title: Service onCreate called before Application onCreate
body: <p>I'm getting crazy with some crashes reported in the Developer Console, in my most recent version of the App.
  They appear as java.lang.IllegalStateException and it seems that Application.onCreate is not called before Service.onCreate</p>
  
  <p>It happens for about 0.3% percentage of the users and it happens ONLY on Android 8 devices.
  I failed to reproduce it on my devices.</p>
  
  <p>I'm going to explain better what happens.
  The App extends Application in this way:</p>
  
  <pre><code>public class MySpecificApp  extends MyBaseApp
  {
      static
      {
          AppCompatDelegate.setCompatVectorFromResourcesEnabled(true);
      }
  
      public void onCreate()
      {
          super.onCreate();
  
          ...  // Specific initializations
      }
  
      ...
  }
  
  public class MyBaseApp  extends Application
  {
  
      private static MyBaseApp smApplication;
  
      public void onCreate()
      {
          super.onCreate();
  
          // Fabric (Crashlitics) initialization. It SHOULD NOT BE needed, just to be sure (tried also without this line)
          Fabric.with(this, new Crashlytics());
  
          MyBaseApp.smApplication = this;             // smApplication is initialized here and NEVER modified
  
          ... // Base initializations     
      }
  
      public static MyBaseApp getApp() {
          return MyBaseApp.smApplication;
      }
  
      ...
  }
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>In the MyService.onCreate method a check to the MyBaseApp.smApplication reveals that the MyBaseClass.onCreate has never been called.</p>
  
  <pre><code>public class MyService extends Service
  {
  
      public MyService()
      {
      }
  
      @Override
      public void onCreate()
      {
          try
          {
              if( MySpecificApp.getApp() == null )
                  Crashlytics.log("MyService.onCreate: probably Application.onCreate not yet called");        &lt;=== Here is raised the Exception
              // The line over is the line 617
  
  
              ... // Service initializations
  
          }
          catch( Exception e )
          {
              e.printStackTrace();
  
              throw e;
          }
      }
  
      ...
  }
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>In fact Crashlytics crashes because it has not been initialized, but it's because the Application has not been initialized.
  Crashlytics is not the clue. The code is in this way, because I had several weird bugs of IllegalStateException and I supposed the lack of Application initialization: I was  trying to investigate it.</p>
  
  <p>Here the stack logs from the Developer Console (the crash does not reach Crashlytics)</p>
  
  <pre><code>java.lang.RuntimeException: 
    at android.app.ActivityThread.handleCreateService (ActivityThread.java:3554)
    at android.app.ActivityThread.-wrap4 (Unknown Source)
    at android.app.ActivityThread$H.handleMessage (ActivityThread.java:1786)
    at android.os.Handler.dispatchMessage (Handler.java:105)
    at android.os.Looper.loop (Looper.java:164)
    at android.app.ActivityThread.main (ActivityThread.java:6944)
    at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke (Method.java)
    at com.android.internal.os.Zygote$MethodAndArgsCaller.run (Zygote.java:327)
    at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit.main (ZygoteInit.java:1374)
  Caused by: java.lang.IllegalStateException: 
    at io.fabric.sdk.android.Fabric.singleton (Fabric.java:301)
    at io.fabric.sdk.android.Fabric.getKit (Fabric.java:551)
    at com.crashlytics.android.Crashlytics.getInstance (Crashlytics.java:191)
    at com.crashlytics.android.Crashlytics.checkInitialized (Crashlytics.java:390)
    at com.crashlytics.android.Crashlytics.log (Crashlytics.java:221)
    at com.xxx.MyService.onCreate (MyService.java:617)                                &lt;==== Here is the line that is reached only if Application.onCreate is not called
    at android.app.ActivityThread.handleCreateService (ActivityThread.java:3544)
    at android.app.ActivityThread.-wrap4 (Unknown Source)
    at android.app.ActivityThread$H.handleMessage (ActivityThread.java:1786)
    at android.os.Handler.dispatchMessage (Handler.java:105)
    at android.os.Looper.loop (Looper.java:164)
    at android.app.ActivityThread.main (ActivityThread.java:6944)
    at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke (Method.java)
    at com.android.internal.os.Zygote$MethodAndArgsCaller.run (Zygote.java:327)
    at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit.main (ZygoteInit.java:1374)
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Here an extract of the manifest:</p>
  
  <pre><code>&lt;application
      android:name=".MySpecificApp"
      android:allowBackup="true"
      android:fullBackupContent="true"
      android:icon="@mipmap/ic_launcher"
      android:label="@string/app_name"
      android:theme="@style/AppTheme"
      android:largeHeap="true"&gt;
  
      ...
  
      &lt;service
          android:name=".MyService"
          android:enabled="true"
          android:exported="false"
          android:stopWithTask="false"&gt;
      &lt;/service&gt;
  
      ...
  &lt;/application&gt;
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Does anyone have any idea of what happens and how I could fix the bug?</p>