I am customizing an NXP based Android 10 BSP on an iMX8 platform and I'm trying to make a custom swipe up bottom sheet that's global to the OS like the status/notifications bar on a swipe down gesture.
I've followed this thread here but customized the swipe up layout to have a list of applications available on the OS (basically a launcher within an app).
While this feature works great within my app, I actually want that slide up layout to be global so that I can launch applications no matter which card/application I'm currently on.
How would I go about doing this since this feature is limited to my main app? Would it be possible to add this to SystemUI?
Yes technically, you can do something like the existing NotificationBar that you can drag from the top of the screen. In your case you'd do from the bottom.
The logic for NotificationPanelView is in SystemUI package.
But beware, the existing logic there is a bit spaghetti code, so it could take a while to understand in order to add your own panel.
Another option for you would be to have your panel as an overlay view on top of everything ( drawn from a background service from your app ). See this answer for some initial guidance.
You'd show at first a transparent view, that receives all inputs. If you detect the gesture, you 'move up' the sheet from the bottom, otherwise you pass the input to apps below.
Note that this:
Would mean your service needs to be a foreground service, so its not killed.
If your app is killed from Settings, the BottomSheet will go away as well.
You cannot show this over the Settings app ( intentional Android limitation)
To recap:
The SystemUI solution would be better long term, less limitations... but more difficult to develop initially.
The App overlay solution is easy to implement, but has several limitations which can be a dealbreaker.
Related
I know that you can create floating ChatHeads as I've seen the tutorials and all, but I never hear of any consequences to using/abusing this feature. I know it's meant for system critical messages, but also that it CAN be used to allow floating applications.
What I mean by "consequences and complications" is the following...
1) If you draw on top of another app, is the app being drawn over still considered in the foreground, even if the user is interacting with the floating app? Would this be preferable to having a transparent "floating" activity? I'm mainly interested because I want to ensure that the other app isn't killed due to the overlay itself.
2) If the floating app/view is inefficient/buggy, could that impact the performance of the app being drawn over?
3) Can you add fragments to the view being drawn over? If so, when the background app is hidden (I.E Home button), what happens to the life-cycle of that view? Does it die when the app being drawn over dies?
4) I'm assuming there is an easy way to remove the floating view once added?
I want to be able to tap the statusbar and the contents in the displayed app to be scrolled up to the top.
Is it technically possible that an app intercept my tap and send the appropriate command to the active app? I have noticed for example that AntTek quick settings shows a drop-down window when swiping down from statusbar. While using the app I did also notice that even by just tapping the statusbar (before beginning to move the finger down), the app seems to already interact with the touch as it dims the screen brightness in preparation to display it's "window" (sorry I use the MS Windows term), so clearly a statusbar tap CAN be sensed by an app.
Starting from this, I wonder if such an app could then send a message to the active program telling it to scroll up.
Is that possible? And if yes, the message must be customized to a particular app (let's say the browser as the most important) or is it standardized so the apps speak the same language between themselves?
I am not a programmer so answers with codesamples might be less helpful than a plain english explanation. Finding out that is possible would lead rather to pursuing a programmer to implement the idea rather than starting to develop it myself.
Thanks :-)
There is an XPosed-module which seems to do exactly what you want.
To use XPosed-modules, you'll need to root your phone and install the XPosed-framework.
The XPosed-module is called "Statusbar Scroll to Top" and its repository can be found here:
http://repo.xposed.info/module/com.mohammadag.statusbarscrolltotop
This will work for almost all app-lists, but for example won't work for browser-content.
If you want to scroll to the top of the page in a browser, then you'll probably do best to get a browser which can do that on its own. (For example Habit Browser has it built-in and respective plugins are available for Firefox.)
Yes it is possible. HiroMacro and Frep can do this, but it requires root. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.prohiro.macro&hl=en
(how do they simulate mouse and keyboard interactions on other applications? i have no clue :/ anyone?)
Is it technically possible that an app intercept my tap and send the appropriate command to the active app?
No. One app cannot send fake input to another app, for security reasons.
An android app comprises of several activities. Each activity display a GUI that allows the user to perform a specific task. To take the user from one activity to another, app must use an Intent to define our app’s intent to do something.
An intent can be explicit in order to start a specific component (a specific Activity instance) or implicit in order to start any component that can handle the intended action.
Interacting one app to other app in android
google docs link
I'm coming from the iOS world and need to port an app with the typical tabbar/navigation pattern to Android. The UI design is the client's decision, so I can't change it (I'd still like to hear from you if you think it's appropriate or not for Android).
So the idea of the app is the following:
3 Tabs are always shown on the bottom of the screen. Inside each tab there can be a hierarchy of screens, with the title and up-button showing in the action bar on the top.
How do I implement this in Android? Am I correct in that the tabs need to be a fragment which need to be implemented in every single activity? How should the hardware back button behave? Say if I switch to a certain tab and then press the back button, should the tab change back or should it mirror the up-button's functionality?
As you can see I'm struggling with all these basic concepts and I'm very thankful for any tip that can help me to implement this navigation structure.
Edit:
Thanks to the competent answer of CommonsWare and looking deeper into it, I realise that I really should push the client to use an UI that's more suitable for the platform. (Also, I know I should use an Android device for some time to get used to the concepts, but I can't change that for now. So I'm sorry for these newbie questions).
The thing is, the app existed before as a web container app with an ugly jquery mobile UI with the above described UI elements. The idea is now to make the app navigation native with native animations, while keeping the content views in html/css/js inside webviews. So while it's possible to adapt each platform's UI principles, I cannot change the general structure of the app, which is: 3 different main entry points, and in each of them the content is navigated hierarchically. I've implemented that in iOS with a tabbar and navigation controllers which works great. The challenge is now to implement it in Android. To reassure that I'm on the right path and understood the points of CommonsWare correctly as well as to maybe receive more tips, I'm writing down what my thoughts on the steps involved:
As CommonsWare suggested, I could replace the tab idea with action buttons in the action bar, which will work well as there are only 3 of it. So it's appropriate to use action buttons for navigation? There will be an additional button for switching the language (Yes I know, usually I should pick the current language of the system, but in this particular app language switching is important and the user will switch it several times while using the app). To separate the navigation action buttons from the language switcher, which works on the current content and is a bit less important, I put the language switcher under the so-called "action overflow" (the 3 dots on the upper right corner).
Now there is an action bar button for each "tab", so far so good. But is there a way the user can tell on which "tab" he is? Or should I only show two action bar buttons at any given time, hiding the one he's currently "in"?
Each of these action bar buttons starts a new activity (with it's own action bar, right?). Inside such activity, the user can navigate hierarchically and back using the up button or back button. He can also use the hardware back button to go back to the last "tab"; would this be appropriate?
Every screen in the navigation hierarchy is a separate activity with a title and a webview.
In the end, to make the whole app compatible back with gingerbread, I would use the actionbarsherlock library, right?
3 Tabs are always shown on the bottom of the screen
That violates the Android design guidelines. On Android, tabs go at the top.
Inside each tab there can be a hierarchy of screens
Outside of a Web browser, I truly detest this navigation concept.
Am I correct in that the tabs need to be a fragment which need to be implemented in every single activity?
You do not appear to have more than one activity in your proposed design.
Say if I switch to a certain tab and then press the back button, should the tab change back or should it mirror the up-button's functionality?
And this is one of the reasons why I truly detest in-tab navigation. Tabs are for presentation of content, not as a navigable container in their own right.
should it mirror the up-button's functionality?
Since you do not appear to have more than one activity, it is unclear to me that you even have an up button.
How do I implement this in Android?
Ideally, you dump the tabs and use action bar items to switch between the different navigable areas, each of which would be its own activity. In that case, back (and to a lesser extent up) will flow more naturally.
If you had more than three tabs, you might go with the navigation drawer pattern, with the navigable areas each having an entry in the drawer. Three, though, would make the drawer look rather empty.
There is plenty more on app structure in the Android design guidelines that can help.
The UI design is the client's decision, so I can't change it
The objective of an app is to allow the users to accomplish their objective. Using design patterns native to a platform help in this regard, by allowing the users' existing experience to guide them in the use of the new app. This is not to say that true innovation beyond the guidelines is inappropriate, but it requires experience and deft hand.
Your client appears to be saying, "hey, this one firm came up with a design pattern for their platform, so therefore let's use it everywhere, as we want a consistent UI design". The problem is that nobody cares about consistency between platforms except them. Few people own mobile devices from multiple platforms, let alone use the same app on both, let alone expect the same UI design on both. Certainly, design touches (e.g., color scheme) could be similar, and the objectives of the app will be similar if not identical. But the delivery of that functionality should use design metaphors and patterns that are native to each platform, as the user is far more important than is your client.
(and if your client says "well, we are the users", because this is an internal-use-only enterprise app, kindly explain to them the concept of the passage of time, introduce them to the notion of employee turnover, and point out that they won't be the users all that long compared to the possible lifetime of the app)
Your client, if they ran a US-based car rental agency, would argue that their firm should rent left-hand-drive cars in the UK, for a consistent UI experience, despite all the accidents that will cause in a left-hand-traffic country.
Now, let's pretend for a moment that you need to write this app following their UI design anyway. Hostages are being held at gunpoint, somebody has a nuke on a hair trigger, the bad guy is demanding the app, the clock is ticking, you're Kiefer Sutherland, and so on.
(and if you really are Kiefer Sutherland, ummm... hi!)
You will wind up with a single activity for this core UI. Ancillary stuff (e.g., preferences, help) would be separate activities, but the three-tabs-to-rule-them-all UI would be in one activity.
The tabs themselves probably would use a FragmentTabHost, perhaps with modifications to better support tabs on the bottom. This is not a common choice, but it's the best fit. ViewPager and a tabbed indicator would be another possibility, if the client does not consider a horizontal swipe to change tabs to be "the devil's gesture" or something. Action bar tabs are at the top and are not always tabs, as they sometimes convert to drop-down navigation in certain screen size and orientation combinations.
Each tab would be a fragment and most likely would use nested fragments for the in-tab navigation between panes of content. Again, there are other possibilities (e.g., lots of hiding and showing of widgets within a single fragment to handle the navigation), but I think you'll go crazy trying to manage all of that.
With respect to the BACK button, without knowing the context of the tabs, my gut instinct would be to follow the tabbed browser metaphor of "BACK is local to a tab". I think that you'll need to manage this manually, unless it magically works because you are using nested fragments, and I don't think that's the case. When you are at the beginning (nested) fragment for a tab, and the user presses BACK, exit the activity.
I went through some posts, but most of them discuss placing a image or a string with information on it.
I however need to place button that manipulates some call features.
Is there a method to do that universally works throughout all android distributions?
(I thought to pop up custom screen with my button above usual screen. Is that good idea, or is there more straightforward way to achieve this?)
Thanks a lot
On stock devices there isn't going to be a legit way to put your own button "on" any portion of the Dialer application Activities (including incoming call screen). This kind of functionality would require the Dialer to explicitly provide an API for it. The stock system prevents applications in the background from placing their own clickable regions "on top of" whatever is currently in the foreground . (It's a good thing too, the bad reasons to do this far outweigh the legit ones.)
If you are wanting to do this you're going to have to look into building your own version of the OS that allows for it. OR potentially if you unlock your device enough to be able to install your own application that handles all of the functionality of the Dialer. Then you could provide an API for a third party application to do it(or just "bake in" your button to the Dialer) But I imagine that being able to get it all hooked up correctly to actually make your calls would be mighty difficult.
Desktop apps have top level menus (File, Edit, Search, ..., Help).
Web apps have very similar thing, menu tabs (Logo, Questions, Tags, Users, Badges, ...).
However I cannot find equivalent of top level menu in Android framework. Assume that my app has 5 main activities. According to menu design guidelines options menu should contain actions related to current activity. So how an app should allow users to easily switch to one of five main activities.
It seems that different apps solve the problem in different ways. Some have a tab list at the top of the screen, some at the bottom. Even Google applications aren't consisted in that field. Google Listen has an options menu item called 'Listen Home', however Listen main activity has no that options menu item. Others have two icons in app luncher which start two different activities from one app.
I realize that due to small phone screens Android apps have to be designed in a slightly different way than web or desktop apps. But I have a feeling that the app top level menu topic was omitted in Android framework. And developers are on their own here. Or am I missing something?
Update: this is Google blueprint for a great app
Update2: this an example app of these patterns
Update3: GreenDroid library helps a lot implementing these patters in your apps. It seems that dashboard and action bar patterns are becoming quite popular.
You should take a look at this Google I/O session: http://www.google.com/events/io/2010/sessions/android-ui-design-patterns.html
They talk about the design patterns they used for the Twitter application and basically the type of concept you are asking about. Basically, your activity should have a top bar that gives the user specific tasks to do in the view or allows them to switch into another activity.
Google has not implemented anything like this into the actual SDK yet so you're sort of on your own in terms of implementing it but the main concept is given in the presentation. This is the direction that Google would like to see Android shift into though.
Hopefully this helps you out somewhat.
The file/edit menus of desktop apps have a very different purpose than the questions/tags etc. tabs at the top of this webpage.
The contents of the file/edit menu should be implemented as in the options menu that appears when you press the menu button. This is, as you noted, to save space on the smaller screens.
App navigation like the questions/tags etc could be implemented using a Tab Layout. You are right that apps vary in whether or not the tabs are on the top or bottom, but I don't think thats a huge deal. In my unscientific look through apps on my phone, the bottom seems to be more common. However, I think it might depend on your specific implementation which you decide.
A lot of apps don't require any sort of navigation like that, and can get away with just having a path forward or back via the back button. I think this is preferable for a lot of applications, but won't work in all cases.
I'm not sure what more you would want built into the framework.. It seems like you can accomplish any kind of navigation desired with the above options.
You can look at the source of the Google IO app
ioshed