Get number of Home screens in Android? - java

I'm making a Live wallpaper for Android, and I want it scroll as user scroll the home screen. I can do that, but on some phones, user can choose the number of home screen. Is there anyway to get the number of home screen?
Thanks.

There is actually a way to know the number of home screens. The 'onOffsetsChanged' call provides to arguments for that porpouse: float xOffset and float xOffsetStep.
xOffset goes from 0 to 1 and xOffsetStep represents the step size for each home scree. So if you configure your home screen with 6 'desktops' xOffsetStep would be 0.2.
So the final way to check the number of screens must be done in that call (by default it sould be always 1) and then: (1/xOffsetStep) + 1.
Hope it helps!

There are many "home screen" apps, including, but not limited to, the ones that ship with every branded firmware. To that, you need to add all the market launchers, such as Go Launcher, Launcher Pro, etc. There is no standardised way to implement a launcher, so it will be quite difficult to find all the possible alternatives.
Most of the launchers do have a built-in option to scroll the wallpaper with every screen, although I can't tell you how well it works for live wallpapers.

Related

Looking for an easy way to capture images on an Android phone as a background service

I'm trying to create an application that automatically clicks pictures as you carry your phone around, the point is that it clicks pictures as you do your own business.
This question is basically what I'm looking for with the added functionality of taking pictures every n seconds. I wanted to know if there was something more efficient than this method (shrinking the preview window to 1x1).
background service is not recommended. You can use foreground service for this job.
You need to give media and camera access permission in the code. Then you can run the capture function with n second delay and while loop as many times as you want.
there are some examples, i don't want to repeat them.
capture, save and show example
take photo without ui

How to create a custom android button overlay?

So to expand on the question stated, to my best understanding android apps have a set of activities such as the default activity_main.xml and you could even generate a login screen (activity_login.xml). After fiddling around with it I sort of feel comfortable with the way buttons work, yadda yadda, but my problem emerges when I want to create a game activity. I am not concerned about that part, I would just make another activity (activity_gameplay.xml) that I would run the game on. My problem is that I want to render my own custom buttons onto the screen which would be transparent and would be stationary while the actual game environment would be moving. Such as in Minecraft(android version obviously).
So to conclude I need to know how to render custom buttons, and though not included in the above, how to position the buttons accordingly sense the XML way only allows stuff such as upper left-hand corner etc.

How to develop a walk through dialog that appears on the first launch?

I would like to develop a Dialog which is composed of 3 steps to guide the user when he launches the app for the first time.
The following image is an example of what I would like to achieve:
1- I would like to know how to add a mark to close the dialog at the top-right corner?
2- How can I implement the small circles at the bottom of the screen that indicates the current step? Can they be created programmatically?
3-Only to be sure, I decided to navigate between the Dialog steps using a ViewFlipper. Is this the right approach?
Thanks in advance.
I would like to know how to add a mark to close the dialog at the
upper right corner?
Don't do that. That looks like it was a straight port from an iphone app. Use the native android dialog containers/buttons.
How can I implement the small dots at the bottom of the screen that
indicates the current step?
What have you tried? There's a million ways of doing this depending on the rest of the workflow.
Only to be sure, I decided to navigate between the dialog steps using
a ViewFlipper. Is this the right approach?
Maybe. It depends what you're displaying. If you're only displaying a single image or something simple, then that might be the best approach. I would create different dialog fragments ( you are using fragments, right?) for the different steps. That way you can automatically push them to the back stack as you move through the workflow.
one of the ways to implement the "little dots on the bottom" is :
include the dots in every image you are creating.
draw one of the dots highlighted in every image
flip through the images in order of the highlighted dots. (or highlight the dots in the order you want to show your images)
but this would make your dots disappear during the images are flipped.
if you want to avoid that :
create two different image views , one acts as a container for the main image, the other as a container for the dots, place the 1st image view above the other.
create a no of images containing just a no of dots, each with one of the dots highlighted
flip through both the imageViews in synchronization
use a "flip animation" in the upper image view
use no animation, or a minimal animation for the dots.
This will produce the desired effect. Hope this helps :-)

Android - Honeycomb or ICS Go Completely Full Screen

Is there a way in ICS or Honeycomb to go completely full screen? I want the system UI completely gone! Currently what I do is:
requestWindowFeature(Window.FEATURE_NO_TITLE);
getWindow().setFlags(WindowManager.LayoutParams.FLAG_FULLSCREEN,
WindowManager.LayoutParams.FLAG_FULLSCREEN);
setContentView(R.layout.main);
getWindow().getDecorView().setSystemUiVisibility(View.STATUS_BAR_HIDDEN);
But this results in the Status Bar being replaced by really dim dots! I want it completely gone! Lets say for example I want to play a video or show a picture that takes up the whole screen. I'm okay with the status bar coming back on user interaction but I need it completely gone when there is no user interaction.
With the code above. I get the following look:
I want the dim dots gone as well and my video / image to be completely full screen.
This is not possible in Honeycomb, but has been added in API v14. Use:
getWindow().getDecorView().setSystemUiVisibility(View.SYSTEM_UI_FLAG_HIDE_NAVIGATION);
See the more detailed answers over here (though I would use a Build.Version.SDK_INT check instead of the suggested reflection-based check for support):
Hide ICS back home task switcher buttons
As the previous poster Suggested, that is completely impossible without rooting your device and performing some somewhat dirty process kill operations. The reason for is that new Hardware (like a tablet, for instance) may not have hardware buttons for navigation - and so by hiding those buttons the User would have no means of doing things that they are supposed to be guaranteed to be able to do, like going to the home screen, or accessing device info. Whether or not you might agree with that reasoning, such is the API.
The last information I have is that you can use the black tape to cover it. That's the suggestion given by Chet Haase. Watch this google IO 2011 session Q&A starting at 53minutes
You want SYSTEM_UI_FLAG_HIDE_NAVIGATION . Keep in mind that since the soft navigation buttons are key to device experience this only hides the buttons until there is some user interaction. If you want to permanently hide them then rooting the device (as others have suggested) is the only way to go.
The flag was added as of Ice Cream Sandwich, API 14. Previous to 14 a flag STATUS_BAR_HIDDEN was added in Honeycomb, API 11 that had a similar function. Previous to that the soft navigation buttons didn't exist, so fullscreen modes were handled entirely by Themes (specifically Theme.NoTitleBar.Fullscreen).
Use:
if( Build.VERSION.SDK_INT >= Build.VERSION_CODES.ICE_CREAM_SANDWICH )
mBaseLayout.setSystemUiVisibility( View.SYSTEM_UI_FLAG_HIDE_NAVIGATION );
else if( Build.VERSION.SDK_INT >= Build.VERSION_CODES.HONEYCOMB )
mBaseLayout.setSystemUiVisibility( View.STATUS_BAR_HIDDEN );

zoomable picture - android

How do I make a photo finger-zoomable on a android device? Is there a simple way, or is it complicated? But I dont want zoom buttons. I want it like a phonebrowser, when you take your fingers and drag them from each other on the phone, it will zoom in. How do I do?? I have searched everywhere. If there no way, can I just have two buttons, - and +. If I click one, the "imageview" change size?
How do I make a photo finger-zoomable on a android device? Is there a simple way, or is it complicated? But I dont want zoom buttons. I want it like a phonebrowser, when you take your fingers and drag them from each other on the phone, it will zoom in. How do I do?? I have searched everywhere. If there no way, can I just have two buttons, - and +. If I click one, the "imageview" change size?
Check out this tutorial: http://www.zdnet.com/blog/burnette/how-to-use-multi-touch-in-android-2-part-6-implementing-the-pinch-zoom-gesture/1847
The simplest way is to load your image on a WebView and let it do all the work
webView.loadUrl("file://...")

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