Lecture 01b

Foundation and Tools

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Lecture Overview
•Programs and Operating Systems
• What is Android (for a programmer)?
• Android - Device and Interaction Overview

• Development Tools

• Configuring the IDE for Android Development

• Using the Logger

• Building a Simple App.

• Building an Interactive App.

Programs and Operating Systems
• All programs eventually execute on Hardware

• They all make use of services from O/S

Program

Operating Systems

Hardware

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We program to an API

•Programs use services from O/S (via API)

Program

API
Operating Systems

Hardware

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API is good - but frameworks are better

• Android and iOS are more than O/S

• They are platforms and hence include,

• Operating System (with primitive API)

• Frameworks (incl. Components/Libraries)

Program

Android Frameworks
iOS
API
Operating Systems
Android
Programming languages:
Java,C/C++,Kotlin

Image Source: http://developer.android.com

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We write to a framework/library

• We are developing programs to use a

framework

• Knowledge of framework is very important

• Android / iOS have very different frameworks

• Different data structures & algorithms

• Different culture

• But ... broad concepts are similar

• You can learn iOS faster if you know Android (vice-

versa)
Lecture Overview - Where are we?
•Programs and Operating Systems
•What is Android (for a programmer)?
• Android - Device and Interaction Overview
• Development Tools

• Configuring the IDE for Android Development

• Using the Logger

• Building a Simple App.

• Building an Interactive App.

Android is a bi-lingual platform
C/C++ Java

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What is Dalvik?
• Dalvik is a Virtual Machine

• Dalvik executes the compiled Java code

• Dalvik uses a ‘register-based architecture’

• It is NOT a stack machine like the JVM

• Stack machine Vs Register machines

• Data is loaded and manipulated differently

• Register based -> quicker load and execution, but

slightly larger program size
What is in the Android Framework?

•All of these are available via Java (or C/C++)

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Android Standard Libraries

•Java & C/C++ code can access these libraries

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Where do we start with Android?
Simple Graphical Applications

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Some Assumptions (from now on...)
• You know how to build Java programs

• You also know,

• Package organization system of Java

• Aware of commonly used standard libraries

• Can use a command interface (Terminal in OSX,

MS Dos console in Windows)

• Can read Java code and understand logic/flow

• Interface inheritance
If your Java is rusty

•You have some catching up to do....

Free e-Book at http://www.mindview.net/Books/TIJ/

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If you know these, you will learn faster

• Event handling

• By implementing listener interfaces

• By use of anonymous inner classes

• Hash Tables / Maps (concept + code)

• Singleton, Factory, Visitor design patterns

• Have built user interfaces in another

language/framework (incl. Swing/AWT)

• Call-backs
Lecture Overview - Where are we?
•Programs and Operating Systems
•What is Android (for a programmer)?
•Android - Device and Interaction Overview
• Development Tools
• Configuring the IDE for Android Development

• Using the Logger

• Building a Simple App.

• Building an Interactive App.

Android Device User Interaction
•Android has special “buttons”

Apart from these

buttons, vendors can
add more buttons (if
they wish)
Menu
Back
Home
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Home Button...

• Typically, this will take you back to the Home Screen

of the phone

• Same (default) behavior as the iPhone / iPad button

Home
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Back Button
• This will take you back to the previous screen

• If app. has only one screen, this will exit app.

• R.when
Vasa Personal Note: I miss this button the most
I use the iPhone / iPad)

Back
Menu Button (mainly older models)

• This will show a contextual menu for a screen (if one is

available)

• Developers can write their own menu for any screen

in their app.

• Quite handy (iOS should borrow this idea)

Menu (as open)

Android (Nexus Devices)

Back Home Recent Apps

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Lecture Overview - Where are we?
•Programs and Operating Systems
•What is Android (for a programmer)?
•Android - Device and Interaction Overview
•Development Tools
•Configuring the IDE for Android Development
•Using the Logger
•Building a Simple App.
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Development Tools
• iOS - XCode IDE + iOS SDK (from Apple)

• Offers a robust/powerful Visual UI Builder

• Android

• Android SDK (Compiler and Emulator)

• Android studio

• Debugger is powerful

• Visual UI Builder (is getting better)

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IDE, SDK and Emulator
• IDE - Editor where we write the code

• SDK - Tools that will compile our code

• Emulator - Runs the code

• Emulator runs as a separate application

• IDEthe codecommunicates to this emulator to deploy

• Debugger (in IDE) also works with emulator

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Android IDE
Android IDE Graphical User
Android Emulator

Permits checking Portrait

and Landscape views

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Emulator is nice .. but phone is better

• The emulator runs the Android O/S (you can run any
version from 1.6 up)

• Emulates the phone hardware (like VMWare)

• Emulator does not have sensors (e.g. GPS, Gyro,
Accelerometer, Cell phone etc.)

• Offers ways to simulate sensor data

Emulators Vs Simulator
• iOS offers a simulator

• Android has gone down the emulator path

• Trade-offs (pros and cons),

• Simulators start-up faster, good enough

• Emulators allow checking against rel. 1.6 of the

O/S easily + closer to phone hardware

• Emulators and Simulators cannot mimic real

CPU speed, disk speed, network speed etc.
(yet!)
You need a phone (for serious work)
• Emulator + Simulators are great to learn with

• Commercial (or serious work) - Need Phone

• Why?

• Mobile apps. are context based (& mobile)

• Best way to test them is in their natural

environment

• Sticky message: “Cannot get users

around with an emulator to their head”
to walk
Short Problem 1 (True Story)
• An app. to learn Japanese

• Built around Flash Card metaphor

• Database of 145k words

• During development,

• Search was super-quick

• When tested on phone,

• Search was taking too long

• Why?

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Lets get our feet wet

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Demo 1
• Run IDE + Create Simple Hello World

• Send it to Emulator

• Watch what happens on Console View

• Send an SMS to the Emulator

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Lecture Overview - Where are we?
• Programs and Operating Systems

• What is Android (for a programmer)?

• Android - Device and Interaction Overview

• Development Tools

• Building a Simple App.

• Configuring IDE for Additional Insight

• Using the Logger

Building a Simple App.

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What is involved?
• Place UI controls (Text and Image)

• Layout the controls

• Centre text

• Make text large font

• Display Image to take up all space

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Knowledge Needed to Build it...
• What UI Controls available?

• How do we place/layout the UI controls?

• How do we set the start screen?

• How is the UI Constructed & Destroyed

• How exactly do we start/exit the app.?

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Android Offers a number of UI Controls

•Offers all standard controls and lot more...

Progress
These are
a small
subset of
available
controls

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Each Screen is an Activity

•Android app. is made up of Activities

Activity

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 Views are Android’s Key UI Building Block

• We need two views on the Activity

TextView

ImageView

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 Views are Placed inside a View Group
• Different types of View Groups are provided

• Each View Group offers a different method to layout

the Views

View Group
(Linear Layout)

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View Groups and Layouts
•Android offers the following View Groups,
•Linear Layout (Horizontal or Vertical)
•Absolute Layout (You set X, Y for each View)
•Table Layout (Rows and Columns)
•Relative Layout (Position relative to other Views)
•Frame Layout (Show only one view at a time)
•Scroll View (Permits scrolling of the screen)
•View Groups can be nested
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 Linear Layout
•Two Linear Layouts with 4 Views each
•Nested View Groups
•Activity contains,
•Linear Layout (Vertical)
•Linear Layout (Horizontal)
•Linear Layout (Vertical)
•8 Text Views
Source code:
http://developer.android.com/resources/tutorials/views/hello-linearlayout.html

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How do we program the Layout?
• Layout can be written as an XML file

• Layout can be also be written in Java

• XML file is easier to start off with

Layout Definition XML File
Concept Recap

• We use a View Group to place and control where

Views are shown

• An App. can have one or more Activities

Activity View Group Views
(Layout)

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Demo 3 - Linear Layout Control

• The layout manager offers control on how much a

View will stretch

• You can set width / height of each View to,

• Match Parent (same width/height as parent)

• Fill Parent (cover up parent)

• Wrap Content (use only what is needed)

• You can use Gravity to position View

• You can combine using bit masking

• You can also assign weight to Views

Common Layouts
•Recommended Reading:
• http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/ui/
layout-objects.html
•Layo
uts
take some time to learn

•Try different layouts and adjust options

•Change the background colour of the views to see
how the layout works

•Remember -- gravity and weight adjustment

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Generated Code, Layout & Resources
• How did Australia image get into the App.?

• How did we set the text to “Australia”?

• Recall: Convention Over Configuration

• Layout Defined in /layout/main.xml

• Resources Placed in /res/drawable-

• String values defined in /values/strings.xml

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Resource Definition

• All images (and media) are placed in “res”

directory -- within subfolders

• Android SDK tools will generate R.java

contains a reference to these resources
which

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Resources and Generated Code

A reference to these
gets automatically
generated by the
Android SDK tools

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Resources and Generated Code

Generated Code

static final int australia=0x7f020000;

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A Reference to Layout also Generated

All References are Integers

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Concept Recap

• We use a View Group to place and control where

Views are shown

• An App. can have one or more Activities

Activity View Group Views
(Layout)

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How does Activity know about layout?
This is the Activity Class

Reference to the layout

(Android Runtime will Render this Layout)
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Who writes the Activity code?

This block of code is created by IDE/SDK

when we create new Android project
You can also write you own -- more on that later in semester

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Activity Creation

Method called (by the Application

Launcher) when Activity is first created

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Activity Creation - Layout Rendeing

Method call will pass the reference to the layout

that needs to be rendered on the screen

(We will discuss the “rending model” later in the semester)

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What is the “root” Activity?

• How does Android know which Activity to create

first?

Answer: Application Manifest File

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Application Manifest File
Application Icon Reference

Activity Name Category

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Concept Recap
Activity Activity Class (Java)

View Group
(Layout)

Layout Definition
(main.xml)

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Layouts and Resources

•How did the Australia image get into layout?

Layout can refer to resources

@drawable is a special tag
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Layouts and String Information

•How did we set the text to “Australia”

String constant

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Layout and String Information

• String information can come from constant values

defined in values.xml

Context Help shows

recommendations

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String Constant Values
Defined as a
resource

Refer using an @string tag

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What is it with the @ tag?

• Constant Resources in Android can be referred

using the “@” tag in XML layout

• Example: @drawable, @string ...

@drawable/australia

@drawable/bots

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Significance of hdpi/ldpi/mdpi

Different resolution images

High-Res, 240 dpi screen

Low-Res, 120 dpi screen

Med-Res, 160 dpi screen

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 @ Tag and Multiple Screen
Resolutions
• Dealing with multiple screen resolutions

@drawable/icon

Android Runtime decides best resource to use based on hardware capabilities

Drawable at Different Resolutions

High

Low

Medium

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Drawable at Multiple Resolutions
• You should ideally provide these images

• Runtime will try to

• Scale down Highest resolution available, (or)

• But, Low may need scaling up (yuk!)

• Images at different resolution must be called the

“same name”

• SDK convention based tools will select best option

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Lecture Overview - Where are we?
• Programs and Operating Systems

• What is Android (for a programmer)?

• Android - Device and Interaction Overview

• Development Tools

• Building a Simple App.

• Configuring IDE for Additional Insight

• Using the Logger

Developers need more insight...

• You need a lot of information when

developing apps:

Views

Need these to see program behaviour

(there is no console or MS-DOS prompt)
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What do developers need?
• Ability to control the Emulator

• Ability to watch the messages between IDE and

Emulator (things are not always perfect)

• Ability to inspect the processes running on the

emulator (or phone)

• Ability to watch the threads and resources used

by various apps.

• Ability to inspect “LOG” messages

Lecture Overview - Where are we?
•Programs and Operating Systems
•What is Android (for a programmer)?
•Android - Device and Interaction Overview
•Development Tools
•Building a Simple App.
•Configuring IDE for Additional Insight
•Using the Logger
75
Can you program without println?
•Guess what? We cannot do ...
• System.out.println(“I am here!”);
•Same issue in iOS and Android
•These devices do not have a console
• But, we can log messages and watch them
• In Android, we can do,

• Log.d(“TAG”, “I am here!”);

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Log Messages in Android

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Demo 2
• Logging a message in Android

• Multiple levels of logging

• Verbose (Log.v(“TAGTAG”, “MethodX Called”);

• Debug (Log.d(“BLAH”, “x should be 34”);

• Information (Log.i(“TAGBLAH”, “Socket open”);)

• We also have Warning, Error, Fatal, Silent

• You can stop log messages from showing

• http://developer.android.com/reference/android/util/Log.html (See last

few methods .. you may say @#$)
Logging
• Android has Log class, iOS has NSLog

• When shipping production/final

should remove these Log methods
code -- we

• iOS -- Use a #define in the make script

• Android -- Adjust configuration of ProGuard

• What is ProGuard?

• Code optimisation/obfuscation
discuss later...)
tool (we will

• Bundled as part of Android SDK

Concept Recap
• Key Buttons -- Home, Back, Menu

• IDE, SDK, Emulator

• Customizing IDE to show additional info.

• Logging, Emulator Control, Console

• Sending messages to emulator

• Use of the Log class

Lecture Overview - Where are we?
• Programs and Operating Systems

• What is Android (for a programmer)?

• Android - Device and Interaction Overview

• Development Tools

• Building a Simple App.

• Configuring IDE for Additional Insight

• Using the Logger

Recommended Reading
• Android Developers Guide
• http://developer.android.com

• Common Layouts
• http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/ui/layout-objects.html