Passing arguments to a BroadcastReceiver through an Intent in Android - android

I have an application, which sets an alarm using AlarmManager, which starts another Activity when it goes off. The AlarmManager takes a PendingIntent and spawns a BroadcastReceiver class when the specified time comes. I'm wondering whether there is any way that I can pass arguments to this BroadcastReceiver through the Intent object which goes into PendingIntent?
Basically what I'd like to do is something like this:
Intent my_intent = new Intent(this, BroadcastService.class);
PendingIntent pendingIntent = PendingIntent.getBroadcast(this, 0, my_intent, 0);
my_intent.putExtra("arg1", arg1);
AlarmManager alarmManager = (AlarmManager) getSystemService(ALARM_SERVICE);
alarmManager.set(AlarmManager.RTC_WAKEUP, System.currentTimeMillis() + (1000), pendingIntent);
and I'd like to be able to retrieve arg1 in the BroadcastReceiver's onReceive(Context, Intent) method. I figured that the local variable my_intent would be the second parameter passed on to onReceive by the PendingIntent, but apparently that's not quite right. Is it possible to pass parameters between an Activity and a BroadcastReceiver in this fashion (using Intent.putExtra()) or should I use a ContentProvider instead?
Thanks!
Iva

I had a similar problem, but I was already populating the Intent first before wrapping it in a PendingIntent. But the answer to my problem was, as pointed out above, that I needed to use the PendingIntent.FLAG_UPDATE_CURRENT flag. Once I set the flag, it worked! I hope this helps others.
-Jeff

int code=1;
Intent i2 = new Intent(StartAlarm);
i2.putExtra("_id",code);
class test extends BroadcastReceiver {
#Override
public void onReceive(Context context, Intent arg1) {
int i=arg1.getIntExtra("_id",-1);
}
}

I have an application, which sets an
alarm using AlarmManager, which starts
another Activity when it goes off.
That is bad form. Do not pop up activities unannounced like this without a very good reason (e.g., an incoming phone call). What if the user is in the middle of doing something, like TXTing or playing a game or trying to tap numbers for a phone menu?
Is it possible to pass parameters
between an Activity and a
BroadcastReceiver in this fashion
(using Intent.putExtra())
Yes. However, bear in mind that you will want to use PendingIntent.FLAG_UPDATE_CURRENT when you create your PendingIntent, to ensure that any new extras you supply on the Intent actually get used.

Yes, I think it is possible to pass any data of basic Java type and Serializable/Parceable types in the extras of an Intent wrapped around a PendingIntent and then retrieve them using the Intent instance passed to the onReceive of the Broadcastreceiver. Your approach looks okay to me.
What is the problem/error that you are getting? Is "arg1" instance Serializable?

Related

Multiple Alarms using BroadcastReceiver and AlarmManager

Ive been searching for how to using multiple alarms, and did find post in Stackoverflow, but never a straightful answer.
Im trying to set multiple alarms who will call a receiver class (AlarmBcast in my case) and, according to which alarm triggered the call, take different actions.
At this point I followed my way creating diferent receicer classes for each alarm call (and thus a different Intent, each with his own PendintIntent).
I read someone in other thread suggested making a stack (list) of alarms visible, and so using one receiver class for all alarms, but that is not an approach I would like to take.
There is a way to "see" which pendingintent was responsible for the call?.
only the intent is passed, but as there is only one, cant get which call was from it.
Before taking the way of the multiple receivers, this is how my code(pseudo) looked
Setting the alarms...
public class SelectedService extends Service {
//get dates from main
//do some date math
AlarmManager alarmManager = (AlarmManager) this.getSystemService(Context.ALARM_SERVICE);
Intent _myIntent = new Intent(this, AlarmBcast.class);
//setting Alarm A
PendingIntent _myPendingIntent = PendingIntent.getBroadcast(this, 123, _myIntent, PendingIntent.FLAG_UPDATE_CURRENT);
alarmManager.set(AlarmManager.RTC_WAKEUP, partidocalendar.getTimeInMillis(),_myPendingIntent);
//setting Alarm B
PendingIntent _myPendingIntent2 = PendingIntent.getBroadcast(this, 124, _myIntent, PendingIntent.FLAG_UPDATE_CURRENT);
alarmManager.set(AlarmManager.RTC_WAKEUP, convopartidocalendar.getTimeInMillis(),_myPendingIntent2);
//setting Alarm C
The receiver as i wa planning it ...
public class AlarmBcast extends BroadcastReceiver {
#Override
public void onReceive(Context context, Intent intent) {
//how to identify call A from B ??
if(AlarmA){}
if(AlarmB){}
}
Maybe i have some conceptual mistake? Back to programming since after 15 years (mostly assembler before)
You can put an "extra" in the Intent that identifies which alarm it is. For example:
_myIntent.putExtra("alarm", "A");
Do this before calling PendingIntent.getBroadcast() for each different alarm.
Then, in your BroadcastReceiver.onReceive() you can check the "extra" in the Intent to determine which alarm got triggered.
I fixed this issue by separating and creating two different Notification Channel and Classes

Is the application context always the same no matter the class?

I'm new in this whole Android environment and I usually have some doubts that maybe you can consider very basic knowledge and a bit stupid. I will try to do my best explaining the doubt I have and why i have it to make me understand.
I'm doing an application where you can set notifications to remind you the scholar classes you want. I have done a class that extends BroadcastReceiver so it can reset all the alarms after the device has booted. I have a database where I keep information about the alarms: the class, the time it has to be configured, etc. I retrieve all the alarms and set them to the alarmManager this way:
intent = new Intent(ctxt.getApplicationContext(), Notificacion.class);
intent.putExtra("TAG", tag);
intent.putExtra("SUBJECT", cursor2.getString(0));
intent.putExtra("AULA", cursor2.getString(1));
displayIntent = PendingIntent.getBroadcast(ctxt, Integer.parseInt(tag), intent, PendingIntent.FLAG_UPDATE_CURRENT );
alarmManager.setRepeating(AlarmManager.RTC_WAKEUP, calendar.getTimeInMillis(), AlarmManager.INTERVAL_DAY*7, displayIntent);
Well, I guess this should work fine until here. The problem is that when you use the app and you want to set a notification, you are doing it from the class "Schedule.class" so the intent would have this context:
Intent intent = new Intent(getApplicationContext(), Notification.class);
PendingIntent pend = PendingIntent.getBroadcast(this, Integer.parseInt(tag), intent, PendingIntent.FLAG_UPDATE_CURRENT);
In the app, you can delete an alarm, and you have to call alarmManager.cancel(pend) in order to do that. So my doubt is if it will be able to cancel it.
If the contexts are different, it won't find the match with the pending intent, because it was set from the context I got in my extension of BroadCastReceiver (ctxt), and the alarm was set with the context I got from Schedule.class.
So.. is the application context always the same? I know that the context is set in order to give information to other classes about what has been going on, but I'm not sure if the Intent filter will differentiate where the context was given.
Thank you in advance!
Looking at the AlarmManager documentation for the cancel method you're using:
public void cancel (PendingIntent operation)
Added in API level 1
Remove any alarms with a matching Intent. Any
alarm, of any type, whose Intent matches this one (as defined by
filterEquals(Intent)), will be canceled.
So, the Intent.filterEquals documentation says the following:
public boolean filterEquals (Intent other)
Added in API level 1
Determine if two intents are the same for the
purposes of intent resolution (filtering). That is, if their action,
data, type, class, and categories are the same. This does not compare
any extra data included in the intents.
I can't think of any reason why the action, data, type, class, or category would be different from one explicit Intent to another (unless, obviously you went out of your way to change those things). The contexts do not appear to be in the criteria for the matching, so I think you can be fairly confident that it will be cancelled no matter which context was used to create it in the first place.

How to update the data send to a service using intent when service is started by alarm manager?

I am writing an Android application where the user can choose several stocks to watch and gets alerted if an predefined alert condition is matched. The stock data is saved to 5 objects of a custom Parcelable class "alert" (one object per stock and condition). The periodic data update is done via a service started by an AlarmManager. The alert objects are passed to the service via putting them into the Intent which is put into the PendingIntent of the AlarmManager.
Intent intent = new Intent(this, UpdateService.class);
Bundle b = new Bundle();
saveAlertsToBundle(b);
intent.putExtras(b);
intent.setData(Uri.parse("updateManager"));
PendingIntent pendIntent = PendingIntent.getService(this,0,intent,0);
// 1min intervall
long intervall = DateUtils.MINUTE_IN_MILLIS * 1;
// time of first start
long firstStartDelay = DateUtils.SECOND_IN_MILLIS * 30;
long firstStart = System.currentTimeMillis() + firstStartDelay;
AlarmManager am = (AlarmManager) getSystemService(Context.ALARM_SERVICE);
// kill running
am.cancel(pendIntent);
//start new
am.setRepeating(AlarmManager.RTC_WAKEUP,firstStart,intervall,pendIntent);
My problem is:
When starting the service for the first time when there is only one object of alert passed to the service everything works fine. As soon as there are more alerts objects existing they also need to be passed to the service but this does not work with the code above. The service does not receive the updated intent with the additional alert objects , but only the initial one with only one alert object. The code above correctly creates an Intent holding the additional alert object, but they never get to the service.
So my question is, how to pass the updated intent to the already running AlarmManager.
I already tried stopping the AlarmManager (the line at the // kill running comment) and restarting it, but this does not work. Perhaps because of the intent not holding the same alert objects as at the time when he was created ? I tried to fix this by setting an uri in the data part of the intent but this also did not help.
Thanks for help.
Your problem is the way PendingIntent works. The system manages a pool of PengingIntents. When your code does:
PendingIntent pendIntent = PendingIntent.getService(this,0,intent,0);
This causes the system to search for a PendingIntent that matches the parameters you've passed in (in this case, your Intent. However, the matching algorithm that PendingIntent uses only compares certain fields of the Intent to determine if it is the one that you are looking for. In particular, it does not compare extras. So this means after you've created the first PendingIntent, the call to PendingIntent.getService() will always return the same PendingIntent from the pool (and not create a new one, which is what you want).
In order to make the call to PendingIntent.getService() create a new PendingIntent every time you call it, try making the parameters you pass to the call unique, like this:
int requestCode = (int) System.currentTimeMillis(); // Create unique request code
PendingIntent pendIntent = PendingIntent.getService(this, requestCode, intent, 0);
Since requestCode will be different for each call to PendingIntent.getService(), this should solve your problem.
EDIT Based on OP's comments below
You want to cancel the existing alarm and create a new one with new data. In that case you don't need to use unique identifiers because you only want to have a single PendingIntent in the pool. But, you want to change the data for that. Try this:
// Create a PendingIntent (or update the existing PendingIntent with new values
PendingIntent pendIntent = PendingIntent.getService(this, 0, intent,
PendingIntent.FLAG_UPDATE_CURRENT);
AlarmManager am = (AlarmManager) getSystemService(Context.ALARM_SERVICE);
// cancel any pending alarms
am.cancel(pendIntent);
//start new
am.setRepeating(AlarmManager.RTC_WAKEUP,firstStart,intervall,pendIntent);

How do I cancel Pending Intents in a Android Widget?

I've got some weird behavior and I can only assume is because of the Pending intents I am using.
Scenario
I have a widget (4x1) which has 4 buttons. Within onUpdate of the widget, I add an pending intent for each button. My intents fires a Service with a bundeled parameter and depending on this parameter starts something. I attach intents as this:
RemoteViews views = new RemoteViews(context.getPackageName(), R.layout.widget_layout);
Bundle b = new Bundle();
b.putString("myVariable", someVariable);
Intent intent = new Intent(context, AppStarterService.class);
intent.putExtras(b);
PendingIntent pendingIntent = PendingIntent.getService(context, buttopnPosition, intent, 0);
views.setOnClickPendingIntent(R.id.btnOne, pendingIntent);
The problem
The code works just fine, until the user decides to update the content of the button. Then, a new Pending Intent is done. So, when I press again the button, sometimes it still executes the old intent and not the new one. I don't know how to explain this better. Let's say for my first intent the parameter is "TestOne", after my update, the new intent has parameter "TestX". When the user clicks on the button, on my service I get in intent extras still "TestOne" instead "TestX". So, my guess is that somehow, I need to cancel the previous intent, when the widget button content changes.
Is this the issue ? Am I doing something wrong ? How do I cancel the old intent, I need to recreate it and then cancel it ?
Thank you for your time.
I you keep having this problem even with FLAG_UPDATE_CURRENT, try defining a different requestCode each time, with something like this:
private static int request = 0;
...
PendingIntent pendingIntent = PendingIntent.getService(context, request++, intent, 0);
So each time a new PendingIntent is created, a new requestCode is used, at least during class life.
I hope it helps.
I think you want to set the flag http://developer.android.com/reference/android/app/PendingIntent.html#FLAG_UPDATE_CURRENT as the last parameter to PendingIntent.getService

Intent's flags and PendingIntent.getBroadcast

I get this exception in my code:
...IllegalArgumentException...Cant use FLAG_RECEIVER_BOOT_UPGRADE here...
Looking into the android source code seems like you can't set flags to an Intent that will be fired through:
PendingIntent.getBroadcast(...);
Here the Android source code:
...
if (type == INTENT_SENDER_BROADCAST) {
if ((intent.getFlags()&Intent.FLAG_RECEIVER_BOOT_UPGRADE) != 0) {
throw new IllegalArgumentException("Can't use FLAG_RECEIVER_BOOT_UPGRADE here");
}
}
...
Here my code:
Intent myIntent = new Intent(context, MyReceiver.class);
//myIntent.setFlags(Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK); if i remove the comment it doesn't work
PendingIntent pending = PendingIntent.
getBroadcast(context, 0, myIntent, PendingIntent.FLAG_UPDATE_CURRENT);
The reason is not clear to me, anyone could clarify it for me please?
When you get a PendingIntent using getBroadcast(), this Intent will be broadcast to BroadcastReceivers. It will NOT be used to start an Activity. So you cannot set any of the Activity-related flags. They wouldn't make any sense in that context anyway.
Why would you want to set FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK in an Intent that will be broadcast? That makes no sense.
Android uses Intents for 3 completely different purposes:
Starting/Communicating with Activity
Starting/Communicating with Service
Broadcast to BroadcastReceiver
The PendingIntent class offers 3 different methods to get a PendingIntent for each of these different purposes:
getActivity()
getService()
getBroadcast()
You need to make sure that you use the right method for the right purpose.
And yes, you can can set Activity-related Intent flags in a PendingIntent, as long as you call getActivity() to get the PendingIntent.

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