ClassNotFoundException: Didn't find class on path: DexPathList

Question

I have a problem since I updated my App on playstore. Since this update, the exception is thrown, but I haven´t changed anything related to this exception.

Stacktrace:

java.lang.RuntimeException: Unable to instantiate activity ComponentInfo{de.opiatefuchs.onthejobtimerlight/de.opiatefuchs.onthejobtimerlight.OnTheJobTimerActivity}: java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: Didn't find class "de.opiatefuchs.onthejobtimerlight.OnTheJobTimerActivity" on path: DexPathList[[zip file "/data/app/de.opiatefuchs.onthejobtimerlight-1/base.apk"],nativeLibraryDirectories=[/vendor/lib, /system/lib]]
at android.app.ActivityThread.performLaunchActivity(ActivityThread.java:2236)
at android.app.ActivityThread.handleLaunchActivity(ActivityThread.java:2387)
at android.app.ActivityThread.access$800(ActivityThread.java:151)
at android.app.ActivityThread$H.handleMessage(ActivityThread.java:1303)
at android.os.Handler.dispatchMessage(Handler.java:102)
at android.os.Looper.loop(Looper.java:135)
at android.app.ActivityThread.main(ActivityThread.java:5254)
at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Native Method)
at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:372)
at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit$MethodAndArgsCaller.run(ZygoteInit.java:903)
at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit.main(ZygoteInit.java:698)
Caused by: java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: Didn't find class "de.opiatefuchs.onthejobtimerlight.OnTheJobTimerActivity" on path: DexPathList[[zip file "/data/app/de.opiatefuchs.onthejobtimerlight-1/base.apk"],nativeLibraryDirectories=[/vendor/lib, /system/lib]]
at dalvik.system.BaseDexClassLoader.findClass(BaseDexClassLoader.java:56)
at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:511)
at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:469)
at android.app.Instrumentation.newActivity(Instrumentation.java:1066)
at android.app.ActivityThread.performLaunchActivity(ActivityThread.java:2226)
... 10 more
Suppressed: java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: de.opiatefuchs.onthejobtimerlight.OnTheJobTimerActivity
at java.lang.Class.classForName(Native Method)
at java.lang.BootClassLoader.findClass(ClassLoader.java:781)
at java.lang.BootClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:841)
at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:504)
... 13 more
Caused by: java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: Class not found using the boot class loader; no stack available

The thing is, my App version before runs without problems and I haven´t changed anything related to this activity. I´ve just added a new info dialog that has nothing to do with this activity. This app is a free lite version, I´ve made the exact same changes on the pro version and there nothing is thrown. This works as expected. The only difference between pro and lite is, I have integrated Admob (on the new way) in the lite version and Google Play license in the pro version. But this I have integrated since the beginning and haven´t made changes to this. I also haven´t made any changes to the manifest, I read many posts here but nothing helps.

It seems that it just happen on Android versions since 5.0 . Has anybody an idea what this problem could cause or has anybody the same experiences? Is it possible that proguard just destroyed anything by obfuscating (also here, no changes)?

I posted no code, because it is not important to this problem, like I said I haven´t made changes related to this exception.

This Question is marked as duplicate but it isn´t. The comment with the link doesn´t fix my problem, all libraries are checked and integrated in the right way. Also, I don´t use NDK.

Answer 1

Update

After a long time, It turned out that it must have anything to do with proguard. I can´t really say what exactly the error causes, but I tried a little bit and that´s what I noticed (that´s in my case with Eclipse IDE):

• I have to close every tab from the project I want to sign
• I have to clean the project and after cleaning, do nothing but export the apk
• making a small change in manifest, save it and undo the change (and save)
• if there is any class in manifest named with "YourClass" or ".YourClass", change it to "com.yourpackage.yourClass"

That are the four points I have done and then it worked. This looks suspicious, but I think there is a problem with obfuscating. Because without doing these points, I can simply compile my apk and install it from eclipse. For me, there is no obvious reason for this behavior. Also the package name does work without a change if I only install it from eclipse. I hope these points can help somebody.