andLegacy

andLegacy is a software library and development framework designed to simplify the integration of legacy code and legacy APIs into modern Android applications. Initiated in 2018 by a community of Android developers, it addresses the challenges faced when older Android components, often written for pre‑Android 5.0 environments, need to function alongside newer platform features and libraries.

The core of andLegacy provides a set of compatibility shims, annotation processors, and runtime utilities that automatically adapt deprecated Android APIs to newer equivalents. It includes wrappers for legacy fragment management, support for older layout inflation mechanisms, and a migration tool that generates refactoring suggestions for codebases targeting API level 21 and above. The library is distributed via Maven Central and can be added to a project with a single Gradle dependency.

Key features of andLegacy encompass automatic permission handling for APIs introduced after Android 6.0, emulation of the now‑removed AsyncTask behavior, and a lightweight emulator for legacy hardware sensors on devices lacking the original hardware. Documentation emphasizes best practices for gradually transitioning legacy modules to modern Android Jetpack components, while still preserving functional parity during the migration phase.

Since its release, andLegacy has been adopted by several enterprise Android teams maintaining large, legacy codebases, and it has received positive feedback for reducing the effort required to maintain backward compatibility. Critiques have focused on the added binary size and occasional performance overhead introduced by the compatibility layers. Ongoing development is coordinated through an open‑source repository, with contributions guided by a maintainers’ committee that reviews pull requests and manages release cycles.