A common request from designers that I work with is to draw text in an application that contains an inner shadow. An example of what this looks like is provided below (top un-styled, bottom with shadow added): Basically we’re talking about a shadow that appears inside the drawn text, rather than slightly outside it. The [...]
Feb
22
2012
Monitoring EditText Sessions
Something that has bothered many Android developers (including myself) since the dawn of the soft keyboard is having a way to track the simple event of when a user is done editing the text in a text field. Depending on your application, there may be actions you need to take when a user has completed [...]
Oct
24
2011
Simplifying Interaction with Contacts
With the introduction of the new ContactsContract to replace the previous Contacts API in Android 2.0, came a drastic increase in both functional capability and API complexity for applications wishing to interact with the Contacts Provider. This level of access allows applications to make very detailed and specific additions and updates to the Contacts/People database [...]
Oct
15
2011
A Developer’s Adventures in Rooting
When I started developing applications for Android in early 2009, I never expected that I would ever own a rooted device. I felt that, as a developer, I needed to be testing my applications in an environment that best emulated my users, and rooting would compromise that environment. However, recently I have been forced to [...]
Sep
03
2011
Synchronizing ScrollView
Recently, a post was made by Kirill Grouchnikov on his blog providing details on how the Android Market app uses a synchronized scrolling technique to take a certain view from inside the ScrollView content and let it float to the top of the screen when it would have otherwise been scrolled off-screen. This post is meant [...]
Aug
23
2011
Quick Rounded Corners
Application developers often want to display images with rounded corners. A common technique for accomplishing this in Android is to construct a new mutable Bitmap object, draw a rounded rectangle, and then draw in the image contents using transfer modes. An example of a method that would accomplish this is below: public Bitmap createRoundedCornerBitmap(float radius, [...]
Apr
26
2011
Manufacturing Unique R.id Values
If you have been developing in Android for any length of time, you’ll most likely be aware that one of the most useful portions the resource framework is the fact that Views and other resources can be given an android:id tag in their XML declaration, and Android will make sure to compile all the ids [...]
Apr
26
2011
Signing Up UITableView
Thanks mainly to Apple’s design choices when building the Settings app for iOS devices, the Grouped-Style UITableView has become the de facto standard UI for app developers to use when creating settings or account signup screens within their own applications. In many ways, this is a very helpful standard to follow due to the amount [...]
Nov
13
2010
The Missing Manual: Android Bluetooth RFCOMM
Bluetooth communication has been a part of the Android SDK since the 2.0 release late last year. The APIs available in the android.bluetooth package are primarily focused around three application functions: Discovering other devices Connecting to devices Transferring data using the RFCOMM layer With this capability, developers can write applications that transfer data between devices using [...]
