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Android Application Development Cookbook

Android Application Development Cookbook

By : Boyer, Mew
4.5 (6)
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Android Application Development Cookbook

Android Application Development Cookbook

4.5 (6)
By: Boyer, Mew

Overview of this book

The Android OS has the largest installation base of any operating system in the world; there has never been a better time to learn Android development to write your own applications, or to make your own contributions to the open source community! This “cookbook” will make it easy for you to jump to a topic of interest and get what you need to implement the feature in your own application. If you are new to Android and learn best by “doing,” then this book will provide many topics of interest. Starting with the basics of Android development, we move on to more advanced concepts, and we’ll guide you through common tasks developers struggle to solve. The first few chapters cover the basics including Activities, Layouts, Widgets, and the Menu. From there, we cover fragments and data storage (including SQLite), device sensors, the camera, and GPS. Then we move on more advanced topics such as graphics and animation (including OpenGL), multi-threading with AsyncTask, and Internet functionality with Volley. We’ll also demonstrate Google Maps and Google Cloud Messaging (also known as Push Notifications) using the Google API Library. Finally, we’ll take a look at several online services designed especially for Android development. Take your application big-time with full Internet web services without having to become a server admin by leveraging the power of Backend as a Service (BaaS) providers.
Table of Contents (17 chapters)
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Preface
Preface
What this book covers
What you need for this book
Who this book is for
Sections
Conventions
Reader feedback
Customer support
Free Chapter
1
1. Activities
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1. Activities
Introduction
Declaring an activity
Starting a new activity with an intent object
Switching between activities
Passing data to another activity
Returning a result from an activity
Saving an activity's state
Storing persistent activity data
Understanding the activity lifecycle
2
2. Layouts
2. Layouts
Introduction
Defining and inflating a layout
Using RelativeLayout
Using LinearLayout
Creating tables – TableLayout and GridLayout
Using ListView, GridView, and Adapters
Changing layout properties during runtime
Optimizing layouts with the Hierarchy Viewer
3
3. Views, Widgets, and Styles
3. Views, Widgets, and Styles
Introduction
Inserting a widget into a layout
Using graphics to show button state
Creating a widget at runtime
Creating a custom component
Applying a style to a View
Turning a style into a theme
Selecting theme based on the Android version
4
4. Menus
4. Menus
Introduction
Creating an Options menu
Modifying menus and menu items during runtime
Enabling Contextual Action Mode for a view
Using Contextual Batch Mode with a ListView
Creating a pop-up menu
5
5. Exploring Fragments, AppWidgets, and the System UI
5. Exploring Fragments, AppWidgets, and the System UI
Introduction
Creating and using a Fragment
Adding and removing Fragments during runtime
Passing data between Fragments
Creating a shortcut on the Home screen
Creating a Home screen widget
Adding Search to the Action Bar
Showing your app full screen
6
6. Working with Data
6. Working with Data
Introduction
Storing simple data
Read and write a text file to internal storage
Read and write a text file to external storage
Including resource files in your project
Creating and using an SQLite database
Access data in the background using a Loader
7
7. Alerts and Notifications
7. Alerts and Notifications
Introduction
Lights, Action, and Sound – getting the user's attention!
Creating a Toast using a custom layout
Displaying a message box with AlertDialog
Displaying a progress dialog
Lights, Action, and Sound Redux using Notifications
Creating a Media Player Notification
Making a Flashlight with a Heads-Up Notification
8
8. Using the Touchscreen and Sensors
8. Using the Touchscreen and Sensors
Introduction
Listening for click and long-press events
Recognizing tap and other common gestures
Pinch-to-zoom with multi-touch gestures
Swipe-to-Refresh
Listing available sensors – an introduction to the Android Sensor Framework
Reading sensor data – using the Android Sensor Framework events
Reading device orientation
9
9. Graphics and Animation
9. Graphics and Animation
Introduction
Scaling down large images to avoid Out of Memory exceptions
A transition animation – defining scenes and applying a transition
Creating a Compass using sensor data and RotateAnimation
Creating a slideshow with ViewPager
Creating a Card Flip Animation with Fragments
Creating a Zoom Animation with a Custom Transition
10
10. A First Look at OpenGL ES
10. A First Look at OpenGL ES
Introduction
Set up the OpenGL ES environment
Drawing shapes on GLSurfaceView
Applying Projection and Camera View while drawing
Moving the triangle with rotation
Rotating the triangle with user input
11
11. Multimedia
11. Multimedia
Introduction
Playing sound effects with SoundPool
Playing audio with MediaPlayer
Responding to hardware media controls in your app
Taking a photo with the default camera app
Taking a picture using the (old) Camera API
Taking a picture using the Camera2 (the new) API
12
12. Telephony, Networks, and the Web
12. Telephony, Networks, and the Web
Introduction
How to make a phone call
Monitoring phone call events
How to send SMS (text) messages
Receiving SMS messages
Displaying a web page in your application
Checking online status and connection type
Getting started with Volley for Internet requests
Canceling a Volley request
Using Volley to request a JSON response
Using Volley to request an image
Using Volley's NetworkImageView and ImageLoader
13
13. Getting Location and Using Geofencing
13. Getting Location and Using Geofencing
Introduction
How to get the last location
Resolving problems reported with the GoogleApiClient OnConnectionFailedListener
How to receive location updates
Create and monitor a Geofence
14
14. Getting your app ready for the Play Store
14. Getting your app ready for the Play Store
Introduction
The new Android 6.0 Run-Time permission model
How to schedule an alarm
Receive notification of device boot
Using the AsyncTask for background work
Adding speech recognition to your app
Push Notification using GCM
How to add Google sign-in to your app
15
15. The Backend as a Service Options
15. The Backend as a Service Options
Introduction
App42
Backendless
Buddy
Firebase
Kinvey
16
Index
Index

Declaring an activity

Activities and other application components, such as services, are declared in the AndroidManifest XML file. Declaring an activity is how we tell the system about our activity and how it can be requested. For example, an application will usually indicate that at least one activity should be visible as a desktop icon and serve as the main entry point to the application.

Getting ready

Android Studio is the new tool used to develop Android applications, replacing the now-deprecated Eclipse ADT solution. Android Studio will be used for all the recipes shown in this book, so if you have not already installed it, visit the Android Studio website (the link has been provided earlier) to install the IDE and the SDK bundle.

How to do it...

For this first example, we'll guide you through creating a new project. Android Studio provides a Quick Start wizard, which makes the process extremely easy. Follow these steps to get started:

  1. Launch Android Studio, which brings up the Welcome to Android Studio dialog.
  2. Click on the Start a new Android Studio project option.
  3. Enter an application name; for this example, we have used DeclareAnActivity. Click on Next.
  4. On the Add an Activity to Mobile dialog, click on the Blank Activity button, and then click on Next.
  5. On the Target Android Devices dialog, chose Android 6.0 (API 23) as the minimum SDK (for this example, it really doesn't matter which API level you chose, as activities have existed since API level 1, but choosing the latest release is considered to be the best practice). Click on Next.
  6. Since we chose the Blank Activity option earlier, the Customize the Activity dialog is shown. You can leave the defaults as provided, but note the default activity name is MainActivity. Click on Finish.

After finishing the wizard, Android Studio will create the project files. For this recipe, the two files that we will examine are MainActivity.java (which corresponds to the activity name mentioned in Step 6) and AndroidManifest.xml.

If you take a look at the MainActivity.java file, you will realize that it's pretty basic. This is because we chose the Blank Activity option (in Step 4). Now look at the AndroidManifest.xml file. This is where we actually declare the activity. Within the <application> element is the <activity> element:

<activity
    android:name=".MainActivity"
    android:label="@string/app_name">
    <intent-filter>
        <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN"/>

        <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER"/>
    </intent-filter>
</activity>

Note

When viewing this xml within Android Studio, you may notice that the label element shows the actual text as defined in the strings.xml resource file. This is just a small example of enhancements in the new IDE.

How it works...

Declaring an activity is a simple matter of declaring the <activity> element and specifying the name of the activity class with the android:name attribute. By adding the <activity> element to the Android Manifest, we are specifying our intention to include this component within our application. Any activities (or any other component for that matter) that are not declared in the manifest will not be included in the application. Attempting to access or utilize an undeclared component will result in an exception being thrown at runtime.

In the preceding code, there is another attribute—android:label. This attribute indicates the title shown on the screen as well as the icon label if this is the Launcher activity.

Note

For a complete list of available application attributes, take a look at this resource:

http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/manifest/activity-element.html

End of Section 3
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