A simple Home Screen App Widget to get Date/Time.

A simple Home Screen App Widget to get Date/Time.

In former exercise, "A dummy Android Home Screen App Widget" without any function have been implemented. Here, we add some code in the onUpdate() method to get and show the date/time on home screen in 30 minutes interval.



Bascically the structure is same as the exercise of "Create a dummy Android Home Screen App Widget".

Modify android:updatePeriodMillis to "1800000" in /res/xml/hellowidgetproviderinfo.xml. Because "updatePeriodMillis will not be delivered more than once every 30 minutes".

Modify /res/layout/hellowidget_layout.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
 android:orientation="vertical"
 android:layout_width="fill_parent"
 android:layout_height="fill_parent"
 >
<TextView
android:id="@+id/widgettext"
 android:layout_width="fill_parent"
 android:layout_height="wrap_content"
 android:textColor="#000000"
 />
</LinearLayout>

Modify HelloWidgetProvider.java to override methods onDeleted(), onDisabled(), onEnabled(), and mainly in onUpdate().

package com.exercise.HelloWidget;

import java.text.SimpleDateFormat;
import java.util.Date;

import android.appwidget.AppWidgetManager;
import android.appwidget.AppWidgetProvider;
import android.content.Context;
import android.widget.RemoteViews;
import android.widget.Toast;

public class HelloWidgetProvider extends AppWidgetProvider {

private SimpleDateFormat formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("dd MMM yyyy  hh:mm:ss a");
String strWidgetText = "";

@Override
public void onDeleted(Context context, int[] appWidgetIds) {
// TODO Auto-generated method stub
//super.onDeleted(context, appWidgetIds);
Toast.makeText(context, "onDeleted()", Toast.LENGTH_LONG).show();
}

@Override
public void onDisabled(Context context) {
// TODO Auto-generated method stub
//super.onDisabled(context);
Toast.makeText(context, "onDisabled()", Toast.LENGTH_LONG).show();
}

@Override
public void onEnabled(Context context) {
// TODO Auto-generated method stub
//super.onEnabled(context);
Toast.makeText(context, "onEnabled()", Toast.LENGTH_LONG).show();
}

@Override
public void onUpdate(Context context, AppWidgetManager appWidgetManager,
 int[] appWidgetIds) {
// TODO Auto-generated method stub

String currentTime = formatter.format(new Date());
strWidgetText = strWidgetText + "\n" + currentTime;

RemoteViews updateViews = new RemoteViews(context.getPackageName(), R.layout.hellowidget_layout);
updateViews.setTextViewText(R.id.widgettext, strWidgetText);
appWidgetManager.updateAppWidget(appWidgetIds, updateViews);

super.onUpdate(context, appWidgetManager, appWidgetIds);
Toast.makeText(context, "onUpdate()", Toast.LENGTH_LONG).show();

}
}

CORRECTION@2010-10-03: The following statement should be moved to the first inside onUpdate() method.

super.onUpdate(context, appWidgetManager, appWidgetIds);

Download the files.

next: A simple Home Screen App Widget with configure activity

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