This repository is a set of scripts written to solved an error appearing when trying to install an app with adb:
Failure [-124: Failed parse during installPackageLI: Targeting R+ (version 30 and above) requires the resources.arsc of installed APKs to be stored uncompressed and aligned on a 4-byte boundary]

Or within Android:
There was a problem parsing the package

I originally found the solution thanks to this comment by T Aria on StackOverflow.

Full example at the bottom.

• In Windows cmd:

  convert-apk.bat [-t] <impossible_to_install.apk> <converted.apk>

  OR

  uncompress-resources.bat [-t] <impossible_to_install.apk> <uncompressed.apk>
  align-and-sign.bat <uncompressed.apk> <converted.apk>

• In Bash:

  chmod +x convert-apk.sh
  ./convert-apk.sh [-t] <impossible_to_install.apk> <converted.apk>

  OR

  chmod +x uncompress-resources.sh align-and-sign.sh
  ./uncompress-resources.sh [-t] <impossible_to_install.apk> <uncompressed.apk>
  ./align-and-sign.sh <uncompressed.apk> <converted.apk>

• In Git Bash:

  ./convert-apk.sh -t <impossible_to_install.apk> <converted.apk>

  OR

  ./uncompress-resources.sh -t <impossible_to_install.apk> <uncompressed.apk>
  ./align-and-sign.sh <uncompressed.apk> <converted.apk>

You have three ways of doing this:

• Install directly the app with adb:
  adb install --no-incremental <converted.apk>
• Transfer the file with adb then install it manually:
  adb push <converted.apk> /sdcard/Download - will put the file in the Download folder of the internal memory
• Transfer it from the file explorer and install it manually

Note that the last two will probably make Google Play Protect throw a warning during installation.

You can change several things in the scripts to customize them. The lines where things can be changed are marked in the files.

• In align-and-sign.bat and align-and-sign.sh:
  • the key path and the key password, to use an already existing one
  • the first letter of "yes" in your language could be different from the ones supported
  • the default minimum SDK version for apksigner can be lowered if you encounter problems while signing the apk (at the cost of "security", see the documentation)

• Android Studio command line tools: zipalign and apksigner must be in your PATH
• Java: keytool must be in your PATH
• Specifically on Windows:
  • PowerShell 5 (included by default) or PowerShell 7 (faster)
    OR
  • Git Bash (use -t for uncompress-resources.sh)
    OR
  • WSL
• Specifically on Linux:
  • zip and unzip commands

Suppose a example-app.apk that is impossible to install:

• In Windows cmd:

  git clone https://github.com/mathieures/convert-apk.git
  cd convert-apk
  copy ..\example-app.apk .
  convert-apk.bat example-app.apk new-example-app.apk

• In Git Bash:

  git clone https://github.com/mathieures/convert-apk.git
  cd convert-apk
  cp ../example-app.apk .
  ./convert-apk.sh -t example-app.apk new-example-app.apk

• On Linux:

  git clone https://github.com/mathieures/convert-apk.git
  cd convert-apk
  cp ../example-app.apk .
  chmod +x *.sh
  ./convert-apk.sh example-app.apk new-example-app.apk