Bdtyktl

I'm using Ubuntu 14.04, I've started to delve into app development and I'm following some online tutorials and I've come across this rendering issue. Whenever I select any theme other than AppTheme.NoActionBar I get an error along the following lines.

The following classes could not be instantiated: -
android.support.design.widget.CoordinatorLayout (Open Class, Show
Exception, Clear Cache) - android.support.design.widget.AppBarLayout
(Open Class, Show Exception, Clear Cache) Tip: Use View.isInEditMode()
in your custom views to skip code or show sample data when shown in
the IDE Exception Details

java.lang.IllegalArgumentException: You need to use a Theme.AppCompat
theme (or descendant) with the design library. at
android.support.design.widget.ThemeUtils.checkAppCompatTheme(ThemeUtils.java:34)
at
android.support.design.widget.CoordinatorLayout.(CoordinatorLayout.java:178)
at
android.support.design.widget.CoordinatorLayout.(CoordinatorLayout.java:172)
at java.lang.reflect.Constructor.newInstance(Constructor.java:422)

at
android.view.LayoutInflater.createViewFromTag(LayoutInflater.java:704)
at android.view.LayoutInflater.inflate(LayoutInflater.java:492) at
android.view.LayoutInflater.inflate(LayoutInflater.java:394) Copy
stack to clipboard

My grasp is I need to use a Theme.AppCompat. Which I'm unsure of what that is or how to do this. As I said I am brand new to Android Studio and the interface is very foreign to me.

One user mentioned

All you need to do is add android:theme="@style/Theme.AppCompat.Light"
to your application tag in the AndroidManifest.xml file.

But I only seem to have a MainActivity.java, content_main.xml and an activity_main.xml,is this a different file I need to add?

If anyone has any input or help it would be greatly appreciated thank you, I am very new to Android Studio and app development!

If you followed the very first "Getting Started" tutorial, you should have a Project tree that looks like the "Modified theme" screen shot I'm including. The AndroidManifest.xml file is under the "manifests" folder, not the "java" or "res" folder.

Modified theme

I've already made the change that you mention.

As a note of commiseration, I'm just now ramping up the same learning curve on Windows and immediately ran into this when trying to render the layout preview for the very first "Hello World" app in the official Google "Getting Started" tutorial. I've got to say, it's pretty discouraging to run into something so cryptic so early on, but according to my friends who know Android, it's a pretty good introduction to the frustrations of developing for the platform. So maybe it's an appropriate introductory experience even if it is sad.