Best android questions in August 2010

Programming for Android as a blind person.

29 votes

I have a friend who is quite a capable programmer, especially considering that he is blind. Now he would like to start developing for Android. But, the problem I see him running into is that there appears to be no accessibility features for the Android emulator. Ideally he would be able to have his computer read the contents of the Android emulation screen to him. However, at least from what I've seen, the contents of the Android screen and the buttons that can be used to manipulate the emulation Android etc. are all invisible to a screen reader.

Does anyone know of a workaround for this?


UPDATE: I found what looks like a promising resource here. It's a Text-to-Speech library for Android developed by T. V. Raman of Google. I'm still looking for more information from the community though.

A long thread on this can be found at http://www.freelists.org/post/programmingblind/Is-Android-Programming-Accessible What I've gathered from it is that accessibility can be enabled with little to no sighted help. When I tried enabling talkback it made the emulator unusably slow although this was over a year ago so maybe things have gotten better? I'm a blind programmer and know Eclipse is accessible with Jaws so he should be able to program with either an IDE or command line and a text editor. I haven't researched this but if the emulator is slow maybe another option would be to run an x86 build of Android in VMWare player? A screen reader written by google employees can be found at http://google-opensource.blogspot.com/2009/10/talkback-open-source-screenreader-for.html and one written by someone else can be found at http://spielproject.info/

Silent installation on Android devices

16 votes

I've accepted for a while now that it's impossible to silently install an application on Android - that is, to have a program install an application bundled as an APK without providing the standard OS installation prompt and going through the app installer activity. But now I've picked up a copy of the Appbrain fast web installer, and it does exactly this.

How on earth is this possible? :D

I think the clue is pretty much in this statement I found here in the FAQ.

The fast web install worked for me yesterday, but it doesn't work anymore today. What's wrong?

The permission to install apps directly on your phone needs to be refreshed once every few days. Go back to the "Fast Web Install" app on your phone and click the button to give us the permission again. We are working on a future update that will optionally automatically refresh this setting.

I presume this is very similar to what Google does in the kill switch. I am assuming that the kill switch is an application on my device, just hidden from me. When Google wants to remove an application, it silently uninstalls it without asking for our permission. I am very sure this security hole is of their making. Now we just need to figure that out... =D

Android emulator reports unknown virtual device

14 votes

I installed all the prerequisites for Android development. I created a virtual device through Eclipse and tried to run the Hello World sample application in that device. I received the following error message.

emulator: ERROR: unknown virtual device name: 'Android21Device'
emulator: could not find virtual device named 'Android21Device'

I get the same error when I try to start the device from the command line and through the SDK program.

I can see the device directory and files at

D:\Users\anthony\.android\avd\Android21Device.avd

Android Virtual Device Tool

The Virtual Device tool in the SDK Manager creates virtual devices in your user profile directory... in this case a secondary drive

D:\Users\anthony\.android

But, the emulator tries to load virtual device images from the system drive

C:\Users\anthony\.android

Directory Junction

There are two workarounds. First, you can create a directory hard-link (or junction) from the system drive android folder to the one in your user profile. In Windows 7, you can use the following command

mklink /J C:\Users\anthony\.android D:\Users\anthony\.android

Android Home

The Android SDK Manager and emulator can use an environment variable ANDROID_SDK_HOME to identify the location of the .android directory. Set a user or environment variable

ANDROID_SDK_HOME = 'D:\Users\anthony'

Android: Detect another application has started playing audio

13 votes

My music application constantly plays music in the background, however I'd like to be able to detect when another application starts playing audio (such as the YouTube app) so I can pause/mute/stop the audio in my application.

This will allow a user to continue browsing the web whilst listening to music, but then if they wish to watch a video at any point, they can do so without audio conflict.

One solution might be to listen for a broadcast which states when an application begins using the AudioManager. Does such an Intent Action exist?


Edit: As in the answer provided below, there appears to be a method of detecting the loss of audio focus in 2.2 with AudioManager.OnAudioFocusChangeListener.

Great, but is there a solution for the more common versions of Android? Ideally 1.5+.

http://developer.android.com/reference/android/media/AudioManager.OnAudioFocusChangeListener.html

this thread also has additional information that might get you heading in the right direction.

http://groups.google.com/group/android-developers/browse_thread/thread/db6822d84feaac6/219d8cba07795c61?hl=en&lnk=gst&q=OnAudioFocusChangeListener#219d8cba07795c61

Testing for the masses with only one phone and emulator

12 votes

I have a new android app I put on the marketplace a few days ago. I did quite a bit of testing on my moto droid before publishing it and tried to be very thorough. Well, I got some negative comments back on how it didnt run right on someone's EVO 2.2 or X10 (didnt even know what that was at first). Well, it runs perfect on my phone.

Any advice on how I'm supposed to fix or support an app that runs on like 100 different phones?

How are other developers approaching this? (without actually buying every phone out there). Thanks.

I don't think there is a silver bullet for avoiding these kind of problems. A couple of guidelines/suggestions:

Preventing problems:

  • Use only publicly documented APIs. If you depend on implementation details, things are likely to fail on different phones.
  • Follow the guidelines for supporting multiple screens, and make sure to test each of the combinations of screen sizes and densities in the emulator.
  • If you are using lots of openGL, research which extensions are supported by which phones. This is where a largest number of the problems tend to be.
  • Recruit your friends to be beta testers. You can send them an apk to load before publishing on the market.

Diagnosing problems:

  • Starting with Android 2.2, you will be able to get error reports back from users, which should help in quickly diagnosing problems: Android Application Error Reports
  • You can also implement something like remote stack trace to get error messages back in the meantime.

What can be achieved in a native mobile application that can't be done in a HTML5 web app?

11 votes

I've talked to a lot of people recently who say they are expecting to stop writing native mobile apps and start writing web apps once HTML5 gets more fully baked in mobile OSs. I just finished my first HTML5 deep dive, and I'm not yet convinced.

Will HTML5 work as a replacement development platform for native apps, or are there certain things that require targeting the native runtime?

HTML 5 is not magic. it adds a lot of long awaited functionality to HTML and to traditional web applications, but still - many things are still out of it's scope. for example:

  • accessing your contact list
  • getting bluetooth data
  • making use of an OS specific function

for those (and other) functions - you would still need to write vendor specific applications.

Accessing the Android media stream for audio visualization.

11 votes

Basically, I want to make an audio visualizer. I know it's possible, because my phone came with a few live wallpapers that do it. The problem is, I can't seem to figure out how to do this with the Android API.

My app would pick up the currently playing media stream and then depending upon the volume that is playing at that time, it would display more or less bars on the screen.

How can I do this? It looks like I could do something like this using the microphone, but I want to be able to do it for music, podcasts, etc.

The MusicVisualization wallpaper source is available at the AOSP. It basically seems to involve calling MediaPlayer.snoop(), an undocumented method added in Eclair.

What should a developer know before building cellphone apps?

10 votes

I want to start making cellphone apps with Android as first choice but not the only one. I have 10 years of experience with Java, C#, C++ in commercial applications and I know that many things and practices for this applications are not valid for cellphones. Where do I start reading? How do I adapt my way of thinking to this new environment as quickly as posible? I plan to make some money with it sometime in the future as an extra income or a career change maybe, who know. Any resource or advice you could recommend will be very welcome. Thanks in advance.

Just start with Android Developer site http://developer.android.com/index.html. It contains all you need for the beginning. Also take a look onto Commonsware android books, those are really great both for beginners and experienced programmers - http://commonsware.com/books.html.

How to develop a soft keyboard for Android?

10 votes

I would like to play around with some ideas and develop a soft keyboard for Android to replace the default one.

  • Is there any general information about soft keyboard development for Android out there? Any best practices or guidelines?

  • Can I do with my keyboard application pretty much anything I could do with a normal Android application?

  • Can I do HTTP connections to synchronize keyboard data with a cloud DB and other phones I have?

  • Can I open other windows/screens from a key press, e.g. to display a custom input interface different to a normal QWERTY one. If that doesn't work, can I use a pop-up dialog instead?

Some tips:

About your questions:

An inputMethod is basically an Android Service, so yes, you can do HTTP and all the stuff you can do in a Service.

You can open Activities and dialogs from the InputMethod. Once again, it's just a Service.

I've been developing an IME, so ask again if you run into an issue.

Android OpenGL ES and 2D

10 votes

Well, here's my request. I don't know OpenGL already, and I'm not willing to learn it, I want to learn OpenGL ES directly since I'm targeting my development to android, however. I want to learn openGL ES in order to develop my 2D games, I choosed that for performances purpose (since basic SurfaceView drawing isn't that efficient when it comes to RT games). My question is: Where to start ? I've spent over a month browsing google and reading/trying some tutorials/examples I've found anywhere but to be honnest, it didn't help much and this is for two reasons: 1- Almost all the articles/tutorials I've came across are 3D related (I only want to learn how to do my 2D Sprites drawing) 2- There's no base to start from since all the articles targets a specific things like: "How to draw a triangle (with vertices)", "How to create a Mesh"... etc

I've tried to read some source code too (ex.: replica island) but the codes are too complicated and contains a lot of things that aren't necessary; result: I get lost among 100 .java files with weird class names and stuff (:P)

I guess there's no course like the one I'm looking for, but i'll be very glad if somebody could give me some guidelines and some links maybe to learn what I'm up to (Only OpenGL ES 2D Sprites rendering ! Nothing 3D)

Thank you very much for reading my posting, and I'm looking forward to hearing from you

Best regards

I was in a similar situation.
The way I started with openGL with start by looking at the very basic GLSurfaceView samples/demos.

Start, by setting up your app activity, and set up the basic canvas.

Take a loot at the replica island source code file: GameRenderer.java for how to setup your canvas with the proper GL flags for 2D (sprite) rendering. You should really take a look at SpriteMethodTest by the same author of replica island: http://code.google.com/p/apps-for-android/source/browse/trunk/SpriteMethodTest

See this question where I posted my own code: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3597323/using-opengl-to-replace-canvas-android/3607943#3607943

After you have your canvas set up, you start by calling something like: gl.glClear(GL10.GL_COLOR_BUFFER_BIT);

After that you're ready to render a sprite. First, you'll need to load the sprite into a texture: http://qdevarena.blogspot.com/2009/02/how-to-load-texture-in-android-opengl.html

However, this is the tutorial that really helped me out with loading sprites: http://tkcodesharing.blogspot.com/2008/05/working-with-textures-in-androids.html

This is how I do it, I have a class named Texture.java:

public class Texture
{
    /*Begin public declarations*/
    public float x = 0;
    public float y = 0;
    public float z = 0;
    public float width = 0;
    public float height = 0;
    /*Begin Private Declarations*/
    private GL10 gl;
    public int[] texture;    //holds the texture in integer form
    private int texture_name;
    private int[] mCropWorkspace;
    private final BitmapFactory.Options sBitmapOptions;


/*Begin Methods*/
public Texture( GL10 gl_obj )
{
    gl = gl_obj;
    texture = new int[1];
    mCropWorkspace = new int[4];
    sBitmapOptions = new BitmapFactory.Options();
    sBitmapOptions.inPreferredConfig = Bitmap.Config.RGB_565;
    //Log.d(TAG, "Initializing Texture Object");
}    
public int get_texture_name( )
{
    return texture_name;
}

/*Loads the resource to memory*/
public boolean Load( Bitmap bitmap ) //rename this to glLoad and don't have it as an initializer parameter
{
    /*many thanks to sprite method test if this works*/
    if ( gl == null )
    {
        Log.e(TAG, "Failed to load resource.  Context/GL is NULL");
        return false;
    }
    int error;

    int textureName = -1;
    gl.glGenTextures(1, texture, 0);
    textureName = texture[0];

    //Log.d(TAG, "Generated texture: " + textureName);
    gl.glBindTexture(GL10.GL_TEXTURE_2D, textureName);
    gl.glTexParameterf(GL10.GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL10.GL_TEXTURE_MIN_FILTER, GL10.GL_NEAREST);
    gl.glTexParameterf(GL10.GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL10.GL_TEXTURE_MAG_FILTER, GL10.GL_LINEAR);
    gl.glTexParameterf(GL10.GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL10.GL_TEXTURE_WRAP_S, GL10.GL_CLAMP_TO_EDGE);
    gl.glTexParameterf(GL10.GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL10.GL_TEXTURE_WRAP_T, GL10.GL_CLAMP_TO_EDGE);
    gl.glTexEnvf(GL10.GL_TEXTURE_ENV, GL10.GL_TEXTURE_ENV_MODE, GL10.GL_REPLACE);

    GLUtils.texImage2D(GL10.GL_TEXTURE_2D, 0, bitmap, 0);

    mCropWorkspace[0] = 0;
    mCropWorkspace[1] = bitmap.getHeight();
    mCropWorkspace[2] = bitmap.getWidth();
    mCropWorkspace[3] = -bitmap.getHeight();

    ((GL11) gl).glTexParameteriv(GL10.GL_TEXTURE_2D, 
            GL11Ext.GL_TEXTURE_CROP_RECT_OES, mCropWorkspace, 0);

    error = gl.glGetError();
    if (error != GL10.GL_NO_ERROR)
    { 
        Log.e(TAG, "GL Texture Load Error: " + error);

    }
    //Log.d(TAG, "Loaded texture: " + textureName);
    return true;
}

}

Then in my onDrawFrame() method I simply do:

Texture texture = ...
gl.glBindTexture(GL10.GL_TEXTURE_2D, texture.texture[0]);
((GL11Ext) gl).glDrawTexfOES((float)(draw_x + 0.5), (float)(draw_y + 0.5), 0, tile_width, tile_height);

That should get you going with drawing 2D sprites on an openGL canvas. I've noticed that there is really no straightforward tutorial on this. Hopefully in the future I will post one in my dev blog: http://developingthedream.blogspot.com/

Good luck.

Can't create handler inside thread that has not called Looper.prepare() inside AsyncTask for ProgressDialog

10 votes

I don't understand why I'm getting this error. I'm using AsyncTask to run some processes in the background.

I have:

protected void onPreExecute() 
{
    connectionProgressDialog = new ProgressDialog(SetPreference.this);
    connectionProgressDialog.setCancelable(true);
    connectionProgressDialog.setProgressStyle(ProgressDialog.STYLE_SPINNER);
    connectionProgressDialog.setMessage("Connecting to site...");
    connectionProgressDialog.show();

    downloadSpinnerProgressDialog = new ProgressDialog(SetPreference.this);
    downloadSpinnerProgressDialog.setProgressStyle(ProgressDialog.STYLE_SPINNER);
    downloadSpinnerProgressDialog.setMessage("Downloading wallpaper...");
}

When I get into doInBackground() depending on a condition I:

[...]    
connectionProgressDialog.dismiss();
downloadSpinnerProgressDialog.show();
[...]

Whenever I try downloadSpinnerProgressDialog.show() I receive the error.

Any ideas guys?

show() must be called from UI thread, while doInBackground() runs on different thread (that's main reason why AsyncTask was designed). You have to call show() either in onPogressUpdate() or at onPostExecute(). For example:

class ExampleTask extends AsyncTask<String, String, String>{

//Your onPreExecute method....

@Override
protected String doInBackground(String... params) {
     //...your code 
     if(condition_is_true){
        this.publishProgress("Show the dialog");
     } 
    }
    return "Result";
}

@Override
protected void onProgressUpdate(String... values) {
    super.onProgressUpdate(values);
    connectionProgressDialog.dismiss();
    downloadSpinnerProgressDialog.show();
}
}

Database Access in Android

9 votes

I am creating an android app that is basically a listing of information on Mushrooms. I get this information from an sqlite database. I have a global singleton with a services class inside it in which I use to access my db. Almost every activity accesses the db. Is it better to leave my db open all the time or open and close it as I need the data?

If the best practice is to leave it open all the time, where do I need to make sure to close it and what is the worst case scenario if I left it open when the activity was destroyed?

Based on my past experience in Java I would say it is better to close the connection, it probably doesn't matter in a small Android application, but if you have 10 applications running and all of them access the database, you have 10 pending connections. Start a few more and sooner or later another application will have to wait because the SQL server can't handle any more requests.

I guess you could think of it as a file on your computer. You read data from it, and then close it when your done. Why keep a file open in your application?

Now I'm very new to Android programming so I haven't got around to implement database calls. But when I faced the same problem in a Java application a few years ago I implemented a database object, in which I had the connection to the database. "Everyone else" (the classes) had to call the database object (singleton or final methods) to get data, sort of like stored procedures but in the application instead.

Because of this I knew when the calls where made and when they stopped. I then put in a timeout, so as if nothing happened in a few minutes, I would close the connection to the db. (This also took care of some timeout exceptions because the timeout of the connection would never happen.) When a new call entered, I could easily start a new connection and use the new db connection.

Basically I abstracted away SQL calls by having methods as public Fungus[] getAllFungus() and public Fungus[] getFilteredFungus(string where).

Developing an Android Homescreen

9 votes

I am working on an app that has a homescreen. This homescreen should behave like the android homescreen where you can switch between several views by flinging your finger over the touch screen.

The solution is easy. I have 3 view instances, right, left and current view. I get this instances from the viewflipper that I initialized earlier. Since I have a HTC G1 my sreen is 320 px in width and 480 px in height.

Imagine you capture the down value of a action down motion event when you touch the screen. Then you move your finger and the screen should move in exactly the same way so you have to recalculate the view's position. It works for me so far but I am facing a strange problem. When you touch the right view without moving you finger but keeping it on the screen for less then a second the view disappears and shows the left view.

Here is my code:

public class MainActivity extends Activity implements OnTouchListener{

    private ViewFlipper vf;
    private float downXValue;
    private View view1, view2, view3;

    @Override
    public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
        setContentView(R.layout.main);

        this.vf = (ViewFlipper) findViewById(R.id.flipper);

        if(this.vf != null){
             this.view1 = vf.getChildAt(0);
             this.view2 = vf.getChildAt(1);  
             this.view3 = vf.getChildAt(2);
             vf.setDisplayedChild(0);
         }      

         LinearLayout layMain = (LinearLayout) findViewById(R.id.layout_main);
         layMain.setOnTouchListener((OnTouchListener) this);
    }

    public boolean onTouch(View v, MotionEvent arg1) {

         final View currentView = vf.getCurrentView();
         final View leftView, rightView;

         if(currentView == view1){
             leftView = view3;
             rightView = view2;
         }else if(currentView == view2){
             leftView = view1;
             rightView = view3;
         }else if(currentView == view3){
             leftView = view2;
             rightView = view1;
         }else{
             leftView = null;
             rightView = null;
         }

         switch (arg1.getAction()){
            case MotionEvent.ACTION_DOWN:{
                this.downXValue = arg1.getX();
                break;
            }
            case MotionEvent.ACTION_UP:{
                float currentX = arg1.getX();            
                    if ((downXValue < currentX)){
                        if(currentView != view3){
                        float t3 = (320-(currentX-downXValue))/320;                             
                        this.vf.setInAnimation(AnimationHelper.inFromLeftAnimation(t3));
                        this.vf.setOutAnimation(AnimationHelper.outToRightAnimation(t3));
                        this.vf.showPrevious(); } 
                      }

                    if ((downXValue > currentX)){
                        if(currentView != view2){
                        float t = (320-(downXValue-currentX))/320;
                        this.vf.setInAnimation(AnimationHelper.inFromRightAnimation(t));
                        this.vf.setOutAnimation(AnimationHelper.outToLeftAnimation(t));
                        this.vf.showNext();}    
                    }                         
            }
            break;
            case MotionEvent.ACTION_MOVE:{

                leftView.setVisibility(View.VISIBLE);
                rightView.setVisibility(View.VISIBLE);

                float currentX = arg1.getX();     
                if(downXValue > currentX){  
                    if(currentView != view2){
                        currentView.layout((int) (currentX - downXValue),
                        currentView.getTop(),
                        (int) (currentX - downXValue) + 320,
                        currentView.getBottom()); 
                    }
                }

                if(downXValue < currentX){  
                    if(currentView != view3){
                        currentView.layout((int) (currentX - downXValue),
                        currentView.getTop(),
                        (int) (currentX - downXValue) + 320,
                        currentView.getBottom());


                    }
                }
                leftView.layout(currentView.getLeft()-320, leftView.getTop(),
                       currentView.getLeft(), leftView.getBottom());   

                rightView.layout(currentView.getRight(), rightView.getTop(), 
                        currentView.getRight() + 320, rightView.getBottom());
                }
            }

        return true;
    }

    public static class AnimationHelper {
          public static Animation inFromRightAnimation(float param) {
            Animation inFromRight = new TranslateAnimation(
            Animation.RELATIVE_TO_PARENT, +param,
            Animation.RELATIVE_TO_PARENT, 0.0f,
            Animation.RELATIVE_TO_PARENT, 0.0f,
            Animation.RELATIVE_TO_PARENT, 0.0f);
            inFromRight.setDuration(250);
            inFromRight.setInterpolator(new AccelerateInterpolator());
            return inFromRight;
          }

          public static Animation outToLeftAnimation(float param) {
            Animation outtoLeft = new TranslateAnimation(
            Animation.RELATIVE_TO_PARENT, 0.0f,
            Animation.RELATIVE_TO_PARENT, -param,
            Animation.RELATIVE_TO_PARENT, 0.0f,
            Animation.RELATIVE_TO_PARENT, 0.0f);
            outtoLeft.setDuration(250);
            outtoLeft.setInterpolator(new AccelerateInterpolator());
            return outtoLeft;
          }

          // for the next movement
          public static Animation inFromLeftAnimation(float param) {
            Animation inFromLeft = new TranslateAnimation(
            Animation.RELATIVE_TO_PARENT, -param,
            Animation.RELATIVE_TO_PARENT, 0.0f,
            Animation.RELATIVE_TO_PARENT, 0.0f,
            Animation.RELATIVE_TO_PARENT, 0.0f);
            inFromLeft.setDuration(250);
            inFromLeft.setInterpolator(new AccelerateInterpolator());
            return inFromLeft;
          }

          public static Animation outToRightAnimation(float param) {
            Animation outtoRight = new TranslateAnimation(
            Animation.RELATIVE_TO_PARENT, 0.0f,
            Animation.RELATIVE_TO_PARENT, +param,
            Animation.RELATIVE_TO_PARENT, 0.0f,
            Animation.RELATIVE_TO_PARENT, 0.0f);
            outtoRight.setDuration(250);
            outtoRight.setInterpolator(new AccelerateInterpolator());
            return outtoRight;
          }
        }

}

I think such a Homescreen is an interesting UI element.

Any ideas?

Update: Thanks for all answers! You can download the working example at the bottom of this blog post: Android Homescreen - DragableSpace currently down for maintance

I think you can find what you are looking for here : http://www.anddev.org/why_do_not_these_codes_work-t4012.html

I used that in a different project to also create a home screen with different views. This is straight from the Android Launcher, it works quite well after following that thread.

Here is my code... first the source code

package com.matthieu.launcher;

import android.content.Context;
import android.util.Log;
import android.content.res.TypedArray;
import android.util.AttributeSet;
import android.view.MotionEvent;
import android.view.VelocityTracker;
import android.view.View;
import android.view.ViewGroup;
import android.view.ViewConfiguration;
import android.widget.Scroller;

public class DragableSpace extends ViewGroup {
    private Scroller mScroller;
    private VelocityTracker mVelocityTracker;

    private int mScrollX = 0;
    private int mCurrentScreen = 0;

    private float mLastMotionX;

    private static final String LOG_TAG = "DragableSpace";

    private static final int SNAP_VELOCITY = 1000;

    private final static int TOUCH_STATE_REST = 0;
    private final static int TOUCH_STATE_SCROLLING = 1;

    private int mTouchState = TOUCH_STATE_REST;

    private int mTouchSlop = 0;

    public DragableSpace(Context context) {
        super(context);
        mScroller = new Scroller(context);

        mTouchSlop = ViewConfiguration.get(getContext()).getScaledTouchSlop();

        this.setLayoutParams(new ViewGroup.LayoutParams(
                    ViewGroup.LayoutParams.WRAP_CONTENT,
                    ViewGroup.LayoutParams.FILL_PARENT));
    }

    public DragableSpace(Context context, AttributeSet attrs) {
        super(context, attrs);
        mScroller = new Scroller(context);

        mTouchSlop = ViewConfiguration.get(getContext()).getScaledTouchSlop();

        this.setLayoutParams(new ViewGroup.LayoutParams(
                    ViewGroup.LayoutParams.WRAP_CONTENT ,
                    ViewGroup.LayoutParams.FILL_PARENT));

        TypedArray a=getContext().obtainStyledAttributes(attrs,R.styleable.DragableSpace);
        mCurrentScreen = a.getInteger(R.styleable.DragableSpace_default_screen, 0);
    }

    @Override
    public boolean onInterceptTouchEvent(MotionEvent ev) {
        /*
         * This method JUST determines whether we want to intercept the motion.
         * If we return true, onTouchEvent will be called and we do the actual
         * scrolling there.
         */

        /*
         * Shortcut the most recurring case: the user is in the dragging state
         * and he is moving his finger. We want to intercept this motion.
         */
        final int action = ev.getAction();
        if ((action == MotionEvent.ACTION_MOVE)
                && (mTouchState != TOUCH_STATE_REST)) {
            return true;
                }

        final float x = ev.getX();

        switch (action) {
            case MotionEvent.ACTION_MOVE:
                /*
                 * mIsBeingDragged == false, otherwise the shortcut would have caught it. Check
                 * whether the user has moved far enough from his original down touch.
                 */

                /*
                 * Locally do absolute value. mLastMotionX is set to the y value
                 * of the down event.
                 */
                final int xDiff = (int) Math.abs(x - mLastMotionX);

                boolean xMoved = xDiff > mTouchSlop;

                if (xMoved) {
                    // Scroll if the user moved far enough along the X axis
                    mTouchState = TOUCH_STATE_SCROLLING;
                }
                break;

            case MotionEvent.ACTION_DOWN:
                // Remember location of down touch
                mLastMotionX = x;

                /*
                 * If being flinged and user touches the screen, initiate drag;
                 * otherwise don't.  mScroller.isFinished should be false when
                 * being flinged.
                 */
                mTouchState = mScroller.isFinished() ? TOUCH_STATE_REST : TOUCH_STATE_SCROLLING;
                break;

            case MotionEvent.ACTION_CANCEL:
            case MotionEvent.ACTION_UP:
                // Release the drag
                mTouchState = TOUCH_STATE_REST;
                break;
        }

        /*
         * The only time we want to intercept motion events is if we are in the
         * drag mode.
         */
        return mTouchState != TOUCH_STATE_REST;
    }

    @Override
    public boolean onTouchEvent(MotionEvent event) {

        if (mVelocityTracker == null) {
            mVelocityTracker = VelocityTracker.obtain();
        }
        mVelocityTracker.addMovement(event);

        final int action = event.getAction();
        final float x = event.getX();

        switch (action) {
            case MotionEvent.ACTION_DOWN:
                Log.i(LOG_TAG, "event : down");
                /*
                 * If being flinged and user touches, stop the fling. isFinished
                 * will be false if being flinged.
                 */
                if (!mScroller.isFinished()) {
                    mScroller.abortAnimation();
                }

                // Remember where the motion event started
                mLastMotionX = x;
                break;
            case MotionEvent.ACTION_MOVE:
                // Log.i(LOG_TAG,"event : move");
                // if (mTouchState == TOUCH_STATE_SCROLLING) {
                // Scroll to follow the motion event
                final int deltaX = (int) (mLastMotionX - x);
                mLastMotionX = x;

                //Log.i(LOG_TAG, "event : move, deltaX " + deltaX + ", mScrollX " + mScrollX);

                if (deltaX < 0) {
                    if (mScrollX > 0) {
                        scrollBy(Math.max(-mScrollX, deltaX), 0);
                    }
                } else if (deltaX > 0) {
                    final int availableToScroll = getChildAt(getChildCount() - 1)
                        .getRight()
                        - mScrollX - getWidth();
                    if (availableToScroll > 0) {
                        scrollBy(Math.min(availableToScroll, deltaX), 0);
                    }
                }
                // }
                break;
            case MotionEvent.ACTION_UP:
                Log.i(LOG_TAG, "event : up");
                // if (mTouchState == TOUCH_STATE_SCROLLING) {
                final VelocityTracker velocityTracker = mVelocityTracker;
                velocityTracker.computeCurrentVelocity(1000);
                int velocityX = (int) velocityTracker.getXVelocity();

                if (velocityX > SNAP_VELOCITY && mCurrentScreen > 0) {
                    // Fling hard enough to move left
                    snapToScreen(mCurrentScreen - 1);
                } else if (velocityX < -SNAP_VELOCITY
                        && mCurrentScreen < getChildCount() - 1) {
                    // Fling hard enough to move right
                    snapToScreen(mCurrentScreen + 1);
                } else {
                    snapToDestination();
                }

                if (mVelocityTracker != null) {
                    mVelocityTracker.recycle();
                    mVelocityTracker = null;
                }
                // }
                mTouchState = TOUCH_STATE_REST;
                break;
            case MotionEvent.ACTION_CANCEL:
                Log.i(LOG_TAG, "event : cancel");
                mTouchState = TOUCH_STATE_REST;
        }
        mScrollX = this.getScrollX();

        return true;
    }

    private void snapToDestination() {
        final int screenWidth = getWidth();
        final int whichScreen = (mScrollX + (screenWidth / 2)) / screenWidth;
        Log.i(LOG_TAG, "from des");
        snapToScreen(whichScreen);
    }

    public void snapToScreen(int whichScreen) {         
        Log.i(LOG_TAG, "snap To Screen " + whichScreen);
        mCurrentScreen = whichScreen;
        final int newX = whichScreen * getWidth();
        final int delta = newX - mScrollX;
        mScroller.startScroll(mScrollX, 0, delta, 0, Math.abs(delta) * 2);             
        invalidate();
    }

    public void setToScreen(int whichScreen) {
        Log.i(LOG_TAG, "set To Screen " + whichScreen);
        mCurrentScreen = whichScreen;
        final int newX = whichScreen * getWidth();
        mScroller.startScroll(newX, 0, 0, 0, 10);             
        invalidate();
    }

    @Override
    protected void onLayout(boolean changed, int l, int t, int r, int b) {
        int childLeft = 0;

        final int count = getChildCount();
        for (int i = 0; i < count; i++) {
            final View child = getChildAt(i);
            if (child.getVisibility() != View.GONE) {
                final int childWidth = child.getMeasuredWidth();
                child.layout(childLeft, 0, childLeft + childWidth, child
                        .getMeasuredHeight());
                childLeft += childWidth;
            }
        }

    }

    @Override
    protected void onMeasure(int widthMeasureSpec, int heightMeasureSpec) {
        super.onMeasure(widthMeasureSpec, heightMeasureSpec);

        final int width = MeasureSpec.getSize(widthMeasureSpec);
        final int widthMode = MeasureSpec.getMode(widthMeasureSpec);
        if (widthMode != MeasureSpec.EXACTLY) {
            throw new IllegalStateException("error mode.");
        }

        final int heightMode = MeasureSpec.getMode(heightMeasureSpec);
        if (heightMode != MeasureSpec.EXACTLY) {
            throw new IllegalStateException("error mode.");
        }

        // The children are given the same width and height as the workspace
        final int count = getChildCount();
        for (int i = 0; i < count; i++) {
            getChildAt(i).measure(widthMeasureSpec, heightMeasureSpec);
        }
        Log.i(LOG_TAG, "moving to screen "+mCurrentScreen);
        scrollTo(mCurrentScreen * width, 0);      
    }  

    @Override
    public void computeScroll() {
        if (mScroller.computeScrollOffset()) {
            mScrollX = mScroller.getCurrX();
            scrollTo(mScrollX, 0);
            postInvalidate();
        }
    }
}

And the layout file :

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<com.matthieu.launcher.DragableSpace xmlns:app="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/com.matthieu.launcher"
    xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
android:id="@+id/space"
android:layout_width="fill_parent"
android:layout_height="fill_parent"
app:default_screen="1"
>
<include android:id="@+id/left"  layout="@layout/left_screen" />
<include android:id="@+id/center"  layout="@layout/initial_screen" />
<include android:id="@+id/right"  layout="@layout/right_screen" />
</com.matthieu.launcher.DragableSpace>

To be able to have the extra attribute in the xml file, you want to save this in res/values/attrs.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<resources>
    <declare-styleable name="DragableSpace">
        <attr name="default_screen" format="integer"/>
    </declare-styleable>
</resources>

Android - gravity and layout_gravity

9 votes

I know we can set the following value to the anroid:gravity and android:layout_gravity :

  1. center
  2. center_vertical
  3. center_horizontal , etc.

But i am confused regarding these both.

what is the difference between the usage of android:gravity and android:layout_gravity?

Their name should help you :
android:gravity sets the gravity of the content of the View its used on.
android:layout_gravity sets the gravity of the View or Layout in its parent.
And an example : http://thinkandroid.wordpress.com/2010/01/14/how-to-position-views-properly-in-layouts/

Android: how can i tell if the soft keyboard is showing or not?

9 votes

Heres the dilemma: I am showing a screen with 3 input fields and 2 buttons inside of a tab(there are 3 tabs total, and they are on the bottom of the screen). the 2 buttons are set to the bottom left and right of the screen, right above the tabs. when i click on an input field, the tabs and buttons are all pushed up on top of the keyboard.

i desire to only push the buttons up, and leave the tabs where they originally are, on the bottom. i am thinking of setting the visibility of the tabs to GONE once i determine that the soft keyboard is showing, and visibility to VISIBLE once the soft keyboard is gone.

is there some kind of listener for the soft keyboard, or maybe the input field? maybe some tricky use of OnFocusChangeListener for the edit text? How can i determine whether the keyboard is visible or not?

Determining if the keyboard is showing is not possible apparently.

You might want to disable it alltogether with the windowSoftInputMode xml tag in your manifest: http://developer.android.com/reference/android/R.attr.html#windowSoftInputMode. Or you can have a look on how to remove focus to hide the keyboard: Hide soft keyboard on activity without any keyboard operations.

Neither will exactly solve your problem. I remember reading a blogpost strongly advising not to use tabs at the bottom, rather than the top of the screen, for UI clarity reasons. I recommend you to follow up on that.