What is the purpose of Tools->Android->Enable ADB Service?

Question

In order to have IDEA and DDMS connected to the same emulator, I had to disable this feature.

What does it do? Is there a downside of this action?

Answer 1

The ADB (Android Debug Bridge) is a service that IDEA uses for debugging Android code on an emulator or USB device. This service can be used by only one application at a time. DDMS tool uses ADB, too, so you need to disable ADB-IDEA connection if you want to use DDMS tool without closing IDEA. You won't be able to debug Android applications in IDEA if this service is disabled, but note that if you try to launch debugging IDEA will notify you that ADB service is disabled and offer to enable it again . So there shouldn't be any problems after disabling this service. You just need to do it before launching DDMS.

Answer 2

ADB is the debugger for android. You can only have one device connect to the debugger at a time.