Android Assets Journalist

Generate Kotlin constants or XML string resources from files in your Android assets/ directories. Use generated names in code and keep raw asset paths out of call sites.

Example

If your module contains:

src/main/assets/
├── models/
│   └── ml_model.tflite
└── configs/
    └── settings.json

you can replace raw strings like this:

assets.open("models/ml_model.tflite")
assets.open("configs/settings.json")

with generated constants:

import com.yourcompany.yourapp.assets.AssetFiles

assets.open(AssetFiles.ASSET_MODELS_ML_MODEL_TFLITE_527533696)
assets.open(AssetFiles.ASSET_CONFIGS_SETTINGS_JSON_2053859403)

Expect a hash suffix on each generated name. The suffix keeps names unique when two paths normalize to the same identifier.

Install

The Gradle badge above and the Gradle Plugin Portal show the latest published version.

Apply the plugin after com.android.application or com.android.library in the Android module that owns the assets/ directory.

plugins {
    id("com.android.application")
    // or id("com.android.library")
    id("com.github.utilx.android-assets-journalist") version "<latest-version>"
}

Configure Kotlin Output

If you leave both outputs disabled, the plugin generates Kotlin output. Unless you set packageName, it writes the generated file to com.github.utilx.

androidAssetsJournalist {
    kotlinFile {
        enabled = true
        packageName = "com.yourcompany.yourapp.assets"
        className = "AssetFiles"
        constNamePrefix = "ASSET_"
    }

    xmlFile {
        enabled = false
    }
}

Configure XML Output

Enable XML generation when you want Android string resources instead of Kotlin constants.

androidAssetsJournalist {
    xmlFile {
        enabled = true
        stringNamePrefix = "asset_"
    }

    kotlinFile {
        enabled = false
    }
}

Build

Run your usual Android build.

./gradlew assembleDebug

Gradle registers variant-aware tasks such as generateAssetsKotlinFileDebug and generateAssetsXmlFileDebug.

You will find generated files under build/generated/assetsjournalist/src/<variant>/.

Generated Output

With the Kotlin config above, you get:

package com.yourcompany.yourapp.assets

object AssetFiles {
    const val ASSET_MODELS_ML_MODEL_TFLITE_527533696 = "models/ml_model.tflite"
    const val ASSET_CONFIGS_SETTINGS_JSON_2053859403 = "configs/settings.json"
}

With XML output enabled, you get:

<resources>
    <string name="asset_models_ml_model_tflite_527533696">models/ml_model.tflite</string>
    <string name="asset_configs_settings_json_2053859403">configs/settings.json</string>
</resources>

Path Transforms And Value Prefixes

Use replaceInAssetsPath when you want the generated name and value to use a transformed path.

androidAssetsJournalist {
    kotlinFile {
        enabled = true
        replaceInAssetsPath = listOf(
            mapOf("match" to "^dev_", "replaceWith" to "prod_")
        )
    }
}

Use constValuePrefix when you need values such as file:///android_asset/....

androidAssetsJournalist {
    kotlinFile {
        enabled = true
        className = "Assets"
        packageName = "com.yourcompany.yourapp.assets"
        constNamePrefix = "ASSET_"
        constValuePrefix = "file:///android_asset/"
    }
}

const val ASSET_MODELS_ML_MODEL_TFLITE_527533696 =
    "file:///android_asset/models/ml_model.tflite"

Configuration Reference

kotlinFile

• enabled: turns Kotlin generation on or off
• className: generated object name. Default AssetFiles
• packageName: generated package name. Default com.github.utilx
• constNamePrefix: prefix added before the sanitized path. Default asset_. The generator uppercases the final constant name.
• constValuePrefix: prefix added to each generated value. Default ""
• replaceInAssetsPath: regex replacements applied before the plugin builds the generated name and value

xmlFile

• enabled: turns XML generation on or off
• stringNamePrefix: prefix added to each generated string resource name

Requirements

• Java 17 or newer
• Gradle 8.0 or newer
• Android Gradle Plugin 8.0.0 or newer
• namespace set in your Android block when you use AGP 8+

Notes

• Apply the plugin in the Android module that owns the assets/ directory.
• Each variant gets its own generated output directory.
• The Kotlin generator removes duplicate entries after path transformation.
• Examples in this README use Kotlin DSL.

License

Apache 2.0. See LICENSE.