Develop Reference

Create a transparent dialog on top of activity

Background
I'm trying to put a layer on top of the current activity which would have explanation of what is going on on the current screen, similar to what occurs on contact+ app .
I know there are some solutions for this (like the showCase library and the superToolTips library ) , and I also know that I can create a view and set it on top by adding it to the window of the activity , but I need put a whole dialog layer on top.
Problem
No matter what I try, each solution doesn't work the way I need it to work.
in short , what I need is:
full screen dialog.
no change (not visual and not logical) to the action bar, notification bar, and content of the activity behind, meaning that everything behind the dialog stays the same it was shown a moment before the dialog was shown.
be transparent except for the views I use for the dialog, which should be shown normally.
what I've tried
Sadly, I've always got only a part of the things I needed.
here's my code:
styles.xml:
<style name="full_screen_dialog">
<item name="android:windowFrame">#null</item>
<item name="android:windowIsFloating">true</item>
<item name="android:windowContentOverlay">#null</item>
<item name="android:windowAnimationStyle">#android:style/Animation.Dialog</item>
<item name="android:windowSoftInputMode">stateUnspecified|adjustPan</item>
</style>
MainActivity.java:
...
final Dialog dialog = new Dialog(this, R.style.full_screen_dialog);
dialog.requestWindowFeature(Window.FEATURE_NO_TITLE);
dialog.setContentView(R.layout.floating_tutorial);
dialog.getWindow().setLayout(LayoutParams.MATCH_PARENT, LayoutParams.MATCH_PARENT);
dialog.getWindow().setFormat(PixelFormat.TRANSLUCENT);
dialog.show();
This code will put the layout on top of the activity, but sadly it doesn't have any transparency , even though I've set it . The layout I've used is very simple which is why I don't post it.
Question
what am I missing ? what should be done to fix the code?
how can I make the dialog both transparent, full screen AND that it won't change the action bar and notifications bar.
Working solution
EDIT: after finding a good solution, here's the working code:
#Override
protected void onCreate(final Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
setContentView(R.layout.activity_main);
final Dialog dialog = new Dialog(this);
dialog.requestWindowFeature(Window.FEATURE_NO_TITLE);
dialog.setContentView(R.layout.floating_tutorial);
final Window window = dialog.getWindow();
window.setLayout(WindowManager.LayoutParams.MATCH_PARENT, WindowManager.LayoutParams.MATCH_PARENT);
window.clearFlags(WindowManager.LayoutParams.FLAG_DIM_BEHIND);
window.setBackgroundDrawable(new ColorDrawable(Color.TRANSPARENT));
dialog.show();
}

Just change the background color of your Dialog:
dialog.getWindow().setBackgroundDrawable(new ColorDrawable(Color.TRANSPARENT));
Edit:
This prevents the dim effect:
dialog.getWindow().clearFlags(WindowManager.LayoutParams.FLAG_DIM_BEHIND);

Just add this, it really works!
<item name="android:windowIsTranslucent">true</item>
<item name="android:windowCloseOnTouchOutside">true</item>
<item name="android:windowBackground">#android:drawable/alert_dark_frame</item>
<item name="android:windowContentOverlay">#null</item>
<item name="android:windowNoTitle">true</item>
<item name="android:windowIsFloating">true</item>
<item name="android:backgroundDimEnabled">false</item>

DialogFragment fullscreen shows padding on sides

I am creating a custom DialogFragment that is displayed underneath the actionbar. So far everything works great. The layout parameters for dialog fragment are match_parent for width and wrap_content for height.
I have tried every solution including setting the layout parameters .width and by getting Display size and removing the themes. However no matter what there is a small amount of space on left, right and top side of the dialog that is invisible. I need to know how to remove this space so it actually matches the width of the screen and hopefully gets rid of the top padding as well.

I figured it out using custom dialog theme. windowIsFloating true will get rid of the background but will add some extra space underneath the background as a background. In which case you can use windowBackground #null to erase it.
<style name="CustomDialog" parent="#android:style/Theme.Holo.Light" >
<item name="android:windowBackground">#null</item>
<item name="android:windowIsFloating">true</item>
</style>
Usage:
AlertDialog.Builder builder = new AlertDialog.Builder(getActivity(), R.style.CustomDialog);
Thank you to Raghunandan who gave me the link that includes all style attributes. It took me a while but I went through that file and found very interesting elements. Definitely have a look at the link posted below to explore theme styles.
https://android.googlesource.com/platform/frameworks/base/+/refs/heads/master/core/res/res/values/themes.xml

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/android-developers/NDFo9pF8sHY
From Dianne Hackborn suggestion
Use non-dialog theme as android.R.style.Theme or android.R.style.Theme_Light.
Look # the themes
https://android.googlesource.com/platform/frameworks/base/+/refs/heads/master/core/res/res/values/themes.xml.
Check this link
http://developer.android.com/reference/android/app/DialogFragment.html
DialogFragment picker = MyDialogFragment.newInstance();
picker.setStyle( DialogFragment.STYLE_NORMAL, android.R.style.Theme );
picker.show(getFragmentManager(), "MyDialogFragment");

if you set this theme to your dialog it will always be fullscreen
<!-- DIALOG STYLE -->
<style name="You.Dialog" parent="android:Theme.Holo.Dialog" >
<item name="android:windowNoTitle">true</item>
<item name="android:windowFullscreen">true</item>
<item name="android:windowIsFloating">false</item>
</style>
to do so you can use this setStyle(int,int) method.
dialogFragment.setStyle( DialogFragment.STYLE_NORMAL, R.style.You_Dialog );

First you need to know that handling of full screen in Dialog fragment is different from the normal Dialog component, second you need to customize the Dialog fragment before the actual creation of the dialog # (OnCreateDialog), according to the answer of "user3244180" Full screen DialogFragment
#Override
public Dialog onCreateDialog(final Bundle savedInstanceState) {
// the content
final RelativeLayout root = new RelativeLayout(getActivity());
root.setLayoutParams(new ViewGroup.LayoutParams(ViewGroup.LayoutParams.MATCH_PARENT, ViewGroup.LayoutParams.MATCH_PARENT));
// creating the fullscreen dialog
final Dialog dialog = new Dialog(getActivity());
dialog.requestWindowFeature(Window.FEATURE_NO_TITLE);
dialog.setContentView(root);
dialog.getWindow().setBackgroundDrawable(new ColorDrawable(Color.TRANSPARENT));
dialog.getWindow().setLayout(ViewGroup.LayoutParams.MATCH_PARENT, ViewGroup.LayoutParams.MATCH_PARENT);
return dialog;
}

This worked for me with support for < API 11.
Create a style that is both full screen and has a transparent background:
<style name="TransparentDialog" parent="#android:style/Theme">
<item name="android:windowBackground">#android:color/transparent</item>
<item name="android:background">#android:color/transparent</item>
</style>
Then your DialogFragment code:
public class MyDialog extends DialogFragment {
public static MyDialog newInstance() {
MyDialog dialog = new MyDialog();
dialog.setStyle(DialogFragment.STYLE_NO_FRAME, R.style.TransparentDialog);
return dialog;
}
#Override
public View onCreateView(LayoutInflater inflater, ViewGroup container, Bundle savedInstanceState) {
View view = inflater.inflate(R.layout.my_custom_layout, container, false);
return view;
}
}
Finally, just for clarity, the contents of my_custom_layout.xml:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<RelativeLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
xmlns:app="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/com.kabx"
android:layout_width="match_parent"
android:layout_height="match_parent"
android:background="#color/semi_transparent_grey" >
..........................
..Whatever You Want Here..
..........................
</RelativeLayout>

I met the issue before: there is always a padding while having set fullscreen. try this code in dialogFragment's onActivityCreated() method:
public void onActivityCreated(Bundle savedInstanceState)
{
Window window = getDialog().getWindow();
LayoutParams attributes = window.getAttributes();
//must setBackgroundDrawable(TRANSPARENT) in onActivityCreated()
window.setBackgroundDrawable(new ColorDrawable(Color.TRANSPARENT));
if (needFullScreen)
{
window.setLayout(LayoutParams.MATCH_PARENT, LayoutParams.MATCH_PARENT);
}
}

<style name="WideDialog" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light.DialogWhenLarge">
<item name="android:windowNoTitle">true</item>
<item name="android:windowFullscreen">false</item>
<item name="android:windowIsFloating">false</item>
</style>
#Override
public void onCreate(#Nullable Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
setStyle(DialogFragment.STYLE_NORMAL, R.style.WideDialog);
}

DialogFragment (when not told explicitly), will use its inner styles that will wrap your custom layout in it (no fullscreen, etc.).
No need to create custom theme for this problem. Just use this method and set style and theme of your choosing:
/* theme is optional, I am using leanback... */
setStyle(STYLE_NORMAL, R.style.AppTheme_Leanback);

The following works perfectly for me. It lets me have a full-width dialog (fills the screen's width with no padding) but with wrap_content for height, and it retains all my other stylings that I do in my builder:
<style name="DialogTheme">
<item name="windowMinWidthMajor">100%</item>
<item name="windowMinWidthMinor">100%</item>
<item name="android:windowBackground">#null</item>
<item name="android:windowIsFloating">true</item>
<item name="android:background">#ffffff</item>
</style>
Background is required or else it does a weird repeat thing, but just set this to the color you want your dialog background to be. WindowBackground and WindowIsFloating are required to make the size wrap correctly.
Add your theme to your builder like so:
builder = new AlertDialog.Builder(_context, R.style.DialogTheme);
and you're good to go!

I was getting huge side padding in the DialogFragment for Nexus 6p and Pixel.
Fixed that by defining custom style as follows:
<style name="Custom.Dialog" parent="android:Theme.DeviceDefault.Dialog.NoActionBar.MinWidth" >
<item name="android:windowBackground">#null</item>
<item name="android:windowIsFloating">true</item>
</style>
parent="android:Theme.DeviceDefault.Dialog.NoActionBar.MinWidth did the trick

For fullscreen dialog I have posted a answer
In this thread
Please check this is the most efficient and shortest way.
Hope this helps :)

Creating a translucent "dialog activity"

I have a dialog-style activity that appears over my main activity in an Android application. How can I get the background to be translucent? Not transparent, but translucent - say 70% opaque. I've tried applying this theme to the activity:
<style name="Theme.Transparent" parent="android:Theme">
<item name="android:windowIsTranslucent">true</item>
<item name="android:windowBackground">#android:color/transparent</item>
<item name="android:windowContentOverlay">#null</item>
<item name="android:windowNoTitle">true</item>
<item name="android:windowIsFloating">true</item>
<item name="android:backgroundDimEnabled">false</item>
</style>
and several variations on this but still the dialog activity appears 100% opaque. Also, the layout xml of the activity itself (and elements displayed on it), specify a background of "#70000000".

For totally transparent dialog you can use this :
Step 1> Create a colors.xml file in the ‘values’ folder under ‘res’ and add the following line..
<drawable name="transparent">#00000000</drawable>
Step 2> Create a styles.xml file in the ‘values’ folder under ‘res’ and the following lines…
<style name="Transparent">
<item name="android:windowIsTranslucent">true</item>
<item name="android:windowAnimationStyle">
#android:style/Animation.Translucent
</item>
<item name="android:windowBackground">#drawable/transparent</item>
<item name="android:windowNoTitle">true</item>
<item name="android:colorForeground">#fff</item>
</style>
(I guess the tags and attributes are self explanatory…)
Step 3> Actually, that's it……………………
Let’s add this to a dialog…..
Step 4> Create a class with the following lines……
public class DialogBox extends Dialog {
public DialogBox(Context context, int theme) {
super(context, theme);
setContentView(R.layout.dialog);
okButton = (Button) findViewById(R.id.dialog_OkButton);
setListeners();
}
}
(Make sure you create a layout for the dialog)
Step 5> Next create an activity class as follows….
public class T_Temp extends Activity {
private DialogBox dialog;
public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
setContentView(R.layout.main);
dialog = new DialogBox(this, R.style.Transparent);
dialog.show();
}
}
or you can use this to make dialog attractive to add blur effect ....
Just check this out: there is near about 30% transparency...
dialog = new AlertDialog.Builder(WordCube.this)
.setTitle(WordCube.this.getResources().getString(R.string.app_name))
.setMessage(s)
.setIcon(R.drawable.logo)
.setPositiveButton(R.string.btn_close, null)
.show();
Below shows the code needed to add blur and remove dimming of the background (as I think the blur looks nicer when the background is well lit).
view plaincopy to clipboardprint?
WindowManager.LayoutParams lp = dialog.getWindow().getAttributes();
lp.dimAmount=0.0f;
dialog.getWindow().setAttributes(lp);
dialog.getWindow().addFlags(WindowManager.LayoutParams.FLAG_BLUR_BEHIND);

Custom ProgressDialog extends Dialog or ProgressDialog?

I am simply trying to create a spinning progress dialog. No text, no borders, no background. Just a spinning notification that lightly is center on the screen on top of content.
I have seen two different Stack Overflow questions in creating this custom Dialog.
They both use this styling:
<style name="NewDialog" parent="#android:style/Theme.Dialog">
<item name="android:windowFrame">#null</item>
<item name="android:windowBackground">#android:color/transparent</item>
<item name="android:windowIsFloating">true</item>
<item name="android:windowContentOverlay">#null</item>
<item name="android:windowTitleStyle">#null</item>
<item name="android:colorBackground">#ffffff</item>
<item name="android:windowAnimationStyle">#android:style/Animation.Dialog</item>
<item name="android:windowSoftInputMode">stateUnspecified|adjustPan</item>
<item name="android:backgroundDimEnabled">true</item>
<item name="android:width">600dip</item>
<item name="android:height">100dip</item>
<item name="android:textColor">#FF0000</item>
</style>
But in the Java side, one extends Dialog and contains lots of custom content, the other one is simply this:
public class MyProgressDialog extends ProgressDialog {
public MyProgressDialog(Context context) {
super(context, R.style.NewDialog);
}
}
On the first (extends Dialog), I get a blank. No dialog. Nothing. On the code sample just above, I get a shrunken small dialog spinning inside a black box that is off centered.
Which method is more correct and can I have a sample on how to implement this?
Also, how can I make that dialog transparent/borderless?

The 'right way' to do this now would be to extend DialogFragment http://developer.android.com/reference/android/app/DialogFragment.html
If you are not using the compatibility library, you are not programming in the current Android world.
If you want to extend Dialog, then I have some example code here: https://github.com/tom-dignan/nifty/tree/master/src/com/tomdignan/nifty/dialogs In this code, I implemented a kind of 'progress dialog' by extending Dialog. I extended Dialog because I wanted full control and wanted my Dialog to be full-screen.
I would recommend reading the above DialogFragment doc and using that, though.
So really, there is no right or wrong way here. Extending any of the three classes will work, but the cleanest and most current would be the DialogFragment approach.

One way of doing it is to use a custom dialog, request feature No_Title and set the background drawable resource to transparent.
You can use the following code, I just wrote and tested it out on Android 4.0.3 ICS.
The xml layout in layout folder is, say dialog_progress.xml
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
android:layout_width="match_parent"
android:layout_height="match_parent"
android:orientation="vertical">
<ProgressBar
android:id="#+id/dialogProgressBar"
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:layout_gravity="center"/>
</LinearLayout>
The java code to display the dialog and make it transparent is as follows.
Dialog dialog = new Dialog (this);
dialog.requestWindowFeature (Window.FEATURE_NO_TITLE);
dialog.setContentView (R.layout.dialog_progress);
dialog.getWindow ().setBackgroundDrawableResource (android.R.color.transparent);
dialog.show ();

Something similar can be achieved very easily by using frame-by-frame animation on an ImageView instead of making custom progress dialog. For this you just need a sequence of images(can be extracted from any gif). And then you can apply frame-by-frame animation on it. It will do exactly what you want.
I have done something similar with the code below -:
// XML for frame by frame animation
<animation-list xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
android:oneshot="false" >
<item
android:drawable="#drawable/frame00"
android:duration="150"/>
<item
android:drawable="#drawable/frame01"
android:duration="150"/>
<item
android:drawable="#drawable/frame02"
android:duration="150"/>
<item
android:drawable="#drawable/frame03"
android:duration="150"/>
<item
android:drawable="#drawable/frame04"
android:duration="150"/>
<item
android:drawable="#drawable/frame05"
android:duration="150"/>
<item
android:drawable="#drawable/frame06"
android:duration="150"/>
Java code for starting animation :-
ImageView iv = (ImageView)findViewById(R.id.progressDialog);
iv.setBackgroundResource(R.anim.progress_dialog_icon_drawable_animation);
AnimationDrawable aniFrame = (AnimationDrawable) iv.getBackground();
aniFrame = (AnimationDrawable) iv.getBackground();
aniFrame.start();
Hope it helps !

How can I get a Dialog style activity window to fill the screen?

I am using an activity with the dialog theme set, and I want it to be full screen. I tried all sorts of things, even going through the WindowManager to expand the window to full width and height manually, but nothing works.
Apparently, a dialog window (or an activity with the dialog theme) will only expand according to its contents, but even that doesn't always work. For instance, I show a progress bar circle which has width and height set to FILL_PARENT (so does its layout container), but still, the dialog wraps around the much smaller progress bar instead of filling the screen.
There must be a way of displaying something small inside a dialog window but have it expand to full screen size without its content resizing as well?

I found the solution:
In your activity which has the Theme.Dialog style set, do this:
#Override
public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
setContentView(R.layout.your_layout);
getWindow().setLayout(ViewGroup.LayoutParams.MATCH_PARENT, ViewGroup.LayoutParams.MATCH_PARENT);
}
It's important that you call Window.setLayout() after you call setContentView(), otherwise it won't work.

You may add this values to your style android:windowMinWidthMajor and android:windowMinWidthMinor
<style name="Theme_Dialog" parent="android:Theme.Holo.Dialog">
...
<item name="android:windowMinWidthMajor">97%</item>
<item name="android:windowMinWidthMinor">97%</item>
</style>

I just want to fill only 80% of the screen for that I did like this below
DisplayMetrics metrics = getResources().getDisplayMetrics();
int screenWidth = (int) (metrics.widthPixels * 0.80);
setContentView(R.layout.mylayout);
getWindow().setLayout(screenWidth, LayoutParams.WRAP_CONTENT); //set below the setContentview
it works only when I put the getwindow().setLayout... line below the setContentView(..)
thanks #Matthias

Wrap your dialog_custom_layout.xml into RelativeLayout instead of any other layout.That worked for me.

For Dialog
This may helpful for someone.
I want a dialog to take full width of screen. searched a lot but nothing found useful. Finally this worked for me:
mDialog.setContentView(R.layout.my_custom_dialog);
mDialog.getWindow().setBackgroundDrawable(null);
after adding this, my dialog appears in full width of screen.

This answer is a workaround for those who use "Theme.AppCompat.Dialog" or any other "Theme.AppCompat.Dialog" descendants like "Theme.AppCompat.Light.Dialog", "Theme.AppCompat.DayNight.Dialog", etc.
I myself has to use AppCompat dialog because i use AppCompatActivity as extends for all my activities. There will be a problem that make the dialog has padding on every sides(top, right, bottom and left) if we use the accepted answer.
#Override
public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
setContentView(R.layout.your_layout);
getWindow().setLayout(ViewGroup.LayoutParams.MATCH_PARENT, ViewGroup.LayoutParams.MATCH_PARENT);
}
On your Activity's style, add these code
<style name="DialogActivityTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Dialog">
<item name="windowNoTitle">true</item>
<item name="android:windowBackground">#null</item>
</style>
As you may notice, the problem that generate padding to our dialog is "android:windowBackground", so here i make the window background to null.

Set a minimum width at the top most layout.
android:minWidth="300dp"
For example:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout android:orientation="vertical" android:layout_width="fill_parent" android:layout_height="fill_parent"
xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android" android:minWidth="300dp">
<!-- Put remaining contents here -->
</LinearLayout>

Matthias' answer is mostly right but it's still not filling the entire screen as it has a small padding on each side (pointed out by #Holmes). In addition to his code, we could fix this by extending Theme.Dialog style and add some attributes like this.
<style name="MyDialog" parent="#android:style/Theme.Dialog">
<item name="android:windowBackground">#android:color/transparent</item>
<item name="android:windowNoTitle">true</item>
</style>
Then we simply declare Activity with theme set to MyDialog:
<activity
android:name=".FooActivity"
android:theme="#style/MyDialog" />

This would be helpful for someone like me. Create custom dialog style:
<style name="MyDialog" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light.Dialog">
<item name="windowNoTitle">true</item>
<item name="android:windowFullscreen">true</item>
<item name="android:windowIsFloating">false</item>
</style>
In AndroidManifest.xml file set theme for wanted activity:
<activity
android:name=".CustomDialog"
...
android:theme="#style/MyDialog"/>
That is all, no need to call methods programaticaly.

In your manifest file where our activity is defined
<activity
android:name=".YourPopUpActivity"
android:theme="#android:style/Theme.Holo.Dialog" >
</activity>
without action bar
<activity android:name=".YourPopUpActivity"
android:theme="#android:style/Theme.Holo.Dialog.NoActionBar"/>