I have an Android application does many things. I would like to be able have it spawn a desktop widget (?) that opens the application to do a specific thing when the widget is clicked.
Can someone give me a road map on how to do this?
As far as i know, Android applications can not add App Widgets to the home screen. Applications can define App Widgets, but user has to add them manually to the home screen.
However it is not hard to launch Activitys from a widget using PendingIntent.
This is called AppWidget and is described in details in Android documentation (both references and step-by-step guide). Note, that it's the user that adds the widget to his launcher screen. AFAIK there's no way to add it to launcher in code (though HTC might have some undocumented ways).
Related
I need a home screen clone app that uses apps, folders, swipable screens of more apps and so on.
So far, I have looked into custom launchers like this one here: https://www.androidauthority.com/make-a-custom-android-launcher-837342-837342/
But to achieve what I need will require a lot of extra additions (the icons are easy enough, but I'll need folders and swiping as well).
Another approach I wondered about is Kiosk mode/Lock-Task-Mode and multi-app kiosk mode. I've looked at the docs and wondered if this could be used to harness the actual homescreen, while still executing code in the background based on what apps the user selects (ultimately acheiving the same desired effect of my project).
I've spent a full day looking at this but I want to know if I'm on the right path. Obviously, I could create an app that contains all of this, but I do think I want it to be a launcher app that's locked in place so that users can't operate the actual home screen and its apps. No malicious intent here, it's just for a closed-off research project.
Any insight is greatly appreciated.
I want to create an accessibility feature for Android where a hint appears whenever a person presses or long-presses on an app icon. To do, this I have a few questions:
How to identify when a user clicks on the icon of an app on the
homescreen or app launcher?
How to make use of this event to then
pull appropriate information and present it to the user?
Do I need to develop a custom launcher app to be able to identify user presses etc.? Or can I somehow retrieve this information from whatever launcher a user uses and give the hint?
There are a couple of different ways to get after the information you are looking for.
The first option is to create a custom launcher, as you suggested. This has obvious drawbacks. Most obviously, having to re-create an entire launcher applications is obviously difficult, and likely to create more issues than fixes. You could search out an open source launcher application, and attempt to add your feature to this, however you'd then be reliant on the purveyors of this codebase to accept your feature.
The second, and the way I'd recommend, to access this information is through accessibility services. This information is available to services like TalkBack. It is essential to how they function. The difficulties you'll face here are interacting properly with the numerous launchers available out there. However, most of these launchers are based off of a similar starting point, which is the Android base open source launcher. As such, the portions of the launcher that you care to interact with should be coded very similarly in most launcher examples.
The downside to this approach is that only one accessibility service can be active on a device at a time. So, users who are partially blind, who may want to use your feature and TalkBack at the same time, won't be able to. It is of course to you to determine which set of difficulties/benefits you'd prefer to deal with, but these are your options.
I know i'm going to die as maybe i didn't place this post correctly, also i'm not a developer, only a graphic designer.
I'm looking for some advise, hope someone could help me with that.
Imagine that you launch your app, and within that there is a button that says "Install widget". You press that button, then the app closes and a widget appears on the home screen.
Is that possible?
i've been reading that before 4.2 i wasn't, but something changed from then. Problem is that i have no more information about this, and also i don't know if it changed over time.
I'm behind the graphic design of a widget. The idea is that you first download the app, which will help you to configure the widget, and then you have to manually place the widget in place.
They are afraid that some people wont understand, and they will cease trying.
I only would like to know if this is possible, (or something similar) and if someone knows any APP that does this thingie.
Note: APPS like "Swiftkey" guides you in the process of installing your keyboard. it asks you to go to a determinate place of the phone settings, and gives you a shortcut to that place so you don't have to go by yourself.
It would be amazing. To directly place a widget o to guide them trhough shortcuts.
Many many thanks in advance!
Is that possible?
No. The user installs the app widget through the home screen.
The idea is that you first download the app, which will help you to configure the widget, and then you have to manually place the widget in place.
That is also not possible. The flow is that the user chooses the app widget in the home screen, places the widget in place, then if you have a configuration activity defined, you will get a chance to help the user configure the app widget (e.g., to choose the city for the weather report that the app widget should display).
APPS like "Swiftkey" guides you in the process of installing your keyboard. it asks you to go to a determinate place of the phone settings, and gives you a shortcut to that place so you don't have to go by yourself.
Input method editors (a.k.a., soft keyboards) are configured through the Settings app, and therefore there is a consistent place to direct users towards. App widgets are configured through the home screen, and different home screens can implement that process in different ways, so there is no standard spot to direct the users towards.
Alright so I have an app that I would like to have utilize other apps. For example I have an app that does quite a number of things except for a directory look up since there is already an app that does that for my school. I know I can launch the application with intents, but that also brings them away from the navigation menu for my application. Is there anyway that I could run an app inside a view layout. I am not hopeful for this but I figured I would chance asking it anyway.
This is technically possible by using widgets. You can implement an AppWidgetHost, and other applications can create App Widgets to use inside your own app. This is how the launcher screen in Android works.
This, of course, will only work if other applications in question implement widgets. So, the general answer to your question would be no, it is not possible to host arbitrary applications or Views/Activities from other applications inside your own.
This not the Android design philosophy. You should send an Intent to the directory app, which I hope is designed to look up a result and then return it to you. The mechanism is startActivityForResult() in your app, and setResult() in the directory app.
I am intending to develop custom Launcher for Android phone. I have searched web, but I haven't found any valuable information regarding creating "launcher" project. What does an android app needs for being at the top of the GUI (aka launcher)?
I saw this thread a while ago, before creating my own launcher. Here are some crucial things I learned:
Declaring your app to be a launcher
David already mentioned the piece of code that determines your app as a launcher:
<category android:name="android.intent.category.HOME" />
Add this as an intent-filter to the activity your launcher will use for the home screen (in AndroidManifest.xml).
Launcher Issues
As a launcher will run all the time, you need to understand the activity livecycle to prevent issues (like this one).
If you want users (and yourself) to be able to constantly user the app (that's what you usually do with launchers), make sure it never crashes. In the case of a crash users will be taken back to the devices default launcher or other installed ones.
In short: Launchers are expected to be reliable.
Common launcher functions (users usually expect those)
1) A list of apps / appdrawer
From which all apps can be launched or modified. You can use packageManager to list the apps.
As generating such a list may take a while, I suggest you to do it asynchronously and save the list somewhere to speed everything up (which also is expected from launchers ^^)
2) Some settings to change the launcher
I had some users stuck in my launcher before implementing those ^^
You can open the devices launcher settings like this (in Kotlin):
// working in APIs newer than Lollipop
val callHomeSettingIntent = Intent(Settings.ACTION_HOME_SETTINGS)
startActivity(callHomeSettingIntent)
Bonus) An in-app tutorial
This may be useful if you have some features in your app that are not trivial, ways of launching apps that users don't know from other apps.
It also gets you way less messages from users asking how to interact with your software.
Resources:
The GitHub of the minimal launcher I created may be helpful: finnmglas/Launcher
Well, firstly you need to listen to the android.intent.category.HOME intent. Here are some links with full source code which you can have a look at:
Old launcher source code
New launcher source code
Or take a look at launcher plus.