How to Fix 'STRING_TOO_LARGE' UTF-8 Encoding Error in Android Studio with Java?

How can I fix the 'STRING_TOO_LARGE' UTF-8 encoding error in my Android Studio project while using a Java compiler?

The 'STRING_TOO_LARGE' error indicates that a string or identifier in your Android project exceeds the maximum length allowable by the UTF-8 encoding format. This issue can arise when cleaning your project in Android Studio, even if no large images or strings were recently added. The problem may be particularly related to resource files or the string lengths in your application that are not compliant with encoding constraints.

// Example of breaking up long strings in strings.xml
<string name="long_string">This is part one of a long string. This is part two of a long string that should be continued in another line.</string>
<string name="long_string_part_2">This is part three of the same long string that is broken into manageable parts.</string>

Causes

• Exceeding the maximum allowed length for string literals in XML resources (typically 65,536 characters).
• Invisible or malformed characters in strings or XML files that may cause the compiler to interpret strings improperly.
• Resource file corruption or incorrect encoding in the resource files, which may lead to unexpected behavior during project cleaning.

Solutions

• Check all string resources in your project's `res/values/strings.xml` file for excessively long strings and split them into multiple shorter strings if necessary.
• Use `String#escape` to ensure that no control characters or non-UTF-8 characters are present in your strings.
• Validate and ensure no hidden characters exist in your XML files that may not be visible in the editor but affect compilation.
• Consider cleaning and rebuilding your project to clear any cached data causing the error. You can do this via `Build -> Clean Project` and then `Build -> Rebuild Project` in Android Studio.

Mistake: Ignoring the maximum length constraints for string resources.

Solution: Always check the length of your strings in `strings.xml` to comply with the standard UTF-8 limits.

Mistake: Not validating all resource files after a project revert or branch switch.

Solution: After switching branches, ensure that all resource files are correctly formatted and don't inadvertently include problematic strings.