Load animated GIF from Internet

Previous examples show how to diaply animated GIF using decodeStream(InputStream) and decodeByteArray(InputStream) loaded from  /res/drawable/ folder. This example show how to load from Internet.

• We cannot access Internet in main thread, such that we have to implement a background thread to load the gif from Internet.
• Once loaded, we have to ask Android system to re-layout with updated graph.
• In the example code, dummy delay is added to simulate network delay.
• Both decodeStream(InputStream) and decodeByteArray(InputStream) are implemented, you can choice it by setting DECODE_STREAM true or false.
• It can be noted that textViewInfo is filled with 0, 0 x 0; because the GIF is not loaded when onCreate() called.
• uses-permission android:name="android.permission.INTERNET" is needed in AndroidManifest.xml

Modify activity_main.xml to added a LinearLayout to show how the system layout at run-time.

<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:orientation="vertical"
    tools:context="com.example.androidgif.MainActivity" >

    <TextView
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:layout_gravity="center_horizontal"
        android:autoLink="web"
        android:text="http://android-er.blogspot.com/"
        android:textStyle="bold" />

    <LinearLayout
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:orientation="horizontal" >

        <ImageView
            android:layout_width="wrap_content"
            android:layout_height="wrap_content"
            android:src="@drawable/android_er" />

        <LinearLayout
            android:layout_width="wrap_content"
            android:layout_height="wrap_content"
            android:background="#ff000090"
            android:orientation="vertical"
            android:padding="5dp" >

            <com.example.androidgif.GifView
                android:id="@+id/gifview"
                android:layout_width="wrap_content"
                android:layout_height="wrap_content" />
        </LinearLayout>
    </LinearLayout>

    <TextView
        android:id="@+id/textinfo"
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="info..." />

</LinearLayout>

GifView.java

package com.example.androidgif;

import java.io.ByteArrayOutputStream;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.io.InputStream;
import java.net.HttpURLConnection;
import java.net.MalformedURLException;
import java.net.URL;

import android.content.Context;
import android.graphics.Canvas;
import android.graphics.Movie;
import android.util.AttributeSet;
import android.view.View;
import android.widget.Toast;

public class GifView extends View {
 
 //Set true to use decodeStream
 //Set false to use decodeByteArray
    private static final boolean DECODE_STREAM = true;
 
 private InputStream gifInputStream;
 private Movie gifMovie;
 private int movieWidth, movieHeight;
 private long movieDuration;
 private long mMovieStart;
 
 final static String gifAddr = "https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6myuJnVNIFw_fX5kZ3ru5B_xtomsmaUZsq2IWaFIKDcy_88cRvwaX9sn8x2rIBWsrOezV9w3BJHcwG2mSq3VLZB0eXCWb2so3znRvZeF3fpK3h0uAZy9WX5S7afEJYvEPl4AJln99dJI/s1600/android_er.gif";

 public GifView(Context context) {
  super(context);
  init(context);
 }

 public GifView(Context context, AttributeSet attrs) {
  super(context, attrs);
  init(context);
 }

 public GifView(Context context, AttributeSet attrs, 
   int defStyleAttr) {
  super(context, attrs, defStyleAttr);
  init(context);
 }
 
 private void init(final Context context){
  setFocusable(true);

  gifMovie = null;
  movieWidth = 0;
  movieHeight = 0;
  movieDuration = 0;
  
  Thread threadLoadGif = new Thread(new Runnable(){

   @Override
   public void run() {
    try {
     URL gifURL = new URL(gifAddr);
     
     HttpURLConnection connection = (HttpURLConnection)gifURL.openConnection();
     gifInputStream = connection.getInputStream();
     
     //Insert dummy sleep
     //to simulate network delay
     try {
      Thread.sleep(3000);
     } catch (InterruptedException e) {
      // TODO Auto-generated catch block
      e.printStackTrace();
     }
     
     if(DECODE_STREAM){
      gifMovie = Movie.decodeStream(gifInputStream);
     }else{
      byte[] array = streamToBytes(gifInputStream);
            gifMovie = Movie.decodeByteArray(array, 0, array.length);
     }
     
     movieWidth = gifMovie.width();
     movieHeight = gifMovie.height();
     movieDuration = gifMovie.duration();
     
     ((MainActivity)context).runOnUiThread(new Runnable(){

      @Override
      public void run() {
       //request re-draw layout
       invalidate();
       requestLayout();
       Toast.makeText(context, 
         movieWidth + " x " + movieHeight + "\n"
         + movieDuration, 
         Toast.LENGTH_LONG).show();
      }});
     
    } catch (MalformedURLException e) {
     // TODO Auto-generated catch block
     e.printStackTrace();
    } catch (IOException e) {
     // TODO Auto-generated catch block
     e.printStackTrace();
    }
   }});
  
  threadLoadGif.start();
  
 }
 
 private static byte[] streamToBytes(InputStream is) {
        ByteArrayOutputStream os = new ByteArrayOutputStream(1024);
        byte[] buffer = new byte[1024];
        int len;
        try {
            while ((len = is.read(buffer)) >= 0) {
                os.write(buffer, 0, len);
            }
        } catch (java.io.IOException e) {
        }
        return os.toByteArray();
    }

 @Override
 protected void onMeasure(int widthMeasureSpec, 
   int heightMeasureSpec) {
  setMeasuredDimension(movieWidth, movieHeight);
 }
 
 public int getMovieWidth(){
  return movieWidth;
 }
 
 public int getMovieHeight(){
  return movieHeight;
 }
 
 public long getMovieDuration(){
  return movieDuration;
 }

 @Override
 protected void onDraw(Canvas canvas) {

  long now = android.os.SystemClock.uptimeMillis();
        if (mMovieStart == 0) {   // first time
            mMovieStart = now;
        }
        
        if (gifMovie != null) {

            int dur = gifMovie.duration();
            if (dur == 0) {
                dur = 1000;
            }

            int relTime = (int)((now - mMovieStart) % dur);
            
            gifMovie.setTime(relTime);

            gifMovie.draw(canvas, 0, 0);
            invalidate();
            
        }
        
 }

}

Other files, MainActivity.java and AndroidManifest.xml to turn OFF hardwareAccelerated, refer to the post "Play animated GIF using android.graphics.Movie, with Movie.decodeStream(InputStream)".

(Remark: to load from Internet, uses-permission of "android.permission.INTERNET" is needed in AndroidManifest.xml.

Download the files.


Another example of playing new Google animated GIF, load from Internet.