Develop Reference

Which is the best approach for dynamic drawing in Android?

I want to make a waveform drawing for an audio recorder in Android. The usual one with lines/bars, like this one:
More importantly, I want it live, while the song is being recorded. My app already computes the RMS through AudioRecord. But I am not sure which is the best approach for the actual drawing in terms of processing, resources, battery, etc.
The Visualizer does not show anything meaningful, IMO (are those graphs more or less random stuff??).
I've seen the canvas approach and the layout approach (there are probably more?). In the layout approach you add thin vertical layouts in a horizontal layout. The advantage is that you don't need to redraw the whole thing each 1/n secs, you just add one layout each 1/n secs... but you need hundreds of layouts (depending on n). In the canvas layout, you need to redraw the whole thing (right??) n times per second. Some even create bitmaps for each drawing...
So, which is cheaper, and why? Is there anything better nowadays? How much frequency update (i.e., n) is too much for generic low end devices?
EDIT1
Thanks to the beautiful trick #cactustictacs taught me in his answer, I was able to implement this with ease. Yet, the image is strangely rendered kind of "blurry by movement":
The waveform runs from right to left. You can easily see the blur movement, and the left-most and right-most pixels get "contaminated" by the other end. I guess I can just cut both extremes...
This renders better if I make my Bitmap bigger (i.e., making widthBitmap bigger), but then the onDraw will be heavier...
This is my full code:
package com.floritfoto.apps.ave;
import android.content.Context;
import android.graphics.Bitmap;
import android.graphics.Canvas;
import android.graphics.Paint;
import android.graphics.Rect;
import android.util.AttributeSet;
import java.util.Arrays;
public class Waveform extends androidx.appcompat.widget.AppCompatImageView {
//private float lastPosition = 0.5f; // 0.5 for drawLine method, 0 for the others
private int lastPosition = 0;
private final int widthBitmap = 50;
private final int heightBitmap = 80;
private final int[] transpixels = new int[heightBitmap];
private final int[] whitepixels = new int[heightBitmap];
//private float top, bot; // float for drawLine method, int for the others
private int aux, top;
//private float lpf;
private int width = widthBitmap;
private float proportionW = (float) (width/widthBitmap);
Boolean firstLoopIsFinished = false;
Bitmap MyBitmap = Bitmap.createBitmap(widthBitmap, heightBitmap, Bitmap.Config.ARGB_8888);
//Canvas canvasB = new Canvas(MyBitmap);
Paint MyPaint = new Paint();
Paint MyPaintTrans = new Paint();
Rect rectLbit, rectRbit, rectLdest, rectRdest;
public Waveform(Context context, AttributeSet attrs) {
super(context, attrs);
MyPaint.setColor(0xffFFFFFF);
MyPaint.setStrokeWidth(1);
MyPaintTrans.setColor(0xFF202020);
MyPaintTrans.setStrokeWidth(1);
Arrays.fill(transpixels, 0xFF202020);
Arrays.fill(whitepixels, 0xFFFFFFFF);
}
public void drawNewBar() {
// For drawRect or drawLine
/*
top = ((1.0f - Register.tone) * heightBitmap / 2.0f);
bot = ((1.0f + Register.tone) * heightBitmap / 2.0f);
// Using drawRect
//if (firstLoopIsFinished) canvasB.drawRect(lastPosition, 0, lastPosition+1, heightBitmap, MyPaintTrans); // Delete last stuff
//canvasB.drawRect(lastPosition, top, lastPosition+1, bot, MyPaint);
// Using drawLine
if (firstLoopIsFinished) canvasB.drawLine(lastPosition, 0, lastPosition, heightBitmap, MyPaintTrans); // Delete previous stuff
canvasB.drawLine(lastPosition ,top, lastPosition, bot, MyPaint);
*/
// Using setPixel (no tiene sentido, mucho mejor setPixels.
/*
int top = (int) ((1.0f - Register.tone) * heightBitmap / 2.0f);
int bot = (int) ((1.0f + Register.tone) * heightBitmap / 2.0f);
if (firstLoopIsFinished) {
for (int i = 0; i < top; ++i) {
MyBitmap.setPixel(lastPosition, i, 0xFF202020);
MyBitmap.setPixel(lastPosition, heightBitmap - i-1, 0xFF202020);
}
}
for (int i = top ; i < bot ; ++i) {
MyBitmap.setPixel(lastPosition,i,0xffFFFFFF);
}
//System.out.println("############## "+top+" "+bot);
*/
// Using setPixels. Works!!
top = (int) ((1.0f - Register.tone) * heightBitmap / 2.0f);
if (firstLoopIsFinished)
MyBitmap.setPixels(transpixels,0,1,lastPosition,0,1,heightBitmap);
MyBitmap.setPixels(whitepixels, top,1, lastPosition, top,1,heightBitmap-2*top);
lastPosition++;
aux = (int) (width - proportionW * (lastPosition));
rectLbit.right = lastPosition;
rectRbit.left = lastPosition;
rectLdest.right = aux;
rectRdest.left = aux;
if (lastPosition >= widthBitmap) { firstLoopIsFinished = true; lastPosition = 0; }
}
#Override
protected void onSizeChanged(int w, int h, int oldw, int oldh) {
super.onSizeChanged(w, h, oldw, oldh);
width = w;
proportionW = (float) width/widthBitmap;
rectLbit = new Rect(0, 0, widthBitmap, heightBitmap);
rectRbit = new Rect(0, 0, widthBitmap, heightBitmap);
rectLdest = new Rect(0, 0, width, h);
rectRdest = new Rect(0, 0, width, h);
}
#Override
protected void onDraw(Canvas canvas) {
super.onDraw(canvas);
drawNewBar();
canvas.drawBitmap(MyBitmap, rectLbit, rectRdest, MyPaint);
canvas.drawBitmap(MyBitmap, rectRbit, rectLdest, MyPaint);
}
}
EDIT2
I was able to prevent the blurring just using null as Paint in the canvas.drawBitmap:
canvas.drawBitmap(MyBitmap, rectLbit, rectRdest, null);
canvas.drawBitmap(MyBitmap, rectRbit, rectLdest, null);
No Paints needed.

Your basic custom view approach would be to implement onDraw and redraw your current data each frame. You'd probably keep some kind of circular Buffer holding your most recent n amplitude values, so each frame you'd iterate over those, and use drawRect to draw the bars (you'd calculate things like width, height scaling, start and end positions etc in onSizeChanged, and use those values when defining the coordinates for the Rects).
That in itself might be fine! The only way you can really tell how expensive draw calls are is to benchmark them, so you could try this approach out and see how it goes. Profile it to see how much time it takes, how much the CPU spikes etc.
There are a few things you can do to make onDraw as efficient as possible, mostly things like avoiding object allocations - so watch out for loop functions that create Iterators, and in the same way you're supposed to create a Paint once instead of creating them over and over in onDraw, you could reuse a single Rect object by setting its coordinates for each bar you need to draw.
Another approach you could try is creating a working Bitmap in your custom view, which you control, and calling drawBitmap inside onDraw to paint it onto the Canvas. That should be a pretty inexpensive call, and it can easily be stretched as required to fit the view.
The idea there, is that very time you get new data, you paint it onto the bitmap. Because of how your waveform looks (like blocks), and the fact you can scale it up, really all you need is a single vertical line of pixels for each value, right? So as the data comes in, you paint an extra line onto your already-existing bitmap, adding to the image. Instead of painting the entire waveform block by block every frame, you're just adding the new blocks.
The complication there is when you "fill" the bitmap - now you have to "shift" all the pixels to the left, dropping the oldest ones on the left side, so you can draw the new ones on the right. So you'll need a way to do that!
Another approach would be something similar to the circular buffer idea. If you don't know what that is, the idea is you take a normal buffer with a start and an end, but you treat one of the indices as your data's start point, wrap around to 0 when you hit the last index of the buffer, and stop when you hit the index you're calling your end point:
Partially filled buffer:
|start
123400
|end
Data: 1234
Full buffer:
|start
123456
|end
Data: 123456
After adding one more item:
|start
723456
|end
Data: 234567
See how once it's full, you shift the start and end one step "right", wrapping around if necessary? So you always have the most recent 6 values added. You just have to handle reading from the correct index ranges, from start -> lastIndex and then firstIndex -> end
You could do the same thing with a bitmap - start "filling" it from the left, increasing end so you can draw the next vertical line. Once it's full, start filling from the left by moving end there. When you actually draw the bitmap, instead of drawing the whole thing as-is (723456) you draw it in two parts (23456 then 7). Make sense? When you draw a bitmap to the canvas, there's a call that takes a source Rect and a destination one, so you can draw it in two chunks.
You could always redraw the bitmap from scratch each frame (clear it and draw the vertical lines), so you're basically redrawing your whole data buffer each time. Probably still faster than the drawRect approach for each value, but honestly not much easier than the "treat the bitmap as another circular buffer" method. If you're already managing one circular buffer, it's not much more work - since the buffer and the bitmap will have the same number of values (horizontal pixels in the bitmap's case) you can use the same start and end values for both

You would never do this with layouts. Layouts are for premade components. They're high level combinations of components and you don't want to dynamically add or remove views from it frequently. For this, you use a custom view with a canvas. Layouts aren't even an option for something like this.

Drawing a Heart with Sharp Corner in Android

The following question might sound a bit stupid but I guess stupidity has no limit so here it goes. I am drawing a Heart using Canvas in Android and have got no issues in drawing the heart but I am not able to make the heart sharp in the meeting point. My heart looks like
CODE :
left_x_moveto = 200;
left_y_moveto = 45;
left_x1 = 197;
left_y1 = -35;
left_x2 = 60;
left_y2 = 20;
left_x3 = 193;
left_y3 = 130;
right_x_moveto = 200;
right_y_moveto = 45;
right_x1 = 197;
right_y1 = -35;
right_x2 = 345;
right_y2 = 20;
right_x3 = 193;
right_y3 = 130;
heart_outline_paint.setColor(getResources().getColor(R.color.heart_outline_color)); // Change the boundary color
heart_outline_paint.setStrokeWidth(15);
heart_outline_paint.setStyle(Paint.Style.STROKE);
path.moveTo(left_x_moveto, left_y_moveto);
path.cubicTo(left_x1, left_y1, left_x2, left_y2, left_x3, left_y3);
path.moveTo(right_x_moveto, right_y_moveto);
path.cubicTo(right_x1, right_y1, right_x2, right_y2, right_x3, right_y3);
canvas.drawPath(path, heart_outline_paint);
What have I tried so far :
Reducing or increasing the points of left_x_moveto,left_y_moveto and vice versa but the heart is completely disfigured for which I am unable to find the reason.
When the right_x_moveto = 198 and right_y_moveto = 45, the heart looks like
I am not sure why this is happening.
Reducing the width of the heart_outline_paint would give me what I want but I want the thickness of the heart to be the same so reducing the setStrokeWidth is not an option.
In short, I want both the curves to MEET AND MERGE and not just MEET.
Any help will be much appreciated. Thanks in advance.

You need to perform a couple of this.
Close the path via path.close().
You need to set the stroke join via heart_outline_paint.setStrokeJoin(Paint.Join.MITER);
A path can be closed only if it's drawn continuously. Hence I have modified the code so that path.close() can be done properly. Below is the code.
protected void onDraw(Canvas canvas) {
super.onDraw(canvas);
heart_outline_paint = new Paint(Paint.ANTI_ALIAS_FLAG);
heart_outline_paint.setStrokeJoin(Paint.Join.MITER);
path = new Path();
int left_x_moveto = 200;
int left_y_moveto = 45;
int left_x1 = 180;
int left_y1 = -20;
int left_x2 = 30;
int left_y2 = 20;
int left_x3 = 193;
int left_y3 = 130;
int right_x_moveto = 200;
int right_y_moveto = 45;
int right_x1 = 214;
int right_y1 = -20;
int right_x2 = 375;
int right_y2 = 20;
int right_x3 = 193;
int right_y3 = 130;
heart_outline_paint.setColor(Color.RED); // Change the boundary color
heart_outline_paint.setStrokeWidth(15);
heart_outline_paint.setStyle(Paint.Style.STROKE);
path.moveTo(left_x_moveto, left_y_moveto);
path.cubicTo(left_x1, left_y1, left_x2, left_y2, left_x3, left_y3);
path.cubicTo(right_x2, right_y2, right_x1, right_y1, right_x_moveto, right_y_moveto);
path.close();
canvas.drawPath(path, heart_outline_paint);
}
Paint.Join.MITER is the one that does what you want.
The outer edges of a join meet at a sharp angle
Now this MITER join works only when the angle is <= 90 degree. But here, based on the values that you have provided, the angle is 90 degree and hence the MITER join doesn't work. I have modified the values to get the following image. The image is not exact, but you need to play around with the value the get the right one.
You could set the ROUND join method to get the following.
The problem is with Path.cubicTo(). It's very hard to get the MITTER join work without getting the heart shape squished. So instead of cubicTo, I tried with lineTo and arcTo to create a simple heart. The below is the code for that. You will notice that I have rotated the canvas to 45 degrees and then drew the heart shape. This is purely for convenience, so that the coordinates are simple and does not involve pythagoras theorem.
protected void onDraw(Canvas canvas) {
super.onDraw(canvas);
heart_outline_paint = new Paint(Paint.ANTI_ALIAS_FLAG);
heart_outline_paint.setStrokeJoin(Paint.Join.MITER);
heart_outline_paint.setColor(Color.RED); // Change the boundary color
heart_outline_paint.setStrokeWidth(15);
heart_outline_paint.setStyle(Paint.Style.STROKE);
path = new Path();
float length = 100;
float x = canvas.getWidth()/2;
float y = canvas.getHeight()/2;
canvas.rotate(45,x,y);
path.moveTo(x,y);
path.lineTo(x-length, y);
path.arcTo(new RectF(x-length-(length/2),y-length,x-(length/2),y),90,180);
path.arcTo(new RectF(x-length,y-length-(length/2),x,y-(length/2)),180,180);
path.lineTo(x,y);
path.close();
canvas.drawPath(path, heart_outline_paint);
}
The final rendered image of this code is below:

What's happening is that the thickness of the line is being drawn on one side, not on both. In true MS paint fashion:
(The left is what's happening, the right is what you want. Black is the actual position of the line would width be 1px, red is the "padding", the 2nd, 3rd through 15th pixel, heart_outline_paint.setStrokeWidth(15);)
To fix this, try to subtract half the width of the line from the x of right line, and add it to the x of the left line. Doing so will work around this problem, not fix it

Draw a segmented circle in Android: OpenGL vs Cavans?

I need to draw something like this:
I was hoping that this guy posted some code of how he drew his segmented circle to begin with, but alas he didn't.
I also need to know which segment is where after interaction with the wheel - for instance if the wheel is rotated, I need to know where the original segments are after the rotation action.
Two questions:
Do I draw this segmented circle (with varying colours and content placed on the segment) with OpenGL or using Android Canvas?
Using either of the options, how do I register which segment is where?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
EDIT:
Ok, so I've figured out how to draw the segmented circle using Canvas (I'll post the code as an answer). And I'm sure I'll figure out how to rotate the circle soon. But I'm still unsure how I'll recognize a separate segment of the drawn wheel after the rotation action.
Because, what I'm thinking of doing is drawing the segmented circle with these wedges, and the sort of handling the entire Canvas as an ImageView when I want to rotate it as if it's spinning. But when the spinning stops, how do I differentiate between the original segments drawn on the Canvas?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I've read about how to draw a segment on its own (here also), OpenGL, Canvas and even drawing shapes and layering them, but I've yet to see someone explaining how to recognize the separate segments.
Can drawBitmap() or createBitmap() perhaps be used?
If I go with OpenGL, I'll probably be able to rotate the segmented wheel using OpenGL's rotation, right?
I've also read that OpenGL might be too powerful for what I'd like to do, so should I rather consider "the graphic components of a game library built on top of OpenGL"?

This kind of answers my first question above - how to draw the segmented circle using Android Canvas:
Using the code found here, I do this in the onDraw function:
// Starting values
private int startAngle = 0;
private int numberOfSegments = 11;
private int sweepAngle = 360 / numberOfSegments;
#Override
protected void onDraw(Canvas canvas) {
setUpPaint();
setUpDrawingArea();
colours = getColours();
Log.d(TAG, "Draw the segmented circle");
for (int i = 0; i < numberOfSegments; i++) {
// pick a colour that is not the previous colour
paint.setColor(colours.get(pickRandomColour()));
// Draw arc
canvas.drawArc(rectF, startAngle, sweepAngle, true, paint);
// Set variable values
startAngle -= sweepAngle;
}
}
This is how I set up the drawing area based on the device's screen size:
private void setUpDrawingArea() {
Log.d(TAG, "Set up drawing area.");
// First get the screen dimensions
Point size = new Point();
Display display = DrawArcActivity.this.getWindowManager().getDefaultDisplay();
display.getSize(size);
int width = size.x;
int height = size.y;
Log.d(TAG, "Screen size = "+width+" x "+height);
// Set up the padding
int paddingLeft = (int) DrawArcActivity.this.getResources().getDimension(R.dimen.padding_large);
int paddingTop = (int) DrawArcActivity.this.getResources().getDimension(R.dimen.padding_large);
int paddingRight = (int) DrawArcActivity.this.getResources().getDimension(R.dimen.padding_large);
int paddingBottom = (int) DrawArcActivity.this.getResources().getDimension(R.dimen.padding_large);
// Then get the left, top, right and bottom Xs and Ys for the rectangle we're going to draw in
int left = 0 + paddingLeft;
int top = 0 + paddingTop;
int right = width - paddingRight;
int bottom = width - paddingBottom;
Log.d(TAG, "Rectangle placement -> left = "+left+", top = "+top+", right = "+right+", bottom = "+bottom);
rectF = new RectF(left, top, right, bottom);
}
That (and the other functions which are pretty straight forward, so I'm not going to paste the code here) draws this:
The segments are different colours with every run.

Painting text over background image is dim

I'm painting text over a background image on a canvas. I move the image interactively (like a Ouija board pointer). I've set the canvas to black, the pointer is red and I want to write white text over it so that the pointer has a player's name on it.
In Android 2.3.4 it appears as solid white text on top of the red pointer which is pretty clear, but I'd like to use any color. In Android 4.1.2 I can barely see the white text. Here's my code:
public Pointer(Context context) {
super(context);
paintBg = new Paint();
paintBg.setColor(Color.BLACK);
paintName = new Paint();
paintName.setColor(Color.WHITE);
paintName.setTextSize(50); // set text size
paintName.setStrokeWidth(5);
paintName.setTextAlign(Paint.Align.CENTER);
this.setImageResource(res); // pointer.png in res/drawable folder
Drawable d = getResources().getDrawable(res);
h = d.getIntrinsicHeight();
w = d.getIntrinsicWidth();
canvas = new Canvas();
canvas.drawPaint(paintBg);//make background black
// float imageScale = width / w; // how image size scales with screen
}
#Override
public void onDraw(Canvas canvas) {
y = this.getHeight() / 2; // center of screen
x = this.getWidth() / 2;
int left = Math.round(x - 0.8f * w);
int right = Math.round(x + 0.8f * w);
canvas.save();
canvas.rotate((direction + 180) % 360, x, y); // rotate to normal
canvas.drawText(s, x, y + 20, paintName); // draw name
canvas.restore();
canvas.rotate(direction, x, y); // rotate back
super.onDraw(canvas);
}
What changed in 4.1.2 that would affect this, or am I doning something incorrectly? Thanks for your help with this as it's driving me crazy.
Edit to include screen shots:
Android 2.3.4
Android 4.1.2
Note how the white text appears to be on top in 2.3.4 while it appears below or muddy in 4.1.2.
As free3dom pointes out it is related to alpha. I do change alpha because if I don't, the text does not appear on top of the arrow. It appears that the ImageView having the pointer image is always on top - could this be what's going on?
Here is how I handle setting alpha:
public static void setAlpha(View view, float alpha, int duration) {
if (Build.VERSION.SDK_INT < 11) {
final AlphaAnimation animation = new AlphaAnimation(alpha, alpha);
animation.setDuration(duration);
animation.setFillAfter(true);
view.startAnimation(animation);
} else //for 11 and above
view.setAlpha(alpha);
}
Maybe it has something to do with using this.setImageResource(res) to set the image resource? According to android developer guide, I can only set alpha to the single view and everything in the view is changed. Yet if I lower the alpha, the arrow image seems to become transparent enough to allow me to see the text.

You set a stroke width, but never indicate that stroke should be used for the Paint.
Try adding
paintName.setStyle( FILL_AND_STROKE );

Android: onDraw method using DrawPoint() causing jitter and distortion on canvas

I am developing an app which draws more or less a two-dimensional matrix of values to a canvas. The values of this matrix are scaled to Alpha levels to illustrate intensity, and the coordinates for the matrix are simply extrapolated from row and column indexes. Below is my onDraw routine.
public void onDraw(Canvas canvas, float [][] spectrum, float nsegs,int seglen) {
//canvas.translate(0,0);
//alpha = 0;
int canHeight = canvas.getHeight();
int canWidth = canvas.getWidth();
//float[] array = generateData(512);
float [] spec = new float[seglen];
final float bw = (float)(canWidth-2)/nsegs;
final float bh = (float)(canHeight-2)/(float) seglen;
for (int i = 0;i<seglen;i++){
spec[i] = spectrum[i][index]; // One column at a time
}
float max = maxVal(spec);
float min = minVal(spec);
xcoor = index;
for (int n = 0; n < seglen; n++){
//Scale value to alpha (0-255)
alpha =(int)Math.round((((spec[n] - min)/max)*255.0));
ycoor = n;
paint.setAlpha(alpha);
canvas.drawPoint(xcoor,ycoor, paint);
}
index = (int) (index +1);
if (index == nsegs-1){
index = 0;
}
}
Here paint configuration is pre-defined as:
Paint paint = new Paint();
paint.setStyle(Paint.Style.FILL);
paint.setColor(Color.WHITE);
paint.setStrokeWidth(2);
This program draws one pixel at a time, fills one column of pixels equal to the number of elements in a column of the matrix. Then it starts on the next column, where the previous column is still displayed and so forth. At this stage when all columns are full it stars from the first column again, drawing on top of previous elements.
The Problem: The tailing columns although already drawn appear to flicker and jump around, as does the Alpha. I have attempted to canvas.save() and canvas.restore() to capture the entire canvas and restore it after a column is printed. I have double checked all my row and column indexing and alpha vales to ensure the coordinates increment as per desired (and they do). This is very similar to the sample APIdemo DrawPoints.java, however there are three primary differences.
I am using DrawPoint not DrawPoints, and
I don't use "canvas.setColour" as it removes the tailing columns from the canvas.
This onDraw function is operating in a Thread which extends SurfaceView
Any idea's would be much appreciated, thank you for your time.

In the case above, I was using a SurfaceView instead of a View. Out of the Android dev docs
Note: On each pass you retrieve the Canvas from the SurfaceHolder, the previous state of the Canvas will be retained. In order to properly animate your graphics, you must re-paint the entire surface. For example, you can clear the previous state of the Canvas by filling in a color with drawColor() or setting a background image with drawBitmap(). Otherwise, you will see traces of the drawings you previously performed.
The Solution, re-draw the entire canvas each time to prevent the jitter.