Develop Reference

android:buttonStyle stopped working on material design 1.2.0

Applying a button style by default on app theme stopped working when material design library was updated to 1.2.1 (possible in 1.2.0 also).
<style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.MaterialComponents.Light.NoActionBar">
<item name="android:buttonStyle">#style/AppTheme.Button.GrayGreen</item>
</style>
<style name="AppTheme.Button" parent="Widget.MaterialComponents.Button">
...
</style>
<style name="AppTheme.Button.GrayGreen">
<item name="android:backgroundTint">#color/green</item>
<item name="android:textColor">#color/white</item>
</style>
Also tried:
<style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.MaterialComponents.Light.NoActionBar">
<item name="buttonStyle">#style/AppTheme.Button.GrayGreen</item>
</style>

First, MaterialButtons use app:backgroundTint for background colors and not the android attribute. Also, based on documentation which I can see on material.io is that when using styling inside style.xml or theme.xml you need to set the style for every type of MaterialButton component. like this:
<style name="Theme.App" parent="Theme.MaterialComponents.*">
...
<item name="borderlessButtonStyle">#style/Widget.App.Button.TextButton</item>
<item name="materialButtonOutlinedStyle">#style/Widget.App.Button.OutlinedButton</item>
<item name="materialButtonStyle">#style/Widget.App.Button</item>
</style>
<style name="Widget.App.Button.TextButton" parent="Widget.MaterialComponents.Button.TextButton">
<item name="materialThemeOverlay">#style/ThemeOverlay.App.Button.TextButton</item>
<item name="android:textAppearance">#style/TextAppearance.App.Button</item>
<item name="shapeAppearance">#style/ShapeAppearance.App.SmallComponent</item>
</style>
...
...
and so on. Check the link for more, it's all the way down on the page.

Understanding styles

I'm trying to set a custom colour for my buttons in Android application but value set for accentColor is always used as button background colour. I am trying to set a global colour for all buttons without having to specify styles or theme for each button individually.
Can you explain please how styling works in Android? I understand the basics, but overriding existing themes is never working for me :(
styles.xml
<resources>
<style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.MaterialComponents.Light.NoActionBar">
<item name="colorPrimary">#color/colorPrimary</item>
<item name="colorPrimaryDark">#color/colorPrimaryDark</item>
<item name="colorAccent">#color/colorAccent</item>
<item name="android:titleTextColor">#ffffff</item>
<item name="android:buttonStyle">#style/AppTheme.Button</item>
</style>
<style name="AppTheme.NoActionBar">
<item name="windowActionBar">false</item>
<item name="windowNoTitle">true</item>
</style>
<style name="AppTheme.Button" >
<item name="android:backgroundTint">#color/colorPrimaryDark</item>
</style>
<style name="AppTheme.AppBarOverlay" parent="ThemeOverlay.AppCompat.Dark.ActionBar" />
<style name="AppTheme.PopupOverlay" parent="ThemeOverlay.AppCompat.Light" />

Short answer: Try going to the source code of how the
Theme.MaterialComponents.Light.NoActionBar is defining the style for
the buttons and override those attributes.
Android styling works by merging all the defined attributes in a theme. For example, you have an AppTheme that includes theming for every built-in view. If you create a new theme for your button and your define just a couple of attributes, what android studio does is to merge all the attributes defined in the AppTheme with your new attributes. So if you want to override the buttons, you need to go deep and find out what are exactly the attributes defined in the general AppTheme you set in your application, they may not be the same.
For example, this is how I changed the color of all the buttons in my app since they were using a global attribute for it:
In the general styles.xml file, I put:
<style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light.NoActionBar">
...
<item name="colorButtonNormal">?myCustomColor</item>
...
</style>
But if I wanted to change the backgroundTint attribute of my buttons, I had to do this:
<style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light.NoActionBar">
...
<item name="colorButtonNormal">?myCustomColor</item>
<item name="android:buttonStyle">#style/AppButtonStyle</item>
...
</style>
<style name="AppButtonStyle" parent="Widget.AppCompat.Button">
<item name="android:backgroundTint">?attr/colorAccent</item>
</style>
Also, check out this cool Medium post for another developer experience in this topic.

I managed to solve the issue. The main point to notice here is that I am using Theme.MaterialComponents and not AppCompact.
I have defined a new style and I set it to buttonStyle, which refers to style for AppCompact button. In order to set a style for the material button, I had to use "materialButtonStyle" instead of "buttonStyle".
All relevant properties that can be overridden for MaterialComponents can be found in material design documentation: https://www.material.io/develop/android/components/material-button/
So the final code looks like this:
<resources>
<!-- Base application theme. -->
<style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.MaterialComponents.Light.NoActionBar">
<!-- Customize your theme here. -->
<item name="colorPrimary">#color/colorPrimary</item>
<item name="colorPrimaryDark">#color/colorPrimaryDark</item>
<item name="colorAccent">#color/colorAccent</item>
<item name="colorSecondary">#color/colorAccent</item>
<item name="floatingActionButtonStyle">#style/AppTheme.Test</item>
<item name="materialButtonStyle">#style/AppTheme.Button</item>
<!--<item name="buttonStyle">#style/Widget.MaterialComponents.Button.Icon</item>-->
</style>
<style name="AppTheme.Button" parent="#style/Widget.MaterialComponents.Button">
<item name="android:backgroundTint">#D400EB</item>
</style>
<style name="AppTheme.Test" parent="#style/Widget.MaterialComponents.FloatingActionButton">
<item name="backgroundTint">#A305B1</item>
</style>
<style name="AppTheme.NoActionBar">
<item name="windowActionBar">false</item>
<item name="windowNoTitle">true</item>
</style>
<style name="AppTheme.AppBarOverlay" parent="ThemeOverlay.AppCompat.Dark.ActionBar"/>
<style name="AppTheme.PopupOverlay" parent="ThemeOverlay.AppCompat.Light"/>
</resources>

No resource found that matches the given name: attr 'colorBackground'

I am trying to edit the ThemeOverlay here which contains the dewfaults regarding the popups and dialogs and things like that but the problem is that it is not accepting the colorBackground attribute.
I know that some will say that I should use android:colorBackground but if I am inheriting from AppCompat then it should not be a problem.
Please help.
<resources>
<!-- Base application theme. -->
<style name="AppTheme" parent="AppTheme.Base">
<!-- Customize your theme here. -->
</style>
<style name="AppTheme.Base" parent="Theme.AppCompat.NoActionBar">
<item name="colorPrimary">#color/Primary</item>
<item name="colorPrimaryDark">#color/PrimaryDark</item>
<item name="colorAccent">#color/Accent</item>
</style>
<style name="PopupTheme" parent="ThemeOverlay.AppCompat.Light">
<item name="colorBackground">#color/TextColor</item>
</style>
</resources>
Also, even after applying android:colorBackground it doesn't work. The error is gone but what I want to get done doesn't happen.

Try changing to :
<style name="PopupTheme" parent="ThemeOverlay.AppCompat.Light">
<item name="android:background">#color/TextColor</item>
</style>
i think you are trying to change the background, why not using an image:
<item name="android:background">#drawable/your_drawable</item>

changing
<style name="PopupTheme" parent="ThemeOverlay.AppCompat.Light">
<item name="colorBackground">#color/TextColor</item>
</style>
to
<style name="PopupTheme" parent="ThemeOverlay.AppCompat.Light">
<item name="android:windowBackground">#color/TextColor</item>
</style>

Styling actionBar action item button

So I have this actionBar:
How do I change the style of the MUTE button text so that it isn't bold and is smaller and is of a different color? Adding android:actionMenuTextColor to AppTheme has no effect. Defining android:actionBarStyle also has no effect, like it's being ignored! I've looked at every other answer I can find, nothing works!
These are the styles that produce the actionbar seen above:
<style name="AppBaseTheme" parent="#style/Theme.AppCompat">
<item name="colorPrimary">#color/actionbar_bgr</item>
<item name="colorPrimaryDark">#color/primary_dark</item>
</style>
<style name="AppTheme" parent="AppBaseTheme">
<item name="android:windowBackground">#color/activity_bgr</item>
<item name="android:textColor">#color/activity_text</item>
<item name="android:textSize">#dimen/small_text_size</item>
<item name="android:actionBarStyle">#style/NewActionBar</item>
<item name="android:actionMenuTextColor">#color/test_pink</item>
</style>
<style name="NewActionBar">
<item name="android:background">#color/test_pink</item>
<item name="android:titleTextStyle">#style/NewActionBarTitle</item>
<item name="android:displayOptions">showHome|showTitle</item>
</style>
<style name="NewActionBarTitle">
<item name="android:textSize">#dimen/action_bar_text_size</item>
<item name="android:textColor">#color/test_yellow</item>
</style>

Since you're using the Theme.AppCompat you need to drop the android: in your items name. Also read the answer here and the resource linked in it.

Use android:actionMenuTextAppearance in your main theme. For example, you could set that to #style/NewActionBarTitle:
<style name="AppTheme" parent="AppBaseTheme">
<item name="android:actionMenuTextAppearance">#style/NewActionBarTitle</item>
</style>

Android apply style to custom TextView

I have a class, TextViewStyled, which extends TextView
In my theme XML, how do I apply a style to all my TextViewStyled widgets on Activities with a chosen theme?
I have this simple theme, but I want to limit the Black Gold style to TextViewStyled Widgets without specifying the Black Gold in the TextViewStyled style attribute. This is one of many themes which will be switched dynamically.:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<resources>
<style name="MyThemeOneofMany" parent="android:Theme.NoTitleBar.Fullscreen">
<item name="android:???????????">#style/TextViewStyled_Black_Gold</item>
</style>
<style name="TextViewStyled_Black_Gold" parent="#android:style/Widget.TextView">
<item name="android:background">#1E1921</item>
<item name="android:textColor">#A85E4F</item>
<item name="android:textColorLink">#FFBC4F</item>
<item name="android:textStyle">normal</item>
</style>
</resources>

For AppCompat theme (2.3.3+):
<!-- Base application theme. -->
<style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light.DarkActionBar">
<!-- Customize your theme here. -->
<item name="android:textViewStyle">#style/PizzaSizeWidget</item>
</style>
<style name="CustomTextView" parent="#android:style/TextAppearance.Widget.TextView">
<item name="android:background">#1E1921</item>
<item name="android:textColor">#A85E4F</item>
<item name="android:textStyle">normal</item>
<item name="android:textSize">93sp</item>
</style>

In order to set the style for TextViews in your custom Theme use the name "android:textViewStyle":
<style name="MyThemeOneofMany" parent="android:Theme.NoTitleBar.Fullscreen">
<item name="android:textViewStyle">#style/TextViewStyled_Black_Gold</item>
</style>
Found it when looking through the official android themes.xml [click].

I found that updating the styles works when overriding the base textview class after the inflation event.