How do I layout a button bar with buttons of different heights? - android

How do I go about implementing a button bar with buttons of different shapes and heights? As an example (please excuse my poor drawing skills for this quick mockup):
The example bar has 3 buttons, with the middle button (3) a different shape and height than the other 2 buttons (1,2). The button bar will be a view that is included and merged into other views so as to seem to float on top of the parent view.
I was thinking of implementing buttons 1 and 2 into a layout, and then button 3 as another layout that I then merge with the first two button's layout.

like my previous comrades said, you need some kind of layout or container that can have a background (if you wish for button #3 to hoover above it) then use relative layout for mixing the two the disadvantage of this other than complexity is that youcannot relate to the other two buttons since they reside in a different layout.
More elegant solution may be to have a special background drawable that can:
have a method setCurrentHeight() that will specify the height the actual viewable section should have the rest will be filled with transparent color.
override it's own draw so just before it's drawing it will have a callback called, call back you can register yourself to.
then you can register the callback in your activity to take the current position of the #3 button and set the height accordingly, this way you are still with one layout with special drawable as background.
A customized LevelDrawable might do the trick.

I would layout this bar as follows:
A RelativeLayout as a container for the rest, with height set to wrap_content and alignparentbottom = true
An ImageView for the bar
2 Buttons with a transparent background (Button 1 and 2)
Button 3 is a custom Button with a custom Image of a trapezoid as background
So you will have a Layout similar to this:
<RelativeLayout
...>
<ImageView
.../>
<Button
... Button 1 />
<Button
... Button 2 />
<Button
... Button 3 />
</RelativeLayout>

I don't exactly know that this will work, and I can't test it, but you might give something like this a try; I believe it can all be done elegantly through XML.
Have a RelativeLayout (id:mainLayout) that will contain all of your views, wrap_content for both dimensions.
Have a blank View as your first child that will serve as your background bar
Set the View's background color/image to what you want; layout_width to fill_parent; layout_height to wrap_content; layout_alignTop="#id/leftButton"; layout_alignBottom="#id/leftButton".
Add an ImageButton for your center button (id:bigButton), wrap_content for both dimensions; layout_centerInParent="true".
Add an ImageButton for your left button (id:leftButton), wrap_content for both dimensions; layout_toLeftOf="#id/bigButton"; layout_centerInParent="true".
Add an ImageButton for your right button (id:rightButton), wrap_content for both dimensions; layout_toRightOf="#id/bigButton"; layout_centerInParent="true".
In my head, I believe this works, but I could be off. Regardless, something to think about, and I hope it helps you find a solution. :)

Better you can tablelayout with different button styles or relative layout for button "3"

Related

Complext "button" (LinearLayout with child views) with background drawable - on children click doesn't reflect the "state_pressed"

I have a LinearLayout that has 2 children: a ImageView aligned left and a TextView aligned right.
I've set the background of the LinearLayout to be a #drawable XML resource that has two <item> tags. One of them has android:state_pressed="true". Also, the LinearLayout has android:clickable="true".
When the LinearLayout is clicked it correctly changes its background to the android:state_pressed style, but clicking on one of its children doesn't propagate the click action up to the LinearLayout.
Is there a way to easily achieve a click state on the parent view when a child view is clicked?
Dont use Both as it will give Exception
Use this to your parent
android:addStatesFromChildren="true"
Or add in your child views
`android:duplicateParentState="true"`
Hope it helps
not sure if it works for your specific implementation, but a very easy way of achieving this "complex" button is by making a normal button and using android:drawableLeft or android:drawableRight or android:drawableTop or android:drawableBottom and android:drawablePaddig to achieve the same visual result in just one view.
for example:
<LinearLayout orientation=vertical>
<ImageView/>
<TextView/>
</LinearLayout>
is pretty much the same as
<Button
drawableLeft="#drawable/..."
text="..."
/>
that way your whole layout is simpler and the pressed states works out-of-the-box.
Consider using a single TextView and using the android:drawableLeft or android:drawableRight attribute to show your image. It's better design and more performant than a LinearLayout with two children.
If that won't work for you, try adding android:addStatesFromChildren="true" to the LinearLayout.

Android - Fading Layout Border

I am working on an android app and I have a scrollview, and in that, I have a linear layout in the main activity. I want to have the top and bottom borders of the linear layout to be "faded
" so as the user scrolls down the child views in the layout will "fade out" as the go down.
Here is an example of what I am trying to achieve in my linearlayout or scrollview (the "fading bottom border".
Thanks for you help!
Subby
You can do that by using the following attributes in the ScrollView.
android:requiresFadingEdge="vertical"
android:fadingEdgeLength="20dp"
If you want it on devices before API14, you need to use the following:
android:requiresFadingEdge="vertical"
android:fadingEdgeLength="20dp"
NOTE: This is actually discouraged as it is seen to have a negative performance impact on devices.
At the bottom of your layout, you can have a view above the listView, and set Gradient Color for the view, and also make it semitransparent, then you can have the effect you want.

Bottom margin Android LinearLayout item in XML ignored, but works in Java code

I am developing an app with an activity with member reactions on a hike event. The reactions are the yellow "balloons" which are made using a LinearLayout. Each item is constructed from a XML file (listitem_deelnemerreactie.xml) which defines the layout for a reaction item. The top level of this layout file is a LinearLayout my itself.
I want some spacing between the separate elements, as well as some right margin. The most straightforward way to so this should be: setting a bottom and right margin on the top-level LinearLAyout element of the listitem_deelnemerreactie.xml layout file.
But setting the bottom margin on the LinearLayout has no effect on the vertical spacing, though the right margin does have an effect.
The only way to be able to set a vertical margin appears to be: setting is in the Java code, after attaching the inflated view to the container.
See the two images for the effect and the code.
Though setting the margins in the code is a working workaround, I still think it is strange this cannot be achieved in the XML. Why is the bottom margin attribute ignored while the right margin is not?
Any ideas?
Have you tried to set an android:padding="10dp" for example on your elements to spaced them ?

Android top left button

I want to make an about button in the top left. I tried:
android:layout_gravity:"top|left"
but it doesn't work , I searched and all what I found was using RelativeLayout and if I use that I'll have to make all my layout from beginning and it's not that good like the linear layout.
Couldn't post the code here. So this is my code on pastebin
http://pastebin.com/5EjgyB0K
Here you have given android:layout_gravity="center" to the Linear Layout so it is going to set gravity of the layout and as center and your About Button is child of layout its to going to set in center and you have given Margin_top also.Try to remove gravity amd Margin_top and you can see the result, the button will be top|left of the screen.

Views taking equal share of Layout

I've created a custom dialog builder that contains 2 buttons.
Depending on the dialog's setup, I may choose to hide one of the buttons completely, using Window.GONE.
Ideally what I want to happen is:
1. If there is only one button, then fill the layout with it
2. If there are two buttons, then split up the space in the layout equally with these
Is it possible to do this without having to work out the width of the dialog, the number of buttons and then set the sizes manually?
I was hoping there may be a neater way to perform this
ok, here is how I would do it:
<LinearLayout layout_width:fill_parent layout_height:wrap_content>
<Button
layout_width=fill_parent
layout_height=wrap_content
layout_weight=1/>
<Button
layout_width=fill_parent
layout_height=wrap_content
layout_weight=1/>
</LinearLayout>
The trick is to put both elements a width of fill_parent and a weight of 1. If they are both drawn, they will each take up half the screen. If you use View.Gone, one of them will disappear and the other should take up all the space.
yes of cource put your views means button in linear layout and give yor buttons equal layout_weight will solve your problem.

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