Develop Reference

Refresh data with RxJava and Retrofit

I'm using Retrofit with RxJava2 to obtain some data from a Rest API. I want to use a SwipeRefreshLayout to update the view and I'm using a ViewModel to handle the API call, so I want to implement a method in there to refresh the data programmatically.
I want to obtain something like this https://stackoverflow.com/a/34276564/6787552 but instead of having a periodic trigger, I want to do that programmatically when the user pull to refresh.
That's the ViewModel:
public class DashboardViewModel extends ViewModel {
public final Single<Dashboard> dashboard;
public DashboardViewModel() {
dashboard = Api.getDashboard();
refresh();
}
public void refresh() {
// Refresh data
}
}
And in the DashboardFragment:
#Override
public View onCreateView(...) {
...
viewModel.dashboard
.observeOn(AndroidSchedulers.mainThread())
.subscribe(dashboard -> {
binding.setDashboard(dashboard);
binding.swipeRefreshLayout.setRefreshing(false);
});
binding.swipeRefreshLayout.setOnRefreshListener(() -> viewModel.refresh());
...
}
Thank you in advance!
EDIT:
That's what I ended up doing:
public class DashboardViewModel extends ViewModel {
private final BehaviorSubject<Dashboard> dashboard;
public DashboardViewModel() {
dashboard = BehaviorSubject.createDefault(Api.getDashboard());
}
public void refresh() {
// I use a Object because null values are not supported
dashboard.onNext(Api.getDashboard());
}
public Observable<Dashboard> getDashboard(){
return dashboard;
}
}
And then in the DashboardFragment just subscribe to viewModel.getDashbaord()

I'm not 100% sure that I understood what you want to do but if I got the question right, you can do something like this:
put a subject inside the model (probably a BehaviorSubject?)
expose it as an observable to the
view and subscribe to it (instead of subscribing to the single)
in the model, when you
receive a new call to refresh() from the ui, do something like
subject.onNext(Api.getDashboard())
in this way, each call to refresh will cause the emission of a new dashboard, and that will be properly bound by the subscription in the view.

View Model keeps creating instance of Live Data

I created the instance of View Model in onCreate method of an activity.
ticketViewModel = ViewModelProviders.of(this).get(TicketViewModel.class);
Then i have a method, AddTicket, which uses viewModel to hit a service and on response from viewModel i dismiss loading animation.
public void addTicket(View view){
ticketViewModel.AddTicket(id).observe(this, response ->{
dismissLoadingAnimation();
}
Now after adding a ticket, user can repress the Add Ticket button, and the addTicket() method will be called again.
but this time observer defined in ViewModel gets called 2 times, resulting in 2 network calls, and 2 dismissLoadingAnimation execution.
And if i keep pressing addTicket button, the number of executing observer defined inside ViewModel keep increases.
This is my View Model code.
public class TicketViewModel extends AndroidViewModel implements IServiceResponse {
MutableLiveData<String> mObservableResponse = new MutableLiveData<String>();
public MutableLiveData AddTicket(String id){
JsonObject jsonObject= new JsonObject();
jsonObject.addProperty("id", id);
NetworkUtility networkUtility= new NetworkUtility(this, ADD_TICKET);
networkUtility.hitService(URL, jsonObject, RequestMethods.POST);
return mObservableResponse;
}
#Override
public void onServiceResponse(String response, String callType){
if(serviceTag.equalsIgnoreCase(ADD_TICKET)){
mObservableResponse.setValue("success");
}
}
}

The number of executing observer defined inside ViewModel keep increases becasue with every click You're registering new observers. You're not supposed to register observer with onClick() method.
You should do it in onCreate() method of your Activity or in onViewCreated method of your fragment. If You'll do that, there won't be a need to removeObserver when You'll finish work. Lifecycle mechanism will cover it for you.
But if you really want answer for you question, this is how you can do it
yourViewModel.yourList.removeObservers(this)
Passing this means passing your Activity, or there is a second way:
yourViewModel.yourList.removeObserver(observer)
val observer = object : Observer<YourObject> {
override fun onChanged(t: YourObject?) {
//todo
}
}

The purpose of Viewmodel is to expose observables (Livedata)
The purpose of View(Activity/Fragment) is to get these observables and observe them
Whenever there is a change in these observables(Livedata) the change is automatically posted to the active subscribed owners(Activity/Fragment), so you need not remove them in onPause/onStop as it is not mandatory
I can suggest few changes to your code to solve the problem with the above mentioned pointers
ViewModel
public class TicketViewModel extends AndroidViewModel implements IServiceResponse {
MutableLiveData<String> mObservableResponse = new MutableLiveData<String>();
public LiveData<String> getResponseLiveData(){
return mObservableResponse;
}
public void AddTicket(String id){
JsonObject jsonObject= new JsonObject();
jsonObject.addProperty("id", id);
NetworkUtility networkUtility= new NetworkUtility(this, ADD_TICKET);
networkUtility.hitService(URL, jsonObject, RequestMethods.POST);
}
#Override
public void onServiceResponse(String response, String callType){
if(serviceTag.equalsIgnoreCase(ADD_TICKET)){
mObservableResponse.setValue("success");
}
}
}
View
onCreate(){
ticketViewModel = ViewModelProviders.of(this).get(TicketViewModel.class);
observeForResponse();
}
private void observeForResponse(){
ticketViewModel.getResponseLiveData().observe(this, response ->{
//do what has to be updated in UI
}
}
public void addTicket(View view){
ticketViewModel.AddTicket(id);
}
Hope this is of help :)

You only need to call the observe once, I prefer to do it in onResume and then call removeObserver in onPause:
Adds the given observer to the observers list
You keep adding listeners to the data so you get multiple callbacks.
Edit:
I took an existing code sample of mine for a Fragment and renamed everything (I hope), there's no example here for setting the data into the ViewModel but it should be ticketViewModel.AddTicket(id); in your case.
public class ListFragment extends Fragment {
private MyViewModel viewModel;
private MyRecyclerViewAdapter recyclerViewAdapter;
private Observer<List<DatabaseObject>> dataObserver;
private RecyclerView recyclerView;
#Override
public View onCreateView(#NonNull LayoutInflater inflater, ViewGroup container,
Bundle savedInstanceState) {
View rootView = inflater.inflate(R.layout.fragment_layout, container, false);
initRecyclerView(rootView, getContext());
initObservers();
return rootView;
}
private void initRecyclerView(View rootView, Context context) {
recyclerViewAdapter = new MyRecyclerViewAdapter(context);
recyclerView = rootView.findViewById(R.id.recycler_view);
recyclerView.setAdapter(recyclerViewAdapter);
LinearLayoutManager linearLayoutManager = new LinearLayoutManager(context);
recyclerView.setLayoutManager(linearLayoutManager);
recyclerView.addItemDecoration(new DividerNoLastItemDecoration());
}
private void initObservers() {
dataObserver = new Observer<List<DatabaseObject>>() {
#Override
public void onChanged(#Nullable final List<DatabaseObject> data) {
recyclerViewAdapter.setData(data);
}
};
}
#Override
public void onResume() {
super.onResume();
initViewModel();
}
private void initViewModel() {
FragmentActivity activity = getActivity();
if (activity != null) {
viewModel = ViewModelProviders.of(activity).get(MyViewModel.class);
viewModel.getData().observe(activity, dataObserver);
}
}
#Override
public void onPause() {
super.onPause();
if (viewModel != null) {
viewModel.getData().removeObserver(dataObserver);
viewModel = null;
}
}
}

I had similar problem. You could try to use SingleLiveEvent
Or, in my, more complicated case, i had to use custom observer. It would looks like this:
public class CustomObserver implements Observer<YourType> {
private MyViewModel mViewModel;
public CustomObserver (){}
public void setViewModel(MyViewModel model) {
mViewModel = model;
}
#Override
public void onChanged(#Nullable YourType object) {
mViewModel.AddTicket(id).removeObserver(this); // removing previous
mmViewModel.refreshTickets(); // refreshing Data/UI
// ... do the job here
// in your case it`s: dismissLoadingAnimation();
}
}
And using it like:
public void addTicket(View view){
ticketViewModel.AddTicket(id).observe(this, myCustomObserver);
}

If you are willing to do some changes, i think we can handle it in much cleaner way
LiveData is meant to be used to contain a property value of a view
In ViewModel
public class TicketViewModel extends AndroidViewModel implements IServiceResponse {
private MutableLiveData<Boolean> showLoadingAnimationLiveData = new MutableLiveData<String>();
public LiveData<Boolean> getShowLoadingAnimationLiveData(){
return showLoadingAnimationLiveData;
}
public void addTicket(String id){
JsonObject jsonObject= new JsonObject();
jsonObject.addProperty("id", id);
NetworkUtility networkUtility= new NetworkUtility(this, ADD_TICKET);
networkUtility.hitService(URL, jsonObject, RequestMethods.POST);
showLoadingAnimationLiveData.setValue(true);
}
#Override
public void onServiceResponse(String response, String callType){
if(serviceTag.equalsIgnoreCase(ADD_TICKET)){
showLoadingAnimationLiveData.setValue(false);
}
}
}
In 'onCreate' of your Activity/Fragment
ticketViewModel.getShowLoadingAnimationLiveData().observe(this,showLoadingAnimation->{
if(showLoadingAnimation != null && showLoadingAnimation){
startLoadingAnimation();
}else{
dismissLoadingAnimation();
}
})
The main concept is to divide the responsibilities,
Activity/Fragment doesn't need to know which process is going on, they only need to know what are the current properties/state of there child views.
We need to maintain a LiveData in ViewModels for each changing property/state depending on Views. ViewModel needs to handle the view states depending on whats happening.
Only responsibility the Activity/Fragment has about a process is to trigger it and forget and ViewModel needs handle everything(like informing Repositories to do the work and changing View Properties).
In your Case,
'addTicket' is a process about which Activity/Fragment doesn't need to know about there status.
The only responsibility of Activity/Fragment about that process is to trigger it.
ViewModel is one who needs to analyze the state of process(in-progress/success/failed) and give appropriate values to the LiveDatas to inform the respective Views

Android manage multi request rxJava on rotation device

I'm using MVVM on android application and i want to manage requests and rxJava on device rotation, how can i disable request after rotation device and countinue from last request?
this is my simple code to know how can i doing that, but i can't find any document and sample code about it
#Override
public void onCreate(#Nullable Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
binding = DataBindingUtil.setContentView(this, R.layout.activity_register);
...
Observer<String> myObserver = new Observer<String>() {
#Override
public void onError(Throwable e) {
// Called when the observable encounters an error
}
#Override
public void onComplete() {
}
#Override
public void onSubscribe(Disposable d) {
}
#Override
public void onNext(String s) {
// Called each time the observable emits data
Log.e("MY OBSERVER", s);
}
};
Observable.just("Hello").subscribe(myObserver);
}
I'm using latest version of rxJava

Handling rotation is a cool challenge in Android. There're a few ways to do that.
1- Services: You can use a service and handle your network requests or other background operations in service. Also with Services, you'll seperate your business logic from ui.
2- Worker Fragment: Worker fragment is a fragment instance without a layout. You should set your worker fragment's retainInstanceState to true. So you'll save your fragment from orientation change and will not lose your background operations.
Why Worker Fragment? If you set retainInstanceState true to a fragment with layout, you'll leak views.
If you're using MVVM you can implement ViewModel as a Worker Fragment which as setRetainInstanceState = true
3- Global Singleton Data Source: You can create a global singleton data source class which handles your operations in an independent scope from Activity / Fragment lifecycle in your application.
4- Loaders: Loaders can recover state from orientation changes. You handle your operations with loaders but they are designed to load data from disk and are not well suited for long-running network requests.
Extra: You can use Path's Priority Job Queue to persist your jobs:
https://github.com/path/android-priority-jobqueue
Edit: You can check my repo for handling device rotation without using Google's new architecture components. (As an example of Worker Fragment which i pointed in my answer.)
https://github.com/savepopulation/bulk-action

You have the following options:
Use some global Singleton, or your Application class, that holds your logic, not within your Activity's lifecycle
Use a Service that runs next to your activity/application
Use a Loader
Global state is often bad and makes your code hard to test / debug. Services tend to be overkill.
For your use case of device rotation and continuing where one left off you'd usually use a Loader, which keeps running on rotation and only gets destroyed once you leave the activity.
I also recently wrote an article about one possible solution to use Loaders together with RxJava to keep state during orientation changes.

You can take advantage of Fragment#setRetainInstance(true). With that flag set, fragment is not destroyed after device rotation and can be used as an object container. Please look at this sample which also stores Observable - https://github.com/krpiotrek/RetainFragmentSample

you need to override
#Override
public void onSaveInstanceState(Bundle outState) {
super.onSaveInstanceState(outState);
}
When device is rotated store data in bundle then inside on create check
#Override
public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
if(savedInstanceState == null){
//saved instance is null
}else{
//get your stored values here
counter = savedInstanceState.getInt("value",0); //here zero is the default value
}
}

How I'm doing this is to have a singleton class (or any long living Object as explained by savepopulation earlier, but - the trick is to store the loaded data in a BehaviorSubject, and subscribe to that subject in the Activity instead of the original network request.
This way:
public class MyNetworkSingleton {
// This static service survives orientation changes
public static MyNetworkSingleton INSTANCE = new MyNetworkSingleton();
private final BehaviorSubject<String> dataSubject = BehaviorSubject.create();
public Observable<String> getData() {
if (!dataSubject.hasValue()) {
refreshData(); // No data is loaded yet, load initial data from network
}
return dataSubject;
}
public void refreshData() {
someDataSourceCall().subscribe(new Observer<String>() {
#Override
public void onError(Throwable e) {
// Remember, this point also needs error handling of some form,
// e.g. propagating the error to the UI as a Toast
}
#Override
public void onComplete() {
}
#Override
public void onSubscribe(Disposable d) {
}
#Override
public void onNext(String data) {
dataSubject.onNext(data); // this refreshes the internally stored data
}
});
}
private Observable<String> someDataSourceCall() {
return // some network request here etc. where you get your data from
}
}
and then:
#Override
public void onCreate(#Nullable Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
...
Observer<String> myObserver = new Observer<String>() {
#Override
public void onError(Throwable e) {
// Called when the observable encounters an error
}
#Override
public void onComplete() {
}
#Override
public void onSubscribe(Disposable d) {
}
#Override
public void onNext(String s) {
// Called each time the observable emits data
Log.e("MY OBSERVER", s);
}
};
MyNetworkSingleton.INSTANCE.getData().subscribe(myObserver);
myRefreshButton.setOnClickListener(new Button.OnClickListener() {
public void onClick(View v) {
// refresh data from network only when button is pressed
MyNetworkSingleton.INSTANCE.refreshData();
}
});
}
This way only first time you need the data from network it will be loaded, or when the user clicks a refresh button (myRefreshButton).

How pass data between activities using RxJava in android?

I need to pass some data between two activities MainActivity and ChildActivity. Button click on MainActivity should open ChildActivity and send event with data. I have singleton:
Subject<Object, Object> subject = new SerializedSubject<>(PublishSubject.create());
and in MainActivity I have the following button click handler:
public void onClick(){
startActivity(new Intent(MainActivity.this, ChildActivity.class));
subject.onNext(new SomeEvent(data));
}
and event listener subscription in ChildActivity :
#Override
protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
addEventListeners();
}
private void addEventListeners() {
subject.ofType(SomeEvent.class)
.observeOn(AndroidSchedulers.mainThread())
.subscribeOn(Schedulers.io()).subscribe(
event -> {
loadData(event.getData());
});
}
When I send event after starting activity and call addEventListeners in ChildActivity onCreate is still not subscribed to this event and loadData() is not called.
What is proper way to pass data between activities using RxJava (if it's possible)?

if anybody needs a complete solution to send data between activities using RxJava2
1- Create the bus:
public final class RxBus {
private static final BehaviorSubject<Object> behaviorSubject
= BehaviorSubject.create();
public static BehaviorSubject<Object> getSubject() {
return behaviorSubject;
}
}
2- the sender activity
//the data to be based
MyData data =getMyData();
RxBus.getSubject().onNext(data) ;
startActivity(new Intent(MainActivity.this, AnotherAct.class));
3-the receiver activity
disposable = RxBus.getSubject().
subscribeWith(new DisposableObserver<Object>() {
#Override
public void onNext(Object o) {
if (o instanceof MyData) {
Log.d("tag", (MyData)o.getData();
}
}
#Override
public void onError(Throwable e) {
}
#Override
public void onComplete() {
}
});
});
4-unSubscribe to avoid memory leacks:
#Override
protected void onDestroy() {
super.onDestroy();
disposable.dispose();
}

Reason:
Problem is that you are using PublishSubject. As per documentation of PublishSubject emits all the subsequent items of the source Observable at the time of the subscription. So in your case it will emit event only if it is subscribed.
Fix for your problem
Instead of using PublishSubject use BehaviorSubject which emits the most recently emitted item and all the subsequent items of the source Observable when a observer subscribe to it.
Browse following link for more details.

rx android vs mosby pattern load data recyclerview

I am working on an Android app. The code I attach is creating a recyclerview. The very first thing we do is to create an asynctask that would fetch data on an SQLite database and load it into the adapter->recylcerview. While the background task is working, a progressdialog is shown to the user.
public class HomeActivity extends AppCompatActivity
{
private RecyclerView recycler;
private RecyclerViewAdapter adapter;
private SwipeRefreshLayout swipeRefresh;
private progressDialog progressDialog;
// ... some code here
#Override
protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
// ... some code here
createRecyclerView();
loadRecyclerView();
// ... some code here
}
private void loadRecyclerView()
{
new LoadingBackgroundTask().execute();
}
private void createRecyclerView()
{
Context context = getApplicationContext();
recycler = (RecyclerView) findViewById(R.id.recycle_view_home);
recycler.setHasFixedSize(true);
RecyclerView.LayoutManager lManager = new LinearLayoutManager(context);
recycler.setLayoutManager(lManager);
adapter = new RecyclerViewAdapter();
recycler.setAdapter(adapter);
recycler.setItemAnimator(new DefaultItemAnimator());
}
private class LoadingBackgroundTask extends AsyncTask<Void, Void, List<items>> {
#Override
protected void onPreExecute() {
super.onPreExecute();
progressDialog = ProgressDialog.show(HomeActivity.this, getString(R.string.dialog_load_list),getString(R.string.dialog_please_wait), false, false);
}
#Override
protected List doInBackground(Void... params) {
List<items> lists;
//Data Source Class ( SQLite)
ListDS listDS = new ListDS(getApplicationContext());
list = listDS.getList();
return list;
}
#Override
protected void onPostExecute(List result) {
super.onPostExecute(result);
//it inserts de list on recyclerview performing animation
adapter.animate(result);
progressDialog.dissmiss();
swipeRefresh.setRefreshing(false);
recycler.scrollToPosition(0);
}
}
}
So far, so good. However, as you probably know this code has some well-known issues; for example if I rotate the screen while asynctask is doing its magic, it will crash the app.
I've tried an alternative I've seen Googling, rxandroid.
(Sorry if I typed something wrong, I am doing it by memory)
public class HomeActivity extends AppCompatActivity
{
private Subscriber suscriptor;
private progressDialog progressDialog;
//some code ....
#Override
protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
suscriptor = new Subscriber() {
#Override
public void onCompleted() {
progressDialog.dismiss();
Log.d("SUSCRIPTOR","ON COMPLETE");
}
#Override
public void onError(Throwable e) {
Log.d("SUSCRIPTOR","ON ERROR");
}
#Override
public void onNext(Object o) {
adapter.animate((List<items>)o);
}
};
Observable.create(
new Observable.OnSubscribe<List<items>>() {
#Override
public void call(Subscriber<? super List<items>> sub) {
progressDialog = ProgressDialog.show(HomeActivity.this, getString(R.string.dialog_load_list),getString(R.string.dialog_please_wait), false, false);
List<items> lists;
//Data Source Class ( SQLite)
ListDS listDS = new ListDS(getApplicationContext());
list = listDS.getList();
sub.onNext(list);
sub.onCompleted();
}
#Override
protected void finalize() throws Throwable {
super.finalize();
Log.d("OBSERAVBLE","FINALIZED");
}
})
.observeOn(AndroidSchedulers.mainThread())
.subscribeOn(Schedulers.newThread())
.cache()
.subscribe(suscriptor);
}
#Override
public void onDestroy()
{
if(suscriptor!=null)
{
if(!suscriptor.isUnsubscribed())
{
suscriptor.unsubscribe();
}
}
super.onDestroy();
}
}
Now the app is not crashing anymore when I rotate the screen. However, the observable keeps working on the background until it finishes but as I unsubscribe to avoid crashing, I don't receive the results properly. Moreover, progressbar disappears even though the observable keeps working as I mentioned.
Looking for a solution, I found there is a pattern called "Ted Mosby" which seems to solve my problem. Although it looks promising, I think is too much coding for something I felt it is not worth it and that rxandroid may have a workaround.
So, my question is how can I get what I want without getting immersed in an architectural coding mess too big for my purpose? Could you give an example if you guys have solved this? Do you think I am wrong and I should implement TedMosby pattern?

Mosby is a Model-View-Presenter (MVP) library. So the pattern you named "ted mosby pattern" is actually MVP.
But you didn't have understood what MVP is all about. It's not about retaining async running taks, even thought this could be achieved with Mosby. MVP is about separation of concerns. View is just displaying UI elements, Presenter is controlling the View, i.e. the presenter tells the view: now display the progress diaolog, now hide the progress dialog, etc. In other words, the presenter controls the state of the view. The Model could be an async task or a RxJava Observable. The Presenter than gets the result back and tell the view to display it. You code is decoupled into 3 layers Model (also called business logic) and Presenter and View. The advantage is that you can change the view (i.e. replace progress dialog with an progressbar widget) without touching any code that loads data (Presenter and business logic). Additionally with MVP your code becomes testable.
So what you should compare is: Should I use AsyncTask or RxJava for loading data. With Mosby you would execute your http request in the presenter. While orientation changes are done the presenter doesn't get destroyed (and hence the background task doesn't get canceled).
However, MVP is not the solution for everything. If you have to ensure that a single http call is executed correctly (i.e. sign up for a community) you should think about using an android service.

What you can do is whatever you do in activity like your AsycTask and RecyclerView, put it inside a fragment and, setRetainInstance(true) in onCreateView() method of fragment and load that fragment in your activity.
setRetainInstance(true) won't let your fragment instance destroy when screen is rotated.

Your Observable should handle himself the fact on unsubscription. There are two mechanism for this:
check subscriber.isUnsubscribed. You can do it between or after "heavy" steps
add unsubscription callback. You can use it to stop long running operations, release resources etc
Take a look at this code:
Observable.create(
new Observable.OnSubscribe<List<items>>() {
#Override
public void call(Subscriber<? super List<items>> sub) {
sub.add(Subscriptions.create(new Action0() {
#Override
public void call() {
cancelLongRunningOperationIfItStillRunning();
}
}));
if (!sub.isUnsubscribed()) {
//start long running operation here
}
}
})
.doOnSubscribe(new Action0() {
#Override
public void call() {
}
})
You shouldn't reference to your activity/context/progress dialog etc inside Observable. Instead use doOnSubscribe if you want to do some side effects.