Android - how to start chain of activities? - android

I intend to start 3 activities in a chain (like from main open Activities A, B and then C, which will be visible for the user), but I wasn't able to find some way how to do that in Android. Do not ask me why, I just have to do that for restoring my application state, where is was before.
Thanks for any ideas
Waypoint
Edit:
Ok, I have tried opening activities in For cycle, but they aren't opened properly. They are chained, but recreated only when I press back button and they display to me. I need some solution which leads to: open A, if A is opened check if needs to open B -> YES, open B, check if needs to open C -> YES, open C, no need to open another activity -> FINISH

prior to start any activity , decide which activity should be start .
Lets take your case >>first check for B , if yes check for C , now open the required 1 .
i understand comparable data is inside the activities, but a right data structure will always allow you to access the data wherever and whenever it actually requires .

For future readers: if you want to start activity with proper back stack, you should use TaskStackBuilder.
define the natural hierarchy for your activities by adding the android:parentActivityName attribute to each element in your app manifest file
create an instance of TaskStackBuilder and call addNextIntentWithParentStack(), passing it the Intent for the activity you want to start.
For more details see official documentation

Override the onResume-method in each activity. Add the check and the start of the activity there.
public void onResume() {
if( condition )
startActivity( intentForTheNextActivity );
}
Where condition is whatever condition you might have (in your example if B should be started, C should be started etc.) and intentForTheNextActivity is the intent for the following activity in the chain (e.g. if now in A, the intent is for B etc.).
I'm having a very hard time understanding exactly what it is you're trying to do. Sometimes it seems like it's a chain (A opens B, B opens C and so forth) sometimes it seems you want some random flow (A opens B, B opens A, A opens B, B opens C) - which makes it really hard to give you a specific answer.
What I can do, is recommend that you read up on the following:
Activity Lifecycle
Starting Activities and getting results (in particular the methods startActivityForResult and setResult)
If you need more help than this - you need to explain yourself better (maybe with a diagram or some sample code of what you have tried so far).

You didn't provide any information of what you've tried, so i'll give you the simplest answer:
method startActivity(Intent intent), more info here.
Edit: Hmm, how about this? I don't have SDK around me now, but i can provide a concept. I'm not sure if it works, but i hope it'll guide you to soultion.
Let's imagine this is ActivityA's code:
#Override
public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
if (doINeedActivityB) {
Intent activityC = new Intent(this, ActivityC.class);
this.startActivity(activityA);
}
if (doINeedActivityC) {
Intent activityC = new Intent(this, ActivityC.class);
this.startActivity(activityC);
}
}

Related

Activity back tracking in Activity stack - Android

I am having two activities, Activity A and activity B.
Activity A starts activity B.
So, the activity stack after some interactions will look like A -> B -> A -> B.
The problem:
I need to go the first activity A in the stack from activity B (last B in the stack). I am using FLAG_CLEAR_TOP as well as Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK for achieving the same.
Right now, the activity A (stack pos 3) will be shown from activity B, but when I press back button, the activity B will be shown again (since activity B (stack pos 2) is already there in the stack).
How do I overcome this issue?
PS: I tried using launchMode singleInstance and singleTask for activities A and B, but that solution doesn't work for my app.
Thanks in advance.
Add finish (); after switching activites like
Intent intent = new Intent (activity_a.this, activity_b.class);
startActivity(intent);
finish ();
Avoid creating multiple instances of activities if possible. Android isn't designed to allow you to identify (and return to) a specific instance of an Activity in the stack, if you have multiple instances of the same Activity in the stack.
Depending on your application, there are different ways to solve the problem.
One way that may work for you is to use <activity-alias>, which allows you to reuse an existing Activity implementation by another name.
Another way would be to create another Activity class, that just inherits from the original, so that you have 2 classes with exactly the same code, but with different names.
The best way is to rearchitect your application so that you only ever have one instance of each Activity alive at any given time. You can do this by rearranging the task stack using Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_REORDER_TO_FRONT.

How to remove old activities from backstack? (true way)

I'm new to Android development and here's my problem:
I have 2 activities: A and B.
From A, I call B via startActivity(new Intent(A.this, B.class))
From B, I do some things and return to A the same way: startActivity(new Intent(B.this, A.class))
However, when on new-A I press "Back" button, first I see B class and then the old (unchanged version) of A class.
I've tried placing finish(); inside onPause() method. However, then my Activity crashes on orientation change.
How can I properly control activity backstack? Thanks in advance.
When you call startActivity without any additional flags, you will create a new instance of the Activity specified. This means that your back stack ends up looking like this:
A -> B -> A(2)
You have two options:
First option, you can add flags on the Intent that instructs it to reorder A to the front if it is already present in the back stack. Note that this will not close B; you have to call finish() in B afterward.
Intent intent = new Intent(B.this, A.class);
intent.addFlags(Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_REORDER_TO_FRONT);
startAcvitiy(intent);
finish();
Second option is to use startActivityForResult instead of startActivity in A and have Activity B pass a result back to A. I think this is much cleaner and it gives you a very easy way to react to what happened when B was finished (e.g. you can update your UI). See this guide from the Android developers site.
Either StartActivityForResult or think about using fragments. If you need to jump between activities think about why you are doing this? If you are passing info between the two then there are a couple of options. Fragments give you the option and you can hold the data on the Activity that hosts the fragments or you can have a Singleton living in an Application class that you would extend.
Read about activity lifecycle - here. You have to implement saving of instance.
It sounds like that rather than calling startActivity in to go back to A, you can just call instead finish();. This will land you back on your previous Activity.
Alternatively you can accomplish the same if you use FLAG_ACTIVITY_CLEAR_TOP:
Intent intent = new Intent(B.this, A.class);
intent.addFlags(Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_CLEAR_TOP);
startActivity(intent);
Regarding the accepted answer's suggestion to use FLAG_ACTIVITY_REORDER_TO_FRONT - for your case it really doesn't matter. but in a slightly different case where you have A->B->C and you use REORDER to go back to A, you'd actually end up with a stack that looks like B->C->A. With CLEAR_TOP, you'd end up with just A. Point is, REORDER is meant to REORDER, CLEAR_TOP is supposed to pop the backstack. In your simple case they happen to accomplish the same, but in my opinion it's better practice to use the flags as they're intended.

starting existing android activity

hi i have an application
A is launcher activity from that i create B activity. From B i want to go back to A without deleting the instance of B(so no finish) then i want to create a new instance of B lets call it B2. And from A i want to be able to show B or B2 without recreating them.
again i stress that B,B2 are the same class just diffrent instances.
from B when i want to go to A i thought of using
Intent myIntent = new Intent(getBaseContext(), MainAct.class);
myIntent.setFlags(Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_SINGLE_TOP);
startActivity(myIntent);
but i think that its a mistake because it will clear other instances.
what intent must i use in the cases?
in c# windows application we would do B.hide();A.show(). then from A we could do
A.hide(); B.SHOW() or B1.show();
how can i do that in android please?
If B is an Activity, you can't have two different instances of it.
You can have 2 different Activities that extend the same class, but you've indicated you don't want that.
You need to find a way to change the appearance and behavior of B rather than creating a new instance.
Please consider reading about the Activity Lifecycle.
use FLAG_ACTIVITY_REORDER_TO_FRONT
from the doc
If set in an Intent passed to Context.startActivity(), this flag will
cause the launched activity to be brought to the front of its task's
history stack if it is already running.

Android activity flow & navigation up/back

I'm working on an Android application that has 4 activities :
A -> B -> C -> D
When I'm going from A to B, from B to C, or from C to D, I put some extras in the Intent.
I guess navigation for something like that is quite simple: there's no need to redefine the back button, and for the "up" action bar button, a simple "finish()" would be to correct way to do it (?)
Now, the problem is that from A, I can also go directly to D. Still no need to redefine the back button, it will go back to A, and that's what I want, but for the "up" button, it must go to C, and from C, up will lead to B, ...
What is the correct way to do that?
Thanks for your answers
To control the flow between the various activities explicitly, I call finish() in each activity when I respond to user input by starting a new activity:
startActivity(intentForNewActivity);
finish();
That leads to that instance of the orignal Activity being destroyed. In each activity I create an Intent to start up the activity I want to go back to. Then write:
#Override public void onBackPressed() {
startActivity(intentWhereIWantToGoNext);
finish();
}
I originally wrote here that I called finish() in onStop(), which does work while the app remains running, but does not give the desired result if the app is stopped for any reason. Sorry for the confusion, and thanks to PravinCG, who, while his comments were not entirely on the right track, at least made me think more carefully.
One of the way is to actually have the same stack but use extras to perform the toggle.
For Instance: When you want to go from A -> D
go from A->B->C->D and use intents to handle whether you want to simply bypass activity or display it. Same is the case in reverse order user resultIntent for that.
Place the following code before the last bracket.
#Override
protected void onPause() {
// TODO Auto-generated method stub
super.onPause();
finish();
}

Android: Using search API to do equivalent of startActivityForResult

I have an activity that is started from the search api. I would like it to "return" some values to the activity that was running when the search was instigated, in a similar way to startActivityForResult, but I can't see how to do it. Any suggestions?
Activity A -> (startActivity) ->
Activity B -> (Search) -> Activity C
-> (return) -> Activity B
At the moment I'm starting a new instance of activity B using the values. This works, but the activity stack is then not the way it should be. Ie, pressing back from B would go back via C, B, A, instead of just A.
Any suggestions on the way to do this?
I'd like to know how to do this too. The only kludge I can think of is to have public static variables in B to pass the result back in, and then have C call finish() after setting said variables, with B processing the results in the onResume() method.
I've come up with a solution: to combine B and C. Instead of having a separate search handling activity, I can get B to handle the search and pop up a dialog with the results in it. It doesn't feel elegant, I'd much rather have the separate, but it's the best solution I could find. This is assuming, of course, that it works, but I can't currently see a reason for it not to (in my particular situation).
EDIT: Here's the code. EditLocation is A, GetLocationMap is B
https://github.com/spookypeanut/Wake-Me-At/tree/e0dde4153c375c20bec3d7201b4faac2300f5956

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