2008-02-28 18:33   system/app/GoogleTTS.apk
 11511850  2008-02-28 18:33   system/app/Hangouts.apk
  7631202  2008-02-28 18:33   system/app/Magazines.apk
 10987553  2008-02-28 18:33   system/app/Maps.apk
   388768  2008-02-28 18:33   system/app/MediaUploader.apk
  8438121  2008-02-28 18:33   system/app/Music2.apk
  3293204  2008-02-28 18:33   system/app/PlayGames.apk
 30177075  2008-02-28 18:33   system/app/PlusOne.apk
   264451  2008-02-28 18:33   system/app/Street.apk
  3474174  2008-02-28 18:33   system/app/Videos.apk
  8374746  2008-02-28 18:33   system/app/YouTube.apk
      154  2008-02-28 18:33   system/etc/g.prop
      816  2008-02-28 18:33   system/etc/permissions/com.google.android.maps.xml
      835  2008-02-28 18:33   system/etc/permissions/com.google.android.media.effects.xml
      261  2008-02-28 18:33   system/etc/permissions/com.google.widevine.software.drm.xml
      967  2008-02-28 18:33   system/etc/permissions/features.xml
     9629  2008-02-28 18:33   system/etc/preferred-apps/google.xml
   160503  2008-02-28 18:33   system/framework/com.google.android.maps.jar
    34818  2008-02-28 18:33   system/framework/com.google.android.media.effects.jar
      688  2008-02-28 18:33   system/framework/com.google.widevine.software.drm.jar
   427480  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libAppDataSearch.so
   830276  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libWVphoneAPI.so
     9340  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libcrashreporter.so
    17484  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libfilterframework_jni.so
   542776  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libfilterpack_facedetect.so
  1848904  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libfrsdk.so
  1446992  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libgames_rtmp_jni.so
   148800  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libgcastv2_base.so
   173516  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libgcastv2_support.so
    54432  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libgoogle_hotword_jni.so
 10716304  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libgoogle_recognizer_jni_l.so
    30092  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libjgcastservice.so
   497116  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libjni_unbundled_latinimegoogle.so
  3276964  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libmoviemaker-jni.so
  3186756  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libnetjni.so
  4634612  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libpatts_engine_jni_api.so
  5236788  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libpatts_engine_jni_api_ub.210030011.so
  3311060  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libphotoeditor_native.so
    29936  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libplus_jni_v8.so
    22564  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/librsjni.so
   140624  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libspeexwrapper.so
   349640  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libvcdecoder_jni.so
  4906560  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libvideochat_jni.so
   132332  2008-02-28 18:33   system/lib/libwebp_android.so
   859115  2008-02-28 18:33   system/priv-app/ConfigUpdater.apk
 14146183  2008-02-28 18:33   system/priv-app/GmsCore.apk
   127784  2008-02-28 18:33   system/priv-app/GoogleBackupTransport.apk
   306772  2008-02-28 18:33   system/priv-app/GoogleFeedback.apk
  5872527  2008-02-28 18:33   system/priv-app/GoogleLoginService.apk
     8500  2008-02-28 18:33   system/priv-app/GoogleOneTimeInitializer.apk
   130086  2008-02-28 18:33   system/priv-app/GooglePartnerSetup.apk
  3031445  2008-02-28 18:33   system/priv-app/GoogleServicesFramework.apk
  6520554  2008-02-28 18:33   system/priv-app/Phonesky.apk
  2112030  2008-02-28 18:33   system/priv-app/SetupWizard.apk
 18403608  2008-02-28 18:33   system/priv-app/Velvet.apk
  2736144  2008-02-28 18:33   system/priv-app/talkback.apk
   411730  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/c_fst
  2841712  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/clg
     1881  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/commands.abnf
      285  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/compile_grammar.config
     3381  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/contacts.abnf
     1721  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/dict
     2539  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/dictation.config
  3667120  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/dnn
     1357  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/endpointer_dictation.config
     1514  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/endpointer_voicesearch.config
    19808  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/ep_acoustic_model
  3326536  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/g2p_fst
     2563  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/grammar.config
     1688  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/hclg_shotword
   182833  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/hmm_symbols
   112016  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/hmmlist
     2745  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/hotword.config
    29252  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/hotword_classifier
     5460  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/hotword_normalizer
       10  2014-06-08 01:25   system/usr/srec/en-US/hotword_prompt.txt
      278  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/hotword_word_symbols
       39  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/metadata
      862  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/norm_fst
   970304  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/normalizer
   575024  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/offensive_word_normalizer
      303  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/phone_state_map
      244  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/phonelist
 10659152  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/rescoring_lm
   126368  2008-02-28 18:33   system/usr/srec/en-US/wordlist
     1675  2008-02-28 18:33   META-INF/com/android/otacert
     9792  2008-02-28 18:33   META-INF/MANIFEST.MF
    10799  2008-02-28 18:33   META-INF/CERT.SF
     1714  2008-02-28 18:33   META-INF/CERT.RSA
---------                     -------
247160412                     109 files

This file contains Google Apps APK files as well. It could be chosen from recovery (such as ) and installed. In this way all apps available in the zip file will be installed altogether and after installation could be uninstalled such as apps installed by .apk file, because they are supposed and built in apps.

My question is that if I extract .apk files from this zip file and install them manually on the device, does they work properly? Or there is some functional difference between installing zip file from recovery and installing apk file manually?

Answer 1

The APK themselves can be installed without recovery. However if an application depends on another application which doesn't exists in the current system or if it depends on features that thee currently installed dependent doesn't provide or provide in incompatible way, then you might see instabilities that wouldn't have been there if you had installed the whole thing. This might translate to crashes or even data corruption. I would not recommend cherry picking APKs from different images, but if you have a very very good reasons to do it, do it at your own risk.

Answer 2

if doing so you have to remount the /system partition as it is mounted read only.

via an adb shell

mount -o remount,rw /system

or from outside the device

adb remount

After this you can copy the content of this file onto the system partition.

Keep in mind that these apk files will rely on some libraries, config files etc, which are also provided in this file and probably it would be best to install the whole as it would be done via the install method in recovery. If you really want to install only some of these apk files you have to figure out their dependencies and install them also. For analysing dependencies of an apk file you could use: http://developer.sonymobile.com/knowledge-base/tools/analyse-your-apks-with-apkanalyser/. The dependencies should be listed in the apks AndroidManifest.xml which you could also read with tools from the Android SDK like: aapt something like: aapt dump badging yourapp.apk. See also: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/4191762/how-to-view-androidmanifest-xml-from-apk-file.

Keep in mind: iam not an app developer so iam not sure if libraries which should be part of the system/lib directory are also listed in it's AndroidManifest.xml file maybe an app developer could comment here.

Usually you should always prefer the installation through recovery as this is a safe way of installing where you can be sure not to break anything while installing, as the main system is not running.(Broken update.zip files can still break your device :P)

Answer 3

Installing zip from custom recovery install these apks to /system directory which is read only file system and you cant uninstall these apks later.

Yes you can install manually and most probably you wont get problems if you install all necessary apks but applications will be on /data directory and used your precious storage space. you can uninstall though this time.

make your choice wisely.

Answer 4

There are tools which allow you to install apk as a system app, but you will need root access.

Nevertheless, after doing so, some apps might not work because of dependencies to other apps. And installing all dependencies is quite tricky.