Swap views or swap activites as a subsection of my layout?

Swap views or swap activites as a subsection of my layout? - android

I've created a custom navigation bar for my application. One of the things it (currently) does is allow you to switch between various activities in the application. One part I still have yet to solve fully is how to keep the navigation bar constant on the UI while the view above it switches to another activity.
This google groups thread seems to ask this very question and the solution seems to revolve around using a LocalActivityManager to add the Window decor of the new activity to a ViewGroup of your current layout. I'm curious if anyone has done this before and what their thoughts were?
In particular I'd be interested in the pros/cons of the LocalActivityManager/multiple activities approach vs one super activity which switches multiple views (rather than activities).

I would guess that Fragments would be the recommended way to accomplish this now: http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/fundamentals/fragments.html They have a lifecycle like activities but are meant to be added and removed from layouts. With the compatibility library (http://android-developers.blogspot.com/2011/03/fragments-for-all.html) you can use them all the way back to OS v1.6. As a bonus this is the way that the OS has been moving in terms of reusable UI components since v3.0, so you should be in better shape for the future.

Related

When we should use fragment and when we should use activity? [duplicate]

I know that Activities are designed to represent a single screen of my application, while Fragments are designed to be reusable UI layouts with logic embedded inside of them.
Until not long ago, I developed an application as it said that they should be developed.
I created an Activity to represent a screen of my application and used Fragments for ViewPager or Google Maps. I rarely created a ListFragment or other UI that can be reused several times.
Recently I stumbled on a project that contains only 2 Activities one is a SettingsActivity and other one is the MainActivity. The layout of the MainActivity is populated with many hidden full screen UI fragments and only one is shown. In the Activity logic there are many FragmentTransitions between the different screens of the application.
What I like about this approach is that because the application uses an ActionBar, it stays intact and does not move with the screen switching animation, which is what happens with Activity switching. This give a more fluent feel to those screen transitions.
So I guess what I'm asking is to share your current development manner regarding this topic, I know it might look like an opinion based question at first look but I look at it as an Android design and architecture question... Not really an opinion based one.
UPDATE (01.05.2014): Following this presentation by Eric Burke from Square, (which I have to say is a great presentation with a lot of useful tools for android developers. And I am not related in any way to Square)
http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Android-Design/
From my personal experience over the past few months, I found that the best way to construct my applications is to create groups of fragments that come to represent a flow in the application and present all those fragments in one Activity. So basically you will have the same number of Activities in your application as the number of flows.
That way the action bar stays intact on all the flow's screens, but is being recreated on changing a flow which makes a lot of sense. As Eric Burke states and as I have come to realize as well, the philosophy of using as few Activities as possible is not applicable for all situations because it creates a mess in what he calls the "God" activity.

Experts will tell you: "When I see the UI, I will know whether to use an Activity or a Fragment". In the beginning this will not have any sense, but in time, you will actually be able to tell if you need Fragment or not.
There is a good practice I found very helpful for me. It occurred to me while I was trying to explain something to my daughter.
Namely, imagine a box which represents a screen. Can you load another screen in this box? If you use a new box, will you have to copy multiple items from the 1st box? If the answer is Yes, then you should use Fragments, because the root Activity can hold all duplicated elements to save you time in creating them, and you can simply replace parts of the box.
But don't forget that you always need a box container (Activity) or your parts will be dispersed. So one box with parts inside.
Take care not to misuse the box. Android UX experts advise (you can find them on YouTube) when we should explicitly load another Activity, instead to use a Fragment (like when we deal with the Navigation Drawer which has categories). Once you feel comfortable with Fragments, you can watch all their videos. Even more they are mandatory material.
Can you right now look at your UI and figure out if you need an Activity or a Fragment? Did you get a new perspective? I think you did.

My philosophy is this:
Create an activity only if it's absolutely absolutely required. With the back stack made available for committing bunch of fragment transactions, I try to create as few activities in my app as possible. Also, communicating between various fragments is much easier than sending data back and forth between activities.
Activity transitions are expensive, right? At least I believe so - since the old activity has to be destroyed/paused/stopped, pushed onto the stack, and then the new activity has to be created/started/resumed.
It's just my philosophy since fragments were introduced.

Well, according to Google's lectures (maybe here, I don't remember) , you should consider using Fragments whenever it's possible, as it makes your code easier to maintain and control.
However, I think that on some cases it can get too complex, as the activity that hosts the fragments need to navigate/communicate between them.
I think you should decide by yourself what's best for you. It's usually not that hard to convert an activity to a fragment and vice versa.
I've created a post about this dillema here, if you wish to read some further.

Since Jetpack, Single-Activity app is the preferred architecture. Usefull especially with the Navigation Architecture Component.
source

Why I prefer Fragment over Activity in ALL CASES.
Activity is expensive. In Fragment, views and property states are separated - whenever a fragment is in backstack, its views will be destroyed. So you can stack much more Fragments than Activity.
Backstack manipulation. With FragmentManager, it's easy to clear all the Fragments, insert more than on Fragments and etcs. But for Activity, it will be a nightmare to manipulate those stuff.
A much predictable lifecycle. As long as the host Activity is not recycled. the Fragments in the backstack will not be recycled. So it's possible to use FragmentManager::getFragments() to find specific Fragment (not encouraged).

In my opinion it's not really relevant. The key factor to consider is
how often are you gonna reuse parts of the UI (menus for example),
is the app also for tablets?
The main use of fragments is to build multipane activities, which makes it perfect for Tablet/Phone responsive apps.

Don't forget that an activity is application's block/component which can be shared and started through Intent! So each activity in your application should solve only one kind of task. If you have only one task in your application then I think you need only one activity and many fragments if needed. Of course you can reuse fragments in future activities which solve another tasks. This approach will be clear and logical separation of tasks. And you no need to maintain one activity with different intent filter parameters for different sets of fragments. You define tasks at the design stage of the development process based on requirements.

There's more to this than you realize, you have to remember than an activity that is launched does not implicitly destroy the calling activity. Sure, you can set it up such that your user clicks a button to go to a page, you start that page's activity and destroy the current one. This causes a lot of overhead. The best guide I can give you is:
** Start a new activity only if it makes sense to have the main activity and this one open at the same time (think of multiple windows).
A great example of when it makes sense to have multiple activities is Google Drive. The main activity provides a file explorer. When a file is opened, a new activity is launched to view that file. You can press the recent apps button which will allow you to go back to the browser without closing the opened document, then perhaps even open another document in parallel to the first.

Thing I did: Using less fragment when possible. Unfortunately, it's possible in almost case. So, I end up with a lot of fragments and a little of activities.
Some drawbacks I've realized:
ActionBar & Menu: When 2 fragment has different title, menu, that
will hard to handle. Ex: when adding new fragment, you can change action bar title, but when pop it from backstack there is no way to restore the old title. You may need an Toolbar in every fragment for this case, but let believe me, that will spend you more time.
When we need startForResult, activity has but fragment hasn't.
Don't have transition animation by default
My solution for this is using an Activity to wrap a fragment inside. So we have separate action bar, menu, startActivityForResult, animation,...

The one big advantage of a fragment over activity is that , the code which is used for fragment can be used for different activities. So, it provides re-usability of code in application development.

use one activity per application to provide base for fragment
use fragment for screen ,
fragments are lite weight as compared to activites
fragments are reusable
fragments are better suited for app which support both phone & tablet

You are free to use one of those.
Basically, you have to evaluate which is the best one to your app. Think about how you will manage the business flow and how to store/manage data preferences.
Think about, how Fragments store garbage data. When you implement the fragment, you have a activity root to fill with fragment(s). So, if your trying to implement a lot of activities with too much fragments, you have to consider performance on your app, coz you're manipulating (coarsely speaks) two context lifecycle, remember the complexity.
Remember: should I use fragments? Why shouldn't I?
regards.

I use Fragments for better user experience. For example if you have a Button and you want to run let's say a webservice when you click it, I attach a Fragment to the parent Activity.
if (id == R.id.forecast) {
ForecastFragment forecastFragment = new ForecastFragment();
FragmentManager fm = getSupportFragmentManager();
FragmentTransaction ft = fm.beginTransaction();
ft.replace(R.id.main_content, forecastFragment);
ft.addToBackStack("backstack");
forecastFragment.setArguments(b);
ft.commit();
}
In that way the user won't have to move in another activity.
And secondly I prefer Fragments because you can handle them easily during rotation.

It depends what you want to build really. For example the navigation drawer uses fragments. Tabs use fragments as well. Another good implementation,is where you have a listview. When you rotate the phone and click a row the activity is shown in the remaining half of the screen. Personally,I use fragments and fragment dialogs,as it is more professional. Plus they are handled easier in rotation.

Almost always use fragments. If you know that the app you are building will remain very small, the extra effort of using fragments may not be worth it, so they can be left out. For larger apps, the complexity introduced is offset by the flexibility fragments provide, making it easier to justify having them in the project.
Some people are very opposed to the additional complexity involved with fragments and their lifecycles, so they never use them in their projects. An issue with this approach is that there are several APIs in Android that rely on fragments, such as ViewPager and the Jetpack Navigation library. If you need to use these options in your app, then you must use fragments to get their benefits.
Excerpt From: Kristin Marsicano. “Android Programming: The Big Nerd Ranch Guide, 4th Edition.” Apple Books.

Some wrong ideas:
Always put an activity in your app and handle different screens with fragments.
Write the UI code directly in the activity.
Handle navigating between screens (I don't mean tabs, I mean for example full-screen views) by fragments.
Activities can be replaced by fragments.
Here is the thing!
Fragments are designed to implement reusable parts of UI and use them in any part of the app that is needed. They are not designed for substituting activities.
When we must use each of them?
When we have an independent screen in which there are some different UI parts (tabs, expandable screens, partial screens, etc...) we should use an activity with some fragments to implement and handle different UI parts separately in the same screen.
Each independent part of the application is actually a component that is conceptually different from other parts and it needs to have an independent activity. For example, the login part may contain some different scenarios like using username-password or using fingerprint. Each scenario can be implemented by a fragment and all login-related fragments should be handled by LoginActivity. But for example, the part of the orders in the application doesn't have a conceptual relationship with login, so it must have a different activity and of course, it may contain some fragments like OrdersFragment, SubmitNewOrderFragment, and etc that all of them must be managed by OrdersActivity.
Do not implement a UI directly in an activity. Always implement UI in fragments and add those fragments in the activity even if there is only one fragment in that activity. It helps you to have more reusable code and change UIs easier.
Never use fragments to navigate infinitely in the application even if you force the user to have a limited number of fragments in the back stack. The fact is that when you add a new fragment into the back stack and remove it, it will not be removed from the memory unless the parent activity gets destroyed and it is only not visible. So when you are using fragment manager back stack, by navigating multiple times between fragments in the same activity (especially in the case of you create a new fragment on each navigation and put them into the back stack) you will get an OutOfMemoryException in the application.
I hope it to be helpful.

This question needs to be reevaluated since Jetpack Compose has reached stable.
Jetpack Compose is Android’s recommended modern toolkit for building
native UI.
from https://developer.android.com/jetpack/compose
The typical jetpack-compose architecture is:
Single Activity, multiple composables, and glued together by jetpack navigation.
Note there's no (need for) Fragments anymore.
See Now in Android for a sample.

Navigation hierarchy on Android?

I've recently been looking into the navigation system that Android uses with as intention to port my iOS app that uses an UITabBarController containing multiple UINavigationControllers. To replace the tab bar (which is not available on Android) I settled on using the built in DrawerLayout.
From what I've read, navigation in Android is generally done by creating an Intent, providing it with extras and then just replacing the current activity. This automatically makes sure the back button works, and optionally the back button in the top left if enabled.
However, I am not sure how to implement this way of navigation with the navigation drawer. The tutorial tells me to create a DrawerLayout containing a FrameLayout and a ListLayout where the FrameLayout will contain the actual application and the ListLayout will contain the navigation. This would mean that when I use the method described above to "navigate", it would replace the activity and thus removing the drawer.
What would be the best way to implement what I want (basic navigation with back button support while maintaining a global drawer navigation menu)? The possible options I can come up with is always keeping the same activity and dynamically replacing the FrameLayout, but that would mean a lot of boilerplate to render and possibly a hack to support the back button (and there would be no animations :(). The other option would be to just render the drawer on every activity (via subclassing or something), but that would mean that if the user navigates a lot the back button "stack" would become quite large.
I have tried to explain what I need in as much detail as possible, but it is quite hard to explain the concept. Basically, I want something similar to the UINavigationControllers in the UITabBarController.

You can either have one Activity with one NavigationDrawer and present the user with different views by switching Fragments back and forth within that one Activity. You would use the FragmentManager to switch between different Fragments.
Or you can use multiple Activities that all have a NavigationDrawer.
Second option might sound more difficult but it really isn't. You create a base Activity that all your Activities inherit from and all let them have their own NavigationDrawer, no problem.
Sure there's something in between or something completely different, but that's the most straightforward approaches I can think of.
The tutorial you've probably used (the one with the planets) is imho a bit misleading because it assumes a very basic app structure. If you have only little different 'screens' that might work, for a very complex application it's not suitable (again, in my opinion).
I've always opted for the second option because handling the navigation / backstack is just easier with Activities / Intents.
There's loads of different flags that you can set to your Intent to influence their navigation behaviour.
Also see this and that documentation. These documents might have been written when the NavigationDrawer pattern was not all that common but they are still useful.

Dilemma: when to use Fragments vs Activities:

Experts will tell you: "When I see the UI, I will know whether to use an Activity or a Fragment". In the beginning this will not have any sense, but in time, you will actually be able to tell if you need Fragment or not.
There is a good practice I found very helpful for me. It occurred to me while I was trying to explain something to my daughter.
Namely, imagine a box which represents a screen. Can you load another screen in this box? If you use a new box, will you have to copy multiple items from the 1st box? If the answer is Yes, then you should use Fragments, because the root Activity can hold all duplicated elements to save you time in creating them, and you can simply replace parts of the box.
But don't forget that you always need a box container (Activity) or your parts will be dispersed. So one box with parts inside.
Take care not to misuse the box. Android UX experts advise (you can find them on YouTube) when we should explicitly load another Activity, instead to use a Fragment (like when we deal with the Navigation Drawer which has categories). Once you feel comfortable with Fragments, you can watch all their videos. Even more they are mandatory material.
Can you right now look at your UI and figure out if you need an Activity or a Fragment? Did you get a new perspective? I think you did.

My philosophy is this:
Create an activity only if it's absolutely absolutely required. With the back stack made available for committing bunch of fragment transactions, I try to create as few activities in my app as possible. Also, communicating between various fragments is much easier than sending data back and forth between activities.
Activity transitions are expensive, right? At least I believe so - since the old activity has to be destroyed/paused/stopped, pushed onto the stack, and then the new activity has to be created/started/resumed.
It's just my philosophy since fragments were introduced.

Well, according to Google's lectures (maybe here, I don't remember) , you should consider using Fragments whenever it's possible, as it makes your code easier to maintain and control.
However, I think that on some cases it can get too complex, as the activity that hosts the fragments need to navigate/communicate between them.
I think you should decide by yourself what's best for you. It's usually not that hard to convert an activity to a fragment and vice versa.
I've created a post about this dillema here, if you wish to read some further.

Since Jetpack, Single-Activity app is the preferred architecture. Usefull especially with the Navigation Architecture Component.
source

Why I prefer Fragment over Activity in ALL CASES.
Activity is expensive. In Fragment, views and property states are separated - whenever a fragment is in backstack, its views will be destroyed. So you can stack much more Fragments than Activity.
Backstack manipulation. With FragmentManager, it's easy to clear all the Fragments, insert more than on Fragments and etcs. But for Activity, it will be a nightmare to manipulate those stuff.
A much predictable lifecycle. As long as the host Activity is not recycled. the Fragments in the backstack will not be recycled. So it's possible to use FragmentManager::getFragments() to find specific Fragment (not encouraged).

In my opinion it's not really relevant. The key factor to consider is
how often are you gonna reuse parts of the UI (menus for example),
is the app also for tablets?
The main use of fragments is to build multipane activities, which makes it perfect for Tablet/Phone responsive apps.

Don't forget that an activity is application's block/component which can be shared and started through Intent! So each activity in your application should solve only one kind of task. If you have only one task in your application then I think you need only one activity and many fragments if needed. Of course you can reuse fragments in future activities which solve another tasks. This approach will be clear and logical separation of tasks. And you no need to maintain one activity with different intent filter parameters for different sets of fragments. You define tasks at the design stage of the development process based on requirements.

There's more to this than you realize, you have to remember than an activity that is launched does not implicitly destroy the calling activity. Sure, you can set it up such that your user clicks a button to go to a page, you start that page's activity and destroy the current one. This causes a lot of overhead. The best guide I can give you is:
** Start a new activity only if it makes sense to have the main activity and this one open at the same time (think of multiple windows).
A great example of when it makes sense to have multiple activities is Google Drive. The main activity provides a file explorer. When a file is opened, a new activity is launched to view that file. You can press the recent apps button which will allow you to go back to the browser without closing the opened document, then perhaps even open another document in parallel to the first.

Thing I did: Using less fragment when possible. Unfortunately, it's possible in almost case. So, I end up with a lot of fragments and a little of activities.
Some drawbacks I've realized:
ActionBar & Menu: When 2 fragment has different title, menu, that
will hard to handle. Ex: when adding new fragment, you can change action bar title, but when pop it from backstack there is no way to restore the old title. You may need an Toolbar in every fragment for this case, but let believe me, that will spend you more time.
When we need startForResult, activity has but fragment hasn't.
Don't have transition animation by default
My solution for this is using an Activity to wrap a fragment inside. So we have separate action bar, menu, startActivityForResult, animation,...

The one big advantage of a fragment over activity is that , the code which is used for fragment can be used for different activities. So, it provides re-usability of code in application development.

use one activity per application to provide base for fragment
use fragment for screen ,
fragments are lite weight as compared to activites
fragments are reusable
fragments are better suited for app which support both phone & tablet

You are free to use one of those.
Basically, you have to evaluate which is the best one to your app. Think about how you will manage the business flow and how to store/manage data preferences.
Think about, how Fragments store garbage data. When you implement the fragment, you have a activity root to fill with fragment(s). So, if your trying to implement a lot of activities with too much fragments, you have to consider performance on your app, coz you're manipulating (coarsely speaks) two context lifecycle, remember the complexity.
Remember: should I use fragments? Why shouldn't I?
regards.

I use Fragments for better user experience. For example if you have a Button and you want to run let's say a webservice when you click it, I attach a Fragment to the parent Activity.
if (id == R.id.forecast) {
ForecastFragment forecastFragment = new ForecastFragment();
FragmentManager fm = getSupportFragmentManager();
FragmentTransaction ft = fm.beginTransaction();
ft.replace(R.id.main_content, forecastFragment);
ft.addToBackStack("backstack");
forecastFragment.setArguments(b);
ft.commit();
}
In that way the user won't have to move in another activity.
And secondly I prefer Fragments because you can handle them easily during rotation.

It depends what you want to build really. For example the navigation drawer uses fragments. Tabs use fragments as well. Another good implementation,is where you have a listview. When you rotate the phone and click a row the activity is shown in the remaining half of the screen. Personally,I use fragments and fragment dialogs,as it is more professional. Plus they are handled easier in rotation.

Almost always use fragments. If you know that the app you are building will remain very small, the extra effort of using fragments may not be worth it, so they can be left out. For larger apps, the complexity introduced is offset by the flexibility fragments provide, making it easier to justify having them in the project.
Some people are very opposed to the additional complexity involved with fragments and their lifecycles, so they never use them in their projects. An issue with this approach is that there are several APIs in Android that rely on fragments, such as ViewPager and the Jetpack Navigation library. If you need to use these options in your app, then you must use fragments to get their benefits.
Excerpt From: Kristin Marsicano. “Android Programming: The Big Nerd Ranch Guide, 4th Edition.” Apple Books.

This question needs to be reevaluated since Jetpack Compose has reached stable.
Jetpack Compose is Android’s recommended modern toolkit for building
native UI.
from https://developer.android.com/jetpack/compose
The typical jetpack-compose architecture is:
Single Activity, multiple composables, and glued together by jetpack navigation.
Note there's no (need for) Fragments anymore.
See Now in Android for a sample.

One Activity and all other Fragments [closed]

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I am thinking of implementing one screen with Activity and all other sreens with Fragments and managing all the fragments thru the activity.
Is it a good idea? and my answer is NO but still I want to know more clearly about this thought.
What are the pros and cons of the idea?
Note:
Please don't give me the link for fragment and activity.
EDIT:
Here is something over Fragments and activity:
Pros:
Fragments are meant to be used with activities as a sub activity.
Fragments are not the replacement for activities.
Fragments are meant for reusability(Need to know in what way reusability can be achieved.).
Fragments are the best way to write code to support both tablets and phones.
Cons:
We need to implement the interface to get the data from fragments.
For dialog we have to go a long way to show it.
Why should we use fragments if we are not considering tablets?
What is the starting time difference between activity and fragment?

It depends on the app you are creating. I've created several apps using both approaches and can't say one way is always better than the other. The latest app I created I used the single Activity approach and a Facebook style navigation. When selecting items from the navigation list I update a single Fragment container to display that section.
That said, having a single Activity also introduces a lot of complexities. Let's say you have an edit form, and for some of the items the user needs to select, or create, requires them to go to a new screen. With activities we'd just call the new screen with startActivityForResult but with Fragments there is no such thing so you end up storing the value on the Activity and having the main edit fragment check the Activity to see if data has been selected and should be displayed to the user.
What Aravind says about being stuck to a single Activity type is also true but not really that limiting. Your activity would be a FragmentActivity and as long as you don't need a MapView then there are no real limitations. If you do want to display maps though, it can be done, but you'll need to either modify the Android Compatibility Library to have FragmentActivity extend MapActivity or use the the publicly available android-support-v4-googlemaps.
Ultimately most the devs I know that went the one Activity route have gone back to multiple Activities to simplify their code. UI wise, on a tablet, you are some times stuck using a single Activity just to achieve what ever crazy interaction your designers come up with :)
-- EDIT --
Google has finally released MapFragment to the compatibility library so you no longer have to use the android-support-v4-googlemaps hack. Read about the update here: Google Maps Android API v2
-- EDIT 2 --
I just read this great post about the modern (2017) state of fragments and remembered this old answer. Thought I would share: Fragments: The Solution to All of Android's Problems

I'm about to finish a project(5 months in development), that has 1 activity, and 17 fragments, all full screen. This is my second fragment based project(previous was 4 months).
Pros
The main activity is 700 lines of code, just nicely managing the order of the fragments navigation.
Each fragment is nicely separated into it's own class, and is relatively small (~couple hundred lines of ui stuff).
Management can say, "hey, how about we switch the order of those screens", and I can do it very easily, as those fragments don't depend on each other, they all communicate through the activity. I don't have to dig through individual activities, to find where they call each other.
my app is very graphics heavy, and would never work as 1 screen 1 activity. All those sub activities in the memory, would make the app run out of memory all the time, so I would have to finish() all non visible activities, and make the same control logic for navigation, as I would do with fragments. Might as well do it with fragments just because of this.
if we ever do a tablet app, we will have an easier time re-factoring stuff, because everything is nicely separated already.
Cons
you have to learn, how to use fragments

First, whatever you do, make sure you have a modular design using model, view, presenter that is not highly dependent on an Activity or a Fragment.
What do Activities and Fragments really provide?
Life cycle events and backstack
Context and resources
Therefore, use them for that, ONLY. They have enough responsibility, don't over complicate them. I would argue that even intantiating a TextView in an Activity or Fragment is bad practice. There is a reason methods like public View findViewById (int id) are PUBLIC.
Now the question gets simpler: Do I need multiple, independent life cycle events and backstacks? If you think yeah maybe, use fragments. If you think never ever, don't use fragments.
In the end, you could make your own backstack and life cycles. But, why recreate the wheel?

Pros
You could control your fragments from a single activity, beacause all fragments are independent of each other. The fragments have a lifecycle (onPause, onCreate, onStart...) of their own. By having a lifecycle, fragments can respond independently to events, save their state through onSaveInstanceState, and be brought back (i.e. such as when resuming after an incoming call or when the user clicks the back button).
Cons
Create complexity in your code of activity.
You have to manage the order of the fragments.
Never the less, it is quite a good idea, as if you need to create an app, where you want to show several views. By this idea, you'll be able to view several fragments in a single view..

It depends on the design layout of your app. Suppose if your using Tabs in ActionBar in the design layout then in the Single Activity of the app one can have fragments being changed on Tab click. So now you have an Activity and say suppose three Tabs in the ActionBar and the view for the tabs being provided by the Fragments, which makes it easy to manage plus is feasible also.
So, it all depends on the design scheme of your app and how you take the decision to build for it.

Pros:
Can be used to create a single interface usable by multiple screen sizes and orientations via xml layouts.
Cons:
Requires more complex code in your activity.
I believe it's a good idea, because using different xml layouts based on the current screen size and orientation can make the app more usable and reduce the need to release multiple versions of your app if you plan on releasing your app for both phones and tablets. If your app will never be used by both tablets and phones, it's probably not worth the trouble.

I'm a proponent of deferring all view inflation to fragments to provide better flexibility. For example having a single landing activity for a tablet which aggregates multiple fragments and reusing the same fragments on a phone to show one screen per fragment. However in the phone implementation I'd have a separate activity for each screen. The activities would not have too much code as they would immediately defer to their fragment counterpart for view inflation.
I think it's a bad idea for the phone implementation to have to change to a single landing activity when tabs or a slide out menu is introduced since the tab or menu navigation just results in a completely new screen.

The most important reason I would give for not using the single activity approach is so that the activity lifecycle can be taken advantage of. Activities contain contextual behavior of a certain portion of the application and fragments supplement that behavior. Having the ability to take advantage of the overridable steps in the activity lifecycle helps to separate one activity's behavior from another with methods such as onPause and onResume. This lifecycle also allows you return to previous context. With the single activity approach, once you leave a fragment you have to create an mechanism to return to it.

Android - how to make a complex tabbed app with views [closed]

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First question on Stack Overflow, apologies if it is not well formed.
I am developing a relatively complex tabbed app, and already had the basics set up before coming across information that ActivityGroup and TabActivity are deprecated, and the preferred model is to use views.
I have had no trouble using views, this is a question about architecture rather than syntax (which is why I haven't posted any code). Specifically, how should I go about restructuring the app to use views instead of Intent launched Activities.
The app has five tabs; two hold a single layout, no problem there. The other three tabs are running an ActivityGroup with 2-5 different Activities (i.e. a tab running an activity for settings, where clicking each view starts a new Activity dealing that particular setting, pressing the back button returns you to the broader settings activity/view). If I were to keep each Tab as a TabActivity, it would still be fairly easy to change those internal transitions to views as opposed to separate Activities.
The main question is using ONLY views, no TabActivity/Activity group at all. The vast majority of the research I've done has been discussion about whether to use Activities or Views, or about specific syntax. I haven't been able to gather a clear idea of how to actually MAKE the transition to views across the whole application.
If I were to do so, wouldn't the entire app now be running in a single Activity - the one hosting the tabbed layout?
If (1) is true, how to manage this? Despite ActivityGroup being deprecated, all of the Android documentation still seems to state that it is preferred to use separate Activities for separate aspects of functionality--which makes sense. Did the Android development team simply decide that the costs to the stack and the device made the TabActivity implementation ineffective?
If the application is running in a single Activity that manages different views for each tab (and then different views WITHIN a tab when necessary), should I have one single enormous onClick method to handle all clicks from any clickable view, handling input based on which view is active? Or should I register and de-register all of my Listeners programatically?
With a single Activity, won't any click listener or any broadcast receiver be running all of the time, consuming resources even when unnecessary?
With a single Activity, the back button would exit the entire app from any point in its functionality. If I am using views, won't I have to consistently override onBackPressed() and carefully manage the app behavior to force it to behave "like an Android app?"
AM I THINKING ABOUT THIS COMPLETELY WRONG? It's possible that I am unintentionally attempting to recreate ActivityGroup and TabActivity functionality using views instead, when I should be taking an entirely different design approach to using tabs and Views.
When the people at Google say we shouldn't use activities as tabs anymore, and Mr. Mark Murphy so emphatically agrees, I'm inclined to believe. I simply haven't been able to research-up a way to switch without resorting to recreating a lot of Activity functionality by hand (which would probably include a variety of dirty hacks).
Appreciation in advance for anyone willing to tackle such a vague and overwritten topic.

Using Fragments is the new standard for performing tabbed style ui components, I think you must have just overlooked them because they are the missing piece to all your above questions. Good luck.
Don't forget that using the compatibility library brings Fragment support all the way back to 1.6.
And here is an easy Google recommended tutorial on using Fragments within a TabHost.

About 3) Split your app in as many Activities as you have different parts of the app. Today I'd even go for Fragements that can be easier composed to different layouts when you e.g. make the app for Phone and Tablet.
Most of the time, you can just set up the onClick listeners in the respective xml layout definition files like this:
<ImageButton
android:id="#+id/new_tweet_back_button"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_gravity="left"
android:onClick="done"
android:src="#drawable/back_button"
android:layout_below="#id/CharCount"
/>
Here the android:onClick attribute points to a method that implements the handler.
You don't need to de-register anything.
And instead of Tabs I'd go for the ViewPager which makes imo a much more natural experience with just swapping views by swiping left and right (see e.g. G+ app or market app)

As a final answer to my own question:
Using fragments in tabs DID solve all of the above issue.
So, instead of an Activity defining tabs containing other Activities, I have one large FragmentActivity that sets up and switches the views of the various fragments. The click methods defined in the XML for each tab view belong to the FragmentActivity, and I opted to have each onClick call a corresponding method in the appropriate fragment (passing a context if necessary) so the code for manipulating each view programatically can stay in the appropriate class.
THIS IS FOR A PHONE USING THE COMPATIBILITY PACKAGE, not a tablet or Honeycomb, so I can't speak for those unfortunately.
This solution seems to have worked well for me. I recommend anyone looking at the same issue to check out:
thepsuedocoder blog post:
http://thepseudocoder.wordpress.com/2011/10/04/android-tabs-the-fragment-way/
Android documentation on Fragments:
http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/fundamentals/fragments.html
The API demo "Fragment Tabs"
http://developer.android.com/resources/samples/ApiDemos/src/com/example/android/apis/app/index.html#Fragment

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The Android operating system is a mobile operating system that was developed by Google (GOOGL?) to be primarily used for touchscreen devices, cell phones, and tablets.