Develop Reference

Java Android Studio Layout - ImageButton position accordly with xml background

First of all I'm quite new in layout development so sorry if this is a noob question.
I'm trying to create an xml with a sort of an interactive background. So I put a background picture and added some ImageButtons with pictures like part of the background layout (to make them invisible).
Everything works as expected but the position of these ImageButtons change from the editor on the base of the device where the app is installed (or the AVD device too). I'm using a constraintlayout.
At the moment, my ImageButtons xml is:
<ImageButton
android:id="#+id/IB1"
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:layout_marginStart="83dp"
android:layout_marginTop="14dp"
android:layout_weight="1"
android:background="#android:color/transparent"
android:src="#drawable/IB1"
android:scaleType="fitCenter"
app:layout_constraintStart_toStartOf="parent"
app:layout_constraintTop_toTopOf="parent" />
I understand that this happen because the background picture is resized on the base of the device screen where the app run (and this is in general correct because I want that the background cover all the layout space even if in portrait mode the picture is clearly very bad rendered; think to a tree, when you rotate the phone it is compressed on the vertical side and expanded on the horizontal side).
Exist a way to do what I want? Maybe with another type of layout or with some properties?
Thanks a lot for the help!

How to align a button corresponding to the background image for multiple screens?

I am very new to this forum and really need help in something I got stuck in during developing the app.
This is the image I am using as my background (I named it SampleBG in xml):
https://i.gyazo.com/946507c2690c8170b54a1ace752906bd.png
Basically, this is what I want my design to look like:
https://i.gyazo.com/896e29846dfd9e4bc9ab15ca39f9a796.png
And for smaller devices, it automatically resizes and looks like this:
[i.gyazo.com/f4278339cc8f246187c011474796a12c.png]
And when I switch to a tablet device, it automatically looks like this:
[i.gyazo.com/1b0e233a0b1731148664e0ac78a05f08.png]
And the above is exactly what I want it to look like. The wooden signs are in the same position for all sizes...
But the problem is:
I want the wooden signs to be clickable, because they are meant to be buttons.
So, I tried to use a button widget and made it transparent and placed it over the wooden signs... it worked but it only worked for that particular size I designed it for (designed it for Nexus 5 to be specific).... However, when I switched to the Nexus One layout, or Nexus 9 layout, etc, the buttons weren't placed correctly over the wooden signs and thus didn't work.
I want a way to make the wooden signs clickable and and the buttons to be fixed with the signs for all device sizes/etc, and at the same time.
I would prefer an xml solution but a programmatic solution is nice too.
Here's the layout code right now, it just using the background image right now....
`<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<RelativeLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
android:layout_width="match_parent"
android:layout_height="match_parent"
android:background="#drawable/sampleBG">
</RelativeLayout>`
NOTE:
I have tried using the door image as the background only and then adding the wooden signs manually by using the ImageButton widgets, but the wooden signs were being placed differently for different screens and it looked odd, so therefore I fixed the wooden signs with the background (in Photoshop).. now I just want the signs to be clickable.

This is a sample code that you can use, in order to achieve this:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<RelativeLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
android:layout_width="match_parent"
android:layout_height="match_parent"
android:background="#mipmap/ic_launcher"
android:paddingBottom="#dimen/activity_vertical_margin"
android:paddingLeft="#dimen/activity_horizontal_margin"
android:paddingRight="#dimen/activity_horizontal_margin"
android:paddingTop="#dimen/activity_vertical_margin"
tools:context="com.test.androidtestapp.MainActivity">
<ImageButton
android:id="#+id/equationsButton"
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:layout_above="#+id/equationsOfTheWeekButton"
android:layout_centerInParent="true"
android:layout_margin="20dp"
android:background="#mipmap/ic_launcher"
android:contentDescription="Equations Button"
android:onClick="equationsButtonClick" />
<ImageButton
android:id="#+id/equationsOfTheWeekButton"
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:layout_centerInParent="true"
android:layout_margin="20dp"
android:background="#mipmap/ic_launcher"
android:contentDescription="Equations Of The Week Button"
android:onClick="equationsOfTheWeekButtonClick" />
<ImageButton
android:id="#+id/settingsButton"
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:layout_below="#+id/equationsOfTheWeekButton"
android:layout_centerInParent="true"
android:layout_margin="20dp"
android:background="#mipmap/ic_launcher"
android:contentDescription="Settings Button"
android:onClick="SettingsButtonClick" />
</RelativeLayout>
You need to slice your image and then just change the background attributes in the code above. When you achieve that, you can change the background to a selector where you can change the image depending on the different states -> when it's clicked, focused, normal; that would make it more user friendly.

The wooden signs should NOT be on the background image.
Instead, make a real background image (ie. with only the "door" background) and make separate images with the signs.
Then use these images to build your buttons.
Edit: I did read your note about the fact that you tried that, but you should definitively go this way. Another advantage is that you'll be able to easily make the buttons reacting to the user click, with "onPress" states, which would be impossible (or at least difficult and ugly) with a single background image.

You can separate wood pics that you want to be button and give them as a background for buttons. For example, you named the wooden pics as 'wood1.png' , 'wood2.png' and 'wood3.png' and by this sample code you can set them for background image for buttons :
<ImageButton
android:id="#+id/button1"
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:background="#drawable/wood1"
/>
Or you can design your app by your own solution that described but you should create your app design by different layout for different size device :
layout-large
layout-small
layout-normal
layout-xlarge
layout-xxlarge
you can search about autoLayout design in android app and find your solution better..

android - best way to place objects / design an activity

So I received a graphic interface for an application I'm building. It has some images and texts and the images are set in a specific way, and some text goes inside or on top some images.
In the android project I opened I get the default activity which is RelativeLayout, but it's hard to set all the elements exactly where they should be with the designer and editing the XML directly seems like a pain.
I also see that elements that I add always "align" to something or right/left to some other element - but what I really want to do is place them at a specific location (so the end result will be the same as the design I got). If I was building it for the web I would have used absolute positions.
What is the correct way to go about this in android?
Thanks
EDIT
I managed to start implementing some elements of the design in a manner that makes them look ok on the eclipse Graphical Layout and on my device.
Is this XML ok - or am I using it wrong:
<ImageView
android:id="#+id/imgClouds"
android:layout_width="match_parent"
android:layout_height="50dp"
android:layout_alignParentLeft="true"
android:layout_alignParentTop="true"
android:contentDescription="#string/layout_activity_main_imgClouds"
android:scaleType="centerCrop"
android:src="#drawable/clouds_ltr" />
<ImageView
android:id="#+id/imgBaby"
android:layout_below="#+id/imgClouds"
android:layout_width="50dp"
android:layout_height="52dp"
android:layout_alignParentLeft="true"
android:layout_alignParentTop="true"
android:layout_marginLeft="5dp"
android:layout_marginTop="75dp"
android:contentDescription="#string/layout_activity_main_imgBaby"
android:src="#drawable/baby" />
<ImageView
android:id="#+id/imgBubble"
android:layout_toLeftOf="#+id/imgBaby"
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:layout_alignParentLeft="false"
android:layout_alignParentTop="false"
android:layout_marginLeft="56dp"
android:layout_marginTop="-5dp"
android:layout_marginRight="5dp"
android:src="#drawable/bubble_ltr" />
</RelativeLayout>

This is primarily opinion based, but there's certain things most android developers will agree, "Absolute Position" is not an option in Android, because of the OS Nature like Fragmentation in Device Screen Sizes/Densities, having an absolute position of the elements will lead to a crappy app, it will look good only in the device you are using and chances are that all the other devices will not look as you expect, you really need to look at the android design patterns and best practices to avoid a terrible GUI implementation, RelativeLayout is the best way to go, in android you must learn to love it...
Also the sooner you get used to work with XML directly in layouts will be better for you, most IDEs that help out with this functionality end up adding a lot of unnecessary code, once you go through the learning curve to build layouts using XML it totally worth it.
Hope it helps!
Regards!

Missing or Incorrect images and backgrounds randomly throughout app lifecycle

I was hoping someone here might have an idea what causes this sort of behaviour:
Throughout my application, in seemingly random places and in random conditions I'm observing this strange UI issue. Images are on occasion being loaded black (with the correct bounds) or with the incorrect image source (again, with the correct bounds). This effects ImageViews and has effected android:background tags with references to colour resources.
My application relies on 6 library projects, it runs Native Code via a Service and Activities in the App use GlSurfaceViews (although, not all Activities which display the problem contain OpenGL components). The problem could I suppose be from any of these places or a combination of them through using large amounts of memory.
You can see this behaviour in the following screen shots:
This is actually a 6 or so pixel wide column separator image which has been incorrectly drawn into my ImageView (the ImageView seems to have correctly sized itself).
When going out of the Application and then back in again (repeatedly) it instead appeared (and remained) like so:
After a Force Clear and a Clear App Data it returned to the correct format:
As you can also see the Magnifying Glass image next to it is displaying fine in each of these. The problems with these missing/incorrect images and backgrounds seems to happen randomly, throughout the application lifecycle, and I've been unable to find a way of reproducing it.
The layouts for these images are nothing special, I'm not doing anything funny during the rendering lifecycle (i'm not overriding onDraw() or onMeasure() or the like). The source of these images aren't being set dynamically but via the XML.
As you can see from the above example, it's not a build issue as it occurs between app lifecycles not between installs. It's also happening on different devices, Samsung 8.9, Acer Iconia Tab, Motarola XOOM,
It seems to me to be some sort of error with the reference table, could it perhaps have been nudged by my native code? Or is it an effect of me in some stages of the application using too much memory?
Here's the XML source for the above example:
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
android:id="#+id/browseProgressWrapper"
android:layout_width="match_parent"
android:layout_height="#dimen/actionbar_compat_height"
android:orientation="horizontal">
<RelativeLayout android:layout_width="#dimen/search_bar_width"
android:layout_height="match_parent">
<EditText android:id="#+id/browseFilter"
android:layout_width="match_parent"
android:layout_height="match_parent"
android:layout_marginTop="4dp"
android:layout_marginLeft="5dp"
android:imeOptions="actionSearch"
android:background="#drawable/edit_text_blue"
android:maxLength="30"/>
<ImageView android:id="#+id/clearSearch"
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:layout_alignParentRight="true"
android:layout_centerVertical="true"
android:src="#drawable/ic_input_delete"
android:layout_marginRight="5dp"/>
</RelativeLayout>
<ImageView android:id="#+id/browseFilterButton"
android:src="#drawable/ic_menu_search"
android:scaleType="center"
android:layout_width="#dimen/actionbar_compat_height"
android:layout_height="#dimen/actionbar_compat_height"
android:layout_gravity="center_vertical"
android:minWidth="#dimen/actionbar_compat_height"/>
</LinearLayout>
A more full description of the code / layout surrounding another such occurrence I happened to get the screenshot for:
I have a "Settings" Activity which restarts my app after saving new settings details. It does this by stopping a Service, calling a new Activity (the Splash Activity) and finishing itself:
mConfiguration.save();
mConfiguration = new Configuration(Configuration.getInstance());
getActivity().stopService(new Intent(getActivity(), NativeService.class));
getActivity().finish();
startActivity(new Intent(getActivity(), SplashActivity.class));
Most of the time (and on most devices) this works fine, the Splash Activity contains an image which loads correctly. Sometimes though on some devices the Splash Activity loads either an incorrect resource (what my testers refer as "an upside down Nike tick") or just a blank box (as seen below). Does anyone know why?
Here is the Layout for the Splash page, as you can see it's pretty simple, no surprises:
<?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:background="#color/ContentBackgroundColor"
android:orientation="vertical" >
<View
android:layout_width="0dp"
android:layout_height="0dp"
android:layout_weight="2" />
<ImageView
android:id="#+id/image"
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:layout_gravity="center_horizontal"
android:src="#drawable/manager_android_400" />
<View
android:layout_width="0dp"
android:layout_height="0dp"
android:layout_weight="1" />
<ProgressBar
style="#android:style/Widget.ProgressBar.Large"
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:layout_gravity="center_horizontal" />
<View
android:layout_width="0dp"
android:layout_height="0dp"
android:layout_weight="2" />
</LinearLayout>
Theory tested and debunct:
I've theorised that this could be a processor/memory issue where the Layout isn't being drawn fully before the Splash screen exits and moves onto the next Activity so I put in this piece of code:
image = (ImageView) findViewById(R.id.image);
image.getViewTreeObserver().addOnGlobalLayoutListener(new OnGlobalLayoutListener() {
#Override
public void onGlobalLayout() {
image.getViewTreeObserver().removeGlobalOnLayoutListener(this);
moveToStartScreen.start();
}
});
The hope was the code above would make sure the Image is definitely loaded before moving onto the Start page but seems to have had no observable effect.
Another Theory
I was also wondering if this could be being caused by the R.id / R.colour / R.drawable resources some how being currupted in program execution? Does anyone know why that might happen.
Could my native code be running rampant on some memory addresses that Android isn't correctly allocating?
Has anybody noticed this before - or perhaps know why this behaviour occurs?

Graeme, I had almost the same problem and found out that it was a reported bug of the android plattform. It was corrected in the 3.0 version I think. Which API are you compiling with? Try to build with the last available api and be sure to compile with JDK 1.6
If your problem is related to this bug, this should fix the problem.

This is a simple problem of refresh, clean, and rebuild.
Images in your various drawable folders or resource id indices are out of sequence because they were either changed outside of the eclipse IDE (via external source control such as GIT, SVN or other edits) and not refreshed in the eclipse navigator. Or, the files may have been updated in a library project upon which your UI Activity depends.
I have found that although .java file dependencies are propagated throughout the system, this is not always the case for resources such as images and .xml files.
The solution is fairly simple, clean everything, refresh all of your projects, and rebuild. The stretched or black edges should be gone.
Note: The predominant manifestation of this problem occurs when 9-patch images become treated like standard .png images. This means that they get stretched in a linear manner across the image instead of just at the edges. To me, this explains your 'Torn/Stretched' example. I have seen similar often. Another common manifestation is that text strings occasionally get displayed with the wrong resources!

iOS to Android: How to display a TextView

I have a background in iPhone development, which may be a cause of some of my confusion with Android, which I am very new at developing.
My question is this: How to I create two TextViews, and specify their exact location on screen? For example, on the iPhone, I would create a UILabel, generate a rectangular frame that specified the label's size and position, and then set this rectangle to the frame property of the UILabel.
If you can help me understand the similarities with Objective C and iOS' UILabel, that would be most helpful.

On Android, we don't use absolute screen positions. This is highly discouraged. It's pretty understandable that you think this way if you are coming from iOS. But you need to revise your habits.
Instead of absolute positions, we use layouts, such as LinearLayout, RelativeLayout or FrameLayout. All of these allow you to arrange your views dynamically. And in many cases, it will automagically adapt to the screen size, which vary a lot from device to device.
Actually, there's nothing exotic about dynamic layouts. Many major UI toolkits, such as GTK, or Qt, work similarly. Pixel position are a bad idea in my opinion, except maybe in the Apple world, where the OS and the hardware are tightly coupled, but this is an exception actually.
So, in your case, all that you need is to put your text views into the appropriate layout. Please read the documentation and tutorials about the different types of layouts mentioned above to decide which one is best. The question is how you want your views to be placed relatively to each other.

Create a basic Android project in eclipse. You will be having a main.xml layout file in your project. You can open it in Eclipse using Ctrl+Shift+r and keying in main.xml
copy paste this in your xml after clearing its content.
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout
xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
android:orientation="horizontal"
android:layout_width="fill_parent"
android:layout_height="fill_parent">
<TextView
android:id="#+id/textView1"
android:layout_width="fill_parent"
android:text="TextView One"
android:layout_height="fill_parent"
android:layout_weight="1"></TextView>
<TextView
android:id="#+id/textView2"
android:layout_width="fill_parent"
android:text="TextView Two"
android:layout_height="fill_parent"
android:layout_weight="1"></TextView>
</LinearLayout>