proguard - AppCompat does not support the current theme features after proguard/minify

Question

I've updated support libs to v23.0.0 from v22.2.1, after building app (with minifyEnabled true) i have "AppCompat does not support the current theme features" exception:

08-23 05:46:10.168 19437 19437 E AndroidRuntime: java.lang.RuntimeException: Unable to start activity ComponentInfo{tm.alashow.dotjpg/tm.alashow.dotjpg.ui.activity.MainActivity}: java.lang.IllegalArgumentException: AppCompat does not support the current theme features
08-23 05:46:10.168 19437 19437 E AndroidRuntime:    at android.app.ActivityThread.performLaunchActivity(ActivityThread.java:2417)
08-23 05:46:10.168 19437 19437 E AndroidRuntime:    at android.app.ActivityThread.handleLaunchActivity(ActivityThread.java:2477)
08-23 05:46:10.168 19437 19437 E AndroidRuntime:    at android.app.ActivityThread.-wrap11(ActivityThread.java)
08-23 05:46:10.168 19437 19437 E AndroidRuntime:    at android.app.ActivityThread$H.handleMessage(ActivityThread.java:1345)

When debugging app or disabling proguard (minifyEnabled false), exception not throws. It throws only when proguard is enabled.

Theme:

<style name="Theme.App" parent="@style/Theme.AppCompat.Light.NoActionBar">
        <item name="colorPrimary">@color/primary</item>
        <item name="colorPrimaryDark">@color/primary_dark</item>
        ...
</style>

Proguard file:

-dontwarn android.support.v7.**
-keep class android.support.v7.** { *; }
-keep interface android.support.v7.** { *; }

-keep class android.support.design.widget.** { *; }
-keep interface android.support.design.widget.** { *; }
-dontwarn android.support.design.**
-keep public class * extends android.support.design.widget.CoordinatorLayout$Behavior {
    public <init>(android.content.Context, android.util.AttributeSet);
}

I already tried answers from this question: Upgraded to AppCompat v22.1.0 and now getting IllegalArgumentException: AppCompat does not support the current theme features and i think it's not duplicate question.

How can i fix it? With proguard enabled, of course

Answer 1

The error message may be misleading. Look out for Proguard warnings like this one:

Warning: org.acra.ErrorReporter: can't find referenced method 'void setLatestEventInfo(android.content.Context,java.lang.CharSequence,java.lang.CharSequence,android.app.PendingIntent)' in library class android.app.Notification
Warning: there were 1 unresolved references to library class members.
         You probably need to update the library versions.
         (http://proguard.sourceforge.net/manual/troubleshooting.html#unresolvedlibraryclassmember)
Exception while processing task 
java.io.IOException: Please correct the above warnings first.
    at proguard.Initializer.execute(Initializer.java:473)
    at proguard.ProGuard.initialize(ProGuard.java:233)
    at proguard.ProGuard.execute(ProGuard.java:98)
    at proguard.gradle.ProGuardTask.proguard(ProGuardTask.java:1074)
    at com.android.build.gradle.tasks.AndroidProGuardTask.doMinification(AndroidProGuardTask.java:139)
    at com.android.build.gradle.tasks.AndroidProGuardTask$1.run(AndroidProGuardTask.java:115)
    at com.android.builder.tasks.Job.runTask(Job.java:48)
    at com.android.build.gradle.tasks.SimpleWorkQueue$EmptyThreadContext.runTask(SimpleWorkQueue.java:41)
    at com.android.builder.tasks.WorkQueue.run(WorkQueue.java:227)
    at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:745)

Although there was an error the build will succeed if there is a classes.jar file from a previous build, a clean build will fail as expected.

In my case fixing the Proguard warning also removed the AppCompat exception.