Android Basics

Introduction to the Android framework and basic concepts

Updated: 03 September 2023

From the Android Docs and this section

Creating a Project

1. Download and install Android Studio
2. Create a new Empty Activity Project with Kotlin selected as the language and make use of androidx.* artifacts

Android Studio should now set up the initial project

After creating the app there should be a gradle download which may take a while

Generated Files and Structure

There are a couple of different files that are generated in the application directory that we created. The files relevant to the application development are contained in the app/src directory

1. The first relevant file is the MainActivity.kt file which is the application’s entrypoint and is in the app/java/com.nabeelvalley.myfirstapp directory, the code in this file can be seen below:

1
package com.nabeelvalley.myfirstapp
2

3
import androidx.appcompat.app.AppCompatActivity
4
import android.os.Bundle
5

6
class MainActivity : AppCompatActivity() {
7

8
    override fun onCreate(savedInstanceState: Bundle?) {
9
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState)
10
        setContentView(R.layout.activity_main)
11
    }
12
}

2. Next is the app/res/activity_main.xml file which is the layout file for the Main Activity, this contains a simple TextView wrapped in a ConstraintLayout which can be seen below:

1
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
2
<androidx.constraintlayout.widget.ConstraintLayout
3
    xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
4
    xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
5
    xmlns:app="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res-auto"
6
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
7
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
8
    tools:context=".MainActivity">
9

10
    <TextView
11
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
12
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
13
        android:text="Hello World!"
14
        app:layout_constraintBottom_toBottomOf="parent"
15
        app:layout_constraintLeft_toLeftOf="parent"
16
        app:layout_constraintRight_toRightOf="parent"
17
        app:layout_constraintTop_toTopOf="parent" />
18

19
</androidx.constraintlayout.widget.ConstraintLayout>

3. Then we have the AndroidManifest.xml file which contains information about the application and define’s its components. It’s a manifest - pretty normal

1
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
2
<manifest xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
3
    package="com.nabeelvalley.myfirstapp" >
4

5
    <application
6
        android:allowBackup="true"
7
        android:icon="@mipmap/ic_launcher"
8
        android:label="@string/app_name"
9
        android:roundIcon="@mipmap/ic_launcher_round"
10
        android:supportsRtl="true"
11
        android:theme="@style/AppTheme" >
12
        <activity android:name=".MainActivity" >
13
            <intent-filter>
14
                <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />
15

16
                <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />
17
            </intent-filter>
18
        </activity>
19
    </application>
20

21
</manifest>

4. Additionally there are build.gradle files for different parts of the application that are used by Gradle to build the application

Running the App

To run the application on a device you will need to do the following:

1. Enable USB Debugging on your device
2. Install your device drivers, information here

Note if using a Huawei you need to use HiSuite which should show up as a drive when your device is plugged in, you may then neeed to run

3. On Android Studio click on File > Sync Project with Gradle Files, this will ensure that the correct debugging options show up in the debug toolbar
4. In the Debuging toolbar click on the Run button, this should show a list of devices and you can select your device from here

Editing the UI

The UI is built using XML, however it can also be edited through the Android Studio Layout Editor which is probably easier for now. Different components are called Views and these are contained in ViewGroups

To view the Layout Editor do the following:

1. Open the app/res/layout/activity_main.xml file
2. Click the Design tab at the bottom of the window if you see the XML
3. Click Select Design Surface and select Blueprint

In the Component Tree you will see that the main wrapper is a ConstraintLayout which contains a TextView object

A ConstraintLayout is a layout that defines the positioning of each child based on constraints to its siblings, this avoids some needs for a nested layout which can take longer to draw to the screen

We can add a Text Box with the following steps

1. Remove the current TextView element by clicking on the Component Tree and then clicking Delete
2. From the Text section of the component list drag an EditText component onto the screen, this is a text box that accepts plain text input
3. Click and drag the anchors (or dots) in the middle of the top edge to the top of the screen and the left to the left edge of the screen to create a constraint
4. In the Layout section of the attributes (should be on the right) set the margins to 16dp

Next add a Button onto the screen and then do the following

1. Add a 16dp constraint from the left side to the EditText
2. Right click on the Button and click Show Baseline
3. Drag a constraint from Button’s Baseline to the EditText’s Baseline

You should notice the different attributes of the elements on the right side of the screen, these can be edited

Now let’s make the text box responsive:

1. Shift + Cick to select the two elements
2. Right Click to open the menu and select Chains > Create Horizontal Chain

A chain is a bidirectional constraint that allows you to lay out children in a group

3. Select the button and set the right margin to 16dp
4. From the Layout menu on the EditText and click twice on the horizontal constraints and set them to be Match Constraints

String Localization

We can add localizations for strings by adding them to the app/res/values/strings.xml file directly or using the Translations Editor

1. Open the strings.xml file and on the top right click Open Editor and then the + at the left to create a new value
2. Use the Translation Editor to create the following values

The Resulting XML file should contain the following:

1
<resources>
2
    <string name="app_name">My First App</string>
3
    <string name="message_edit">Enter a Message</string>
4
    <string name="button_submit">Submit</string>
5
</resources>

Next we can apply the strings to our field and button from the Design View/Editor

1. Select the layout element
2. In the text property delete the value and click on icon to the right and select the correct string resource for the field

The resulting layout should be as follows:

1
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
2
<androidx.constraintlayout.widget.ConstraintLayout
3
        xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
4
        xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
5
        xmlns:app="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res-auto"
6
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
7
        android:layout_height="match_parent"
8
        tools:context=".MainActivity">
9
    <EditText
10
            android:layout_width="0dp"
11
            android:layout_height="wrap_content"
12
            android:inputType="textShortMessage"
13
            android:ems="10"
14
            android:id="@+id/editText" android:layout_marginTop="16dp"
15
            app:layout_constraintTop_toTopOf="parent" android:layout_marginStart="16dp"
16
            app:layout_constraintStart_toStartOf="parent" android:layout_marginLeft="16dp"
17
            android:text="@string/message_edit" app:layout_constraintHorizontal_bias="0.5"
18
            app:layout_constraintEnd_toStartOf="@+id/button"/>
19
    <Button
20
            android:layout_width="wrap_content"
21
            android:layout_height="wrap_content"
22
            android:id="@+id/button" app:layout_constraintStart_toEndOf="@+id/editText" android:layout_marginLeft="16dp"
23
            android:layout_marginStart="16dp"
24
            app:layout_constraintBaseline_toBaselineOf="@+id/editText" android:text="@string/button_submit"
25
            app:layout_constraintHorizontal_bias="0.5" app:layout_constraintEnd_toEndOf="parent"
26
            android:layout_marginRight="16dp" android:layout_marginEnd="16dp"/>
27
</androidx.constraintlayout.widget.ConstraintLayout>

Handling Events

We can handle the click event on the Submit button by using an event handler in our MainActivity.kt file, we just need to add a handler function to the class

We can add something like:

1
/** Called when the user taps the submit button */
2
fun handleSubmit(view: View) {
3
    // Do stuff
4
}

We can then bind this to the onClick event on the Attributes list for the button. For a method to be compatible with the android:onClick attribute it must:

1. Be publicly accessible
2. Return unit or void
3. Have a View as its only parameter

Next, from the function we defined we can use the following to get the text value from the EditText

1
val editText = findViewById<EditText>(R.id.editText)
2
val message = editText.text.toString()

Note that you can click Alt + Enter to resolve missing references

Next we can create an Intent for a second activity for which we will send the message to using the following code

1
val intent = Intent(this, DisplayMessageActivity::class.java).apply {
2
    putExtra(EXTRA_MESSAGE_KEY, message)
3
}

From the above we have the DisplayMessageActivity class that is not yet defined, this is the class for the activity we will create next. The putExtra function is used to store intent data as a key-value pair

The EXTRA_MESSAGE_KEY is defined above out class as a const

1
const val EXTRA_MESSAGE_KEY = "com.example.myfirstapp.MESSAGE"

And then we can start an activity with the intent using:

1
startActivity(intent)

The overall MainActivity.kt file should now be as follows

1
package com.nabeelvalley.myfirstapp
2

3
import androidx.appcompat.app.AppCompatActivity
4
import android.content.Intent
5
import android.os.Bundle
6
import android.view.View
7
import android.widget.EditText
8

9
const val EXTRA_MESSAGE = "com.example.myfirstapp.MESSAGE"
10

11
class MainActivity : AppCompatActivity() {
12

13
    override fun onCreate(savedInstanceState: Bundle?) {
14
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState)
15
        setContentView(R.layout.activity_main)
16
    }
17

18
    /** Called when the user taps the submit button */
19
    fun handleSubmit(view: View) {
20
        val editText = findViewById<EditText>(R.id.editText)
21
        val message = editText.text.toString()
22
        val intent = Intent(this, DisplayMessageActivity::class.java).apply {
23
            putExtra(EXTRA_MESSAGE, message)
24
        }
25
        startActivity(intent)
26
    }
27
}

Lastly from the design view from the activity_main.xml you should be able to select the handleSubmit option in the onClick dropdown which will set the handler to the function we created

Create a New Activity

From the Project Window right click on the app folder and select New > Activity > Empty Activity and call it DisplayMessageActivity

On the new activity add a TextField and change the id to messageDisplay

Now using the onCreate function we can add the following code to set the TextView to display the data we have from the EditText on the main screen

1
// Get the Intent that started this activity and extract the string
2
val message = intent.getStringExtra(EXTRA_MESSAGE)
3

4
// Capture the layout's TextView and set the string as its text
5
val textView = findViewById<TextView>(R.id.messageDisplay).apply {
6
    text = message
7
}

This leaves the resulting DisplayMessageActivity.kt file as follows:

1
package com.nabeelvalley.myfirstapp
2

3
import androidx.appcompat.app.AppCompatActivity
4
import android.os.Bundle
5
import android.widget.TextView
6

7
class DisplayMessageActivity : AppCompatActivity() {
8

9
    override fun onCreate(savedInstanceState: Bundle?) {
10
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState)
11
        setContentView(R.layout.activity_display_message)
12

13
        // Get the Intent that started this activity and extract the string
14
        val message = intent.getStringExtra(EXTRA_MESSAGE)
15

16
        // Capture the layout's TextView and set the string as its text
17
        val textView = findViewById<TextView>(R.id.messageDisplay).apply {
18
            text = message
19
        }
20
    }
21
}

Lastly we need to add a button from the DisplayMessageActivity back to the MainActivity, we can do this from the AndroidManifest.xml by replacing the <activity> tag for the DisplayMessageActivity with the following to indicate the parent activity:

1
<activity android:name=".DisplayMessageActivity"
2
          android:parentActivityName=".MainActivity">
3
    <!-- The meta-data tag is required if you support API level 15 and lower -->
4
    <meta-data
5
        android:name="android.support.PARENT_ACTIVITY"
6
        android:value=".MainActivity" />
7
</activity>

Lastly we can run the application and we should be able to pass data between as well as navigate the two activities