Android Apps on Mac OS X!
Now it is also possible to run apps from Google Android on your Mac without Android APKs or other complex developer tools, because programmers of popular BlueStacks App Player Android virtualization software released its version for Apple Mac OS X.
BlueStacks App Player for Apple Mac
BlueStacks for Mac is distributed in standard .dmg installation package. Download it from developer's website and copy content of installation package to Applications folder.
Bluestacks is currently in beta stage and its development continues. You can download it for free and try it for yourself!
How to use BlueStacks App Player for Mac
Open BlueStacks.app file in your Applications folder and wait a minute till the application loaded to the main screen.
You will be welcomed to My Apps section with pre-installed Android apps, like Facebook, Twitter, Pulse etc. Now you can try any installed applications, or install any other. Applications to install are sorted in categories, like Kids, Tools, News, Messaging, Top 25 Apps etc.
Also you can try to find the application by the name. Simply click on button with magnifying glass and type.
All installed applications are found in the My Apps category. To run the app simply click on it.
In the bottom section of main screen are available three Android control buttons:
- Back arrow key
- Menu key
- Home key
The last is Option key that opens Setting of BlueStacks app, where you can set the sync with your Android phone, change language, manage Google accounts, contacts, apps etc.
How to install APK file to BlueStacks App Player
BlueStacks App Player is able to install applications from 1Mobile Market, Amazon App Store and Get Jar. It is not able to install Android application installation packages (.apk file extension). However, its application package stores command line program that can do it.
Open Terminal (Applications\Utilities\Terminal.app). and navigate to /Applications/BlueStacks.app/Contents/Runtime folder with cd command:
cd /Applications/BlueStacks.app/Contents/Runtime/
Press Enter.
Type command:
./uHD-Adb install "path to your .apk file"
in our case:
./uHD-Adb install /users/michelin/downloads/Wolfenstein-3D-v10.apk
Press Enter and wait till the program will install .apk file to BlueStacks app. Now open the BlueStack App Player and you will find new application in My Apps category.