Question

I’m trying to use JDBC in my Android application to connect to a remote database to do inserts, queries, etc. I have successfully connected and done these things in a different JAVA project. So I figured since Android is Java, I could just port over the relevant code, add the same build path for the driver, etc. But it gives me the error:

java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: com.mysql.jdbc.Driver

I really don’t think it’s a code issue since the same code works in a Java project (which I just execute in main()). But for reference here it is:

String url = "jdbc:mysql://localhost:3306/eventhub_test"; //
    String user = "root"; 
    String pass = "";

 SQLUtils sqlu = new SQLUtils(url, user, pass);

//the SQLUtils class I made:

public class SQLUtils {


private String CONNECTION_URL;
private String user;
private String pass;
private java.sql.Statement stmt; 
private java.sql.Connection conn;

public SQLUtils(String conn_url, String user, String pass) {
    this.CONNECTION_URL = conn_url; 
    this.user = user;
    this.pass = pass; 
}


public void init() throws IllegalAccessException, InstantiationException, ClassNotFoundException, SQLException {

    Class.forName ("com.mysql.jdbc.Driver").newInstance ();
    conn = DriverManager.getConnection(CONNECTION_URL, user, pass);
    stmt = conn.createStatement();

}
}

So I’m really confused here. Does JDBC not work with Android? If so, tell me what alternatives I should look into for remote MySQL database access.

Thanks.

Answer 1

Does JDBC not work with Android?

JDBC is infrequently used on Android, and I certainly would not recommend it.

IMHO, JDBC is designed for high-bandwidth, low-latency, highly-reliable network connections (e.g., desktop to database server, Web application server to database server). Mobile devices offer little of these, and none of them consistently.

If so, tell me what alternatives I should look into for remote MySQL database access.

Create a Web service around your database and access that from Android.

As side benefits, you improve security (vs. leaving your database open), can offload some business logic from the client, can better support other platforms (e.g., Web or Web-based mobile frameworks), etc.