Develop Reference

SearchView in one activity, results in another one

My use case is the following: in activity A, I have an action bar with a collapsible SearchView. When the user gives her query and presses the 'search' button, I would like to show activity B with the results. I'm failing to do so, here is my code:
searchable.xml:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<searchable xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
android:hint="#string/action_search_hint"
android:label="#string/app_name"/>
Activity A:
#Override
public boolean onCreateOptionsMenu(Menu menu) {
getMenuInflater().inflate(R.menu.menu, menu);
SearchManager searchManager = (SearchManager) getSystemService(Context.SEARCH_SERVICE);
SearchView searchView = (SearchView) menu.findItem(R.id.action_search).getActionView();
searchView.setSearchableInfo(searchManager.getSearchableInfo(getComponentName()));
return true;
}
AndroidManifest for Activity A and B:
<activity
android:name=".ActivityA">
<intent-filter>
<action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN"/>
<category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER"/>
</intent-filter>
</activity>
<activity android:name=".ActivityB">
<intent-filter>
<action android:name="android.intent.action.SEARCH"/>
</intent-filter>
<meta-data
android:name="android.app.searchable"
android:resource="#xml/searchable"/>
</activity>
Howerver, no matter what I try, getSearchableInfo in A always returns null.
I have the feeling I'm not understanding something. The only way I can make getSearchableInfo() return not null is when I put the SEARCH intent filter and the searchable meta-data into activity A in the manifest. But then, when I press the 'search' button, another instance of activity A is started again on top of the current one, which definitely is not what I want. I guess I could add singleTop to A and handle the SEARCH action in onNewIntent and start B, but I generally don't want A to be singleTop, I want the default. Or do I?
I tried adding this to A in the manifest (as suggested in some other threads):
<meta-data
android:name="android.app.default_searchable"
android:value=".ActivityB" >
</meta-data>
What am I doing wrong?
EDIT: I replaced the 'getComponentName()' line in A with the following:
searchView.setSearchableInfo(searchManager.getSearchableInfo(new ComponentName(this, ActivityB.class)));
and it seems to work the way I want! Am I doing something wrong here, or is this the correct way? I'm a bit uncertain because it is not mentioned anywhere!

According to Android documentations, SearchManager.getSearchableInfo(componentName) takes one argument, which is:
componentName: The activity to get searchable information for
In your case you need ActivityB, so constructing a ComponentName that points to ActivityB is the correct way
new ComponentName(this, ActivityB.class)

<intent-filter>
<action android:name="android.intent.action.SEARCH"/>
</intent-filter>
add this intent filter to activity A.
2.SearchView Menu
SearchManager searchManager = (SearchManager) getSystemService(Context.SEARCH_SERVICE);
searchView = (SearchView) menu.findItem(R.id.search).getActionView();
searchView.setSearchableInfo(searchManager
.getSearchableInfo(getComponentName()));
xml:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<menu xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android" >
<item
android:id="#+id/search"
android:actionViewClass="android.widget.SearchView"
android:icon="#drawable/ic_action_search"
android:showAsAction="collapseActionView|always"
android:title="#string/search_hint"/>
</menu>
3.Call this method from oncreate.
private void handleIntent(Intent intent) {
if (Intent.ACTION_SEARCH.equals(intent.getAction())) {
String query = intent.getStringExtra(SearchManager.QUERY);
Debug.e("Suggestion handle click", "call " + query);
startNextActivity(query);
}
}
4. if you are using Autosuggestion Listview implement searchView.setOnQueryTextListener ,setOnSuggestionListener and setSuggestionsAdapter.

searchSuggestThreshold attribute doesn't work : ContentProvider triggered on every typed character

I have a search widget within the action bar of my main activity. I would like to display suggestions after the user type at least 2 characters.
I'm aware this can be done by setting android:searchSuggestThreshold="2", but it doesn't seem to work because the SuggestionContentProvider is called when the user types zero or many characters.
Even when the user clicks on the search icon (0 characters) to expand the widget, the ContentProvider is called.
Here is my searchable.xml:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<searchable xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
android:label="#string/app_name"
android:hint="#string/search_hint"
android:searchSettingsDescription="#string/search_settings"
android:searchSuggestAuthority="com.studiofrenetic.rmfb.Services.SearchContentProvider"
android:searchSuggestIntentAction="android.intent.action.VIEW"
android:searchSuggestThreshold="2">
</searchable>
Only one searchable activity in my Manifest.xml:
<activity
android:name="com.studiofrenetic.rmfb.MainActivity"
android:screenOrientation="portrait"
android:label="#string/app_name" >
<intent-filter>
<action android:name="android.intent.action.SEARCH" />
</intent-filter>
<meta-data android:name="android.app.searchable"
android:resource="#xml/searchable" />
</activity>
Code to set SearchableInfo in onCreateOptionsMenu:
MenuItem searchItem = menu.findItem(R.id.action_search);
mSearchView = (SearchView) MenuItemCompat.getActionView(searchItem);
mSearchView.setOnQueryTextListener(this);
// Assumes current activity is the searchable activity
SearchManager searchManager = (SearchManager)getSystemService(Context.SEARCH_SERVICE);
mSearchView.setSearchableInfo(searchManager.getSearchableInfo(getComponentName()));
mSearchView.setIconifiedByDefault(true);
I use ActionBarCompat (with minSdkVersion 14 and targetSdkVersion 19).
I search across the web and nobody seems to have this strange behavior... Please help me to understand the problem.
Thanks in advance :)

Finally I had a misunderstanding concerning the behavior related to searchSuggestThreshold:
It's normal that SuggestionContentProvider is called on every typed character, but the uri parameter doesn't contain the query until the threshold is reached.
So, the code related to suggestions generation should be skipped.

Search in android activity

I am new in android and I am working with a search related feature. After read the tutorial I have some questions:
1 Does the SearchableActivity unique in an application?
It seems that 3 steps are required to setup the search feature(from the android developer guide):
1)create the SearchableActivity to receive the search keyword.
2)make the SearchableActivity to accept the ACTION_SEARCH intent
3)specify the searchable configuration to use, in a element.
Then I wonder if all the search related job will be delegated to the SearchableActivity?
And suppose I have two MainActivity and MainActivityTwo, both of them make a SearchView inside the action bar.
The AndroidMinefset.xml:
<activity android:name="com.app.activity.MainActivityTwo" />
<activity android:name="com.app.activity.MainActivity" />
<activity android:name="com.app.activity.SearchableActivity"
android:launchMode="singleTop" >
<intent-filter>
<action android:name="android.intent.action.SEARCH" />
</intent-filter>
<meta-data
android:name="android.app.searchable"
android:resource="#xml/searchable" />
</activity>
xml/search.xml:
<searchable xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
android:hint="#string/search_hint"
android:label="#string/app_name" >
</searchable>
And register the search configuration(serchableInfo) toSerchView:
.MainActivity
#Override
public boolean onCreateOptionsMenu(Menu menu) {
MenuInflater inflater = getMenuInflater();
inflater.inflate(R.menu.u_action_menu_map, menu);
MenuItem searchItem = menu.findItem(R.id.action_search);
SearchManager searchManager = (SearchManager) getSystemService(Context.SEARCH_SERVICE);
SearchView searchView = (SearchView) MenuItemCompat.getActionView(searchItem);
searchView.setSearchableInfo(searchManager.getSearchableInfo(getComponentName()));
return super.onCreateOptionsMenu(menu);
}
This does not work, it seems that there is no serchableInfo bound with the current Activity(MainActivity).
Even I changed to this:
searchView.setSearchableInfo(searchManager.getSearchableInfo(new ComponentName("com.app.activity", "SearchableActivity")));
It still cannot find the searchableInfo.
After I add the search related configuration to MainActivity:
<activity android:name="com.app.activity.MainActivityTwo" />
<activity android:name="com.app.activity.SearchableActivity" />
<activity android:name="com.app.activity.MainActivity"
android:launchMode="singleTop" >
<intent-filter>
<action android:name="android.intent.action.SEARCH" />
</intent-filter>
<meta-data
android:name="android.app.searchable"
android:resource="#xml/searchable" />
</activity>
This worked. WTF.
I always thought that the Activity provide the Search UI and the Activity handle the input are different, but after my test it seems that they are the same Activity, that't to say the user input are submit to the Activity itself,but why use the **ing intent to transfer the input data?
2 The search submit
The Search dialog have a search submit button at the right of the dialog:
But there is nothing inside the SearchView so how to submit the search in a SearchView:

There should be a search key on your keyboard. It can also be go, return or similar keys that should start the search.

Hookup hard search key to SearchView [duplicate]

I set up a SearchWidget as described in the Android API Guide. It properly displays a magnifying glass icon in the Action Bar and if I click on it, it launches the search widget within the Action Bar (an input field with dark background).
However, if I press the virtual device's search button, then a different search field is launched: It has a white background and does not invoke the callback methods I specified.
So I added this to my MainActivity class:
public boolean onSearchRequested() {
SearchView searchView = (SearchView) menu.findItem(R.id.menu_search).getActionView();
searchView.setIconified(!searchView.isIconified());
return false;
}
The set up of the search widget is exactly the same as it is described in the docs:
SearchManager searchManager = (SearchManager) getSystemService(Context.SEARCH_SERVICE);
SearchView searchView = (SearchView) menu.findItem(R.id.menu_search).getActionView();
searchView.setSearchableInfo(searchManager.getSearchableInfo(getComponentName()));
searchView.setIconifiedByDefault(false);
searchView.setOnQueryTextListener(new CustomSearchQueryTextListener());
My searchable.xml:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<searchable xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
android:label="#string/app_name">
</searchable>
And AndroidManifest.xml:
<activity
android:name="MainActivity"
android:label="#string/app_name"
android:launchMode="singleTask"
android:uiOptions="splitActionBarWhenNarrow" >
<intent-filter>
<action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />
<category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />
</intent-filter>
<intent-filter>
<action android:name="android.intent.action.SEARCH" />
</intent-filter>
<meta-data android:name="android.app.searchable" android:resource="#xml/searchable"/>
</activity>
The reason why I tried the setIconfied() method is that in the Android API Guide it says under "The ability to toggle the search box visibility":
"By default, the search widget is "iconified," meaning that it is
represented only by a search icon (a magnifying glass), and expands to
show the search box when the user touches it. As shown above, you can
show the search box by default, by calling
setIconifiedByDefault(false). You can also toggle the search widget
appearance by calling setIconified()."
I also tried to call startSearch("", false, null, false); but this brings up the same search field with the white background.
So my question is: Is it possible to launch the search widget within the action bar if the user presses the device's search button, i.e. peform exactly the same action as if the search menu item is clicked?

While writing this question I came up with the solution by myself. I still decided to post it along with the answer, because it does not seem like this question has been asked on SO before and maybe someone encounters the same problem and/or comes up with a better solution.
All you need to do is call expandActionView() on the search menu item, and everything works like expected:
public boolean onSearchRequested() {
menu.findItem(R.id.menu_search).expandActionView();
return true;
}

Search widget on action bar doesn't trigger my search activity

I'm developing search widget interface based on official tutorial: http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/search/search-dialog.html
Problem: My SearchableActivity doesn't get triggered when I enter my query and press Ok/enter.
Manifest for SearchableActivity:
<activity android:name="SearchableActivity" android:launchMode="singleTop" >
<intent-filter>
<action android:name="android.intent.action.SEARCH" />
</intent-filter>
<meta-data
android:name="android.app.searchable"
android:resource="#xml/searchable" />
</activity>
xml/searchable.xml
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<searchable xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
android:hint="Search" android:label="#string/app_name" >
</searchable>
Main activity lifecycle method which adds icons to the action bar (works fine):
#Override
public boolean onCreateOptionsMenu(Menu menu) {
getMenuInflater().inflate(R.menu.main, menu);
// Get the SearchView and set the searchable configuration
SearchManager searchManager = (SearchManager)getSystemService(Context.SEARCH_SERVICE);
SearchView searchView = (SearchView) menu.findItem(R.id.menu_search).getActionView();
searchView.setSearchableInfo(searchManager.getSearchableInfo(getComponentName()));
// Do not iconify the widget;expand it by default
searchView.setIconifiedByDefault(false);
return true;
}
SearchableActivity.java
public class SearchableActivity extends ListActivity {
/** Called when the activity is first created. */
#Override
public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
Log.d("MY", "search activity triggered");
}
}
Note: The search widget appear on the action bar and I can insert data, but pressing the OK/Enter doesn't take me to the SearchableActivity (doesn't trigger onCreate of the SearchableActivity).
Am I missing something or is the official tutorial flawed?

Problem solved: the tutorial seems to missing one important part: <meta-data android:name="android.app.default_searchable" android:value=".MySearchActivityName" /> has to be added inside <application> tags in manifest to get the search widget working correctly.
EDIT- Also a hint to solving a problem when the actionbar search is not triggered on data posting (no error given whatsoever and documentations hasn't got a word about this limitation): in searchable.xml file android:hint and android:label attributes MUST be references to strings in strings.xml. Source

You should override onOptionsItemSelected and probably onSearchRequested in your activity.

If "xml/searchable.xml" file is not correctly formatted (things such as "searchable" tag not in all lower case), there is no error message returned during execution and the "SearchableActivity" doesn't get invoked.