Android Architecture

Android Operating System

 OS Components
• Linux Kernel
Android relies on Linux version 2.6 for core
system services such as security, memory
management, process management, network
stack, and driver model. The kernel also acts
as an abstraction layer between the hardware
and the rest of the software stack.
 OS Components
Android Runtime
• Android includes a set of core libraries that
provides most of the functionality available in the
core libraries of the Java programming language.
• Every Android application runs in its own process,
with its own instance of the Dalvik virtual
machine.
• Dalvik has been written so that a device can run
multiple VMs efficiently.
 OS Components
Android Runtime
• The Dalvik VM executes files in the Dalvik
Executable (.dex) format which is optimized for
minimal memory footprint.
• The VM is register-based, and runs classes
compiled by a Java language compiler that have
been transformed into the .dex format by the
included "dx" tool.
• The Dalvik VM relies on the Linux kernel for
underlying functionality such as threading and
low-level memory management.
 OS Components
Libraries
• Android includes a set of C/C++ libraries used by various
components of the Android system. These capabilities are exposed
to developers through the Android application framework. Some of
the core libraries are listed below:
• System C library - a BSD-derived implementation of the standard C
system library (libc), tuned for embedded Linux-based devices
• Media Libraries - based on PacketVideo's OpenCORE; the libraries
support playback and recording of many popular audio and video
formats, as well as static image files, including MPEG4, H.264, MP3,
AAC, AMR, JPG, and PNG
• Surface Manager - manages access to the display subsystem and
seamlessly composites 2D and 3D graphic layers from multiple
applications
 OS Components
Libraries
• LibWebCore - a modern web browser engine which
powers both the Android browser and an embeddable
web view
• SGL - the underlying 2D graphics engine
• 3D libraries - an implementation based on OpenGL ES
1.0 APIs; the libraries use either hardware 3D
acceleration (where available) or the included, highly
optimized 3D software rasterizer
• FreeType - bitmap and vector font rendering
• SQLite - a powerful and lightweight relational database
engine available to all applications
 OS Components
Application Framework
• Developers are free to take advantage of the device
hardware, access location information, run background
services, set alarms, add notifications to the status bar, and
much, much more.
• Developers have full access to the same framework APIs
used by the core applications. The application architecture
is designed to simplify the reuse of components; any
application can publish its capabilities and any other
application may then make use of those capabilities
(subject to security constraints enforced by the
framework). This same mechanism allows components to
be replaced by the user.
 OS Components
Application Framework
• Underlying all applications is a set of services and systems,
including:
• A rich and extensible set of Views that can be used to build an
application, including lists, grids, text boxes, buttons, and even an
embeddable web browser
• Content Providers that enable applications to access data from
other applications (such as Contacts), or to share their own data
• A Resource Manager, providing access to non-code resources such
as localized strings, graphics, and layout files
• A Notification Manager that enables all applications to display
custom alerts in the status bar
• An Activity Manager that manages the lifecycle of applications and
provides a common navigation backstack
 Application Fundamentals
• Android applications are written in the Java
programming language.
• The compiled Java code — along with any data
and resource files required by the application —
is bundled by the aapt tool into an Android
package, an archive file marked by an .apk suffix.
• This file is the vehicle for distributing the
application and installing it on mobile devices; it's
the file users download to their devices. All the
code in a single .apk file is considered to be one
application.
 Application Fundamentals
• By default, every application runs in its own
Linux process. Android starts the process
when any of the application's code needs to
be executed, and shuts down the process
when it's no longer needed and system
resources are required by other applications.
• Each process has its own virtual machine
(VM), so application code runs in isolation
from the code of all other applications.
 Application Fundamentals
• By default, each application is assigned a unique
Linux user ID. Permissions are set so that the
application's files are visible only to that user and
only to the application itself — although there are
ways to export them to other applications as well.
• It's possible to arrange for two applications to share
the same user ID, in which case they will be able to
see each other's files. To conserve system resources,
applications with the same ID can also arrange to run
in the same Linux process, sharing the same VM.
 Application Components
• An Android application can make use of
elements of other applications. If your
application needs to display a scrolling list of
images and another application has developed
a suitable scroller and made it available to
others, you can call upon that scroller to do
the work.
• Your application simply starts up that piece of
the other application when the need arises.
 Application Components
• The system must start an application process
when any part of it is needed, and instantiate
the Java objects for that part. Android
applications don't have a single entry point
(no main() function).
• Android applications have essential
components that the system can instantiate
and run as needed.
 Four Component Types
Activities
• Present a visual user interface for one focused
endeavor the user can undertake.
• Example - Present a list of menu items users can
choose from or it might display photographs along
with their captions.
• Example - A text messaging application might have
one activity that shows a list of contacts to send
messages to, a second activity to write the message
to the chosen contact, and other activities to review
old messages or change settings.
 Activities
• Each activity is independent of the others.
• Each one is implemented as a subclass of the
Activity base class.
• Typically, one of the activities is marked as the first
one that should be presented to the user when the
application is launched.
• Moving from one activity to another is
accomplished by having the current activity start
the next one.
 Four Component Types
Activities
• The visual content of the window is provided by a
hierarchy of views — objects derived from the base
View class.
• Each view controls a particular rectangular space
within the window. Parent views contain and
organize the layout of their children.
• Leaf views (those at the bottom of the hierarchy)
draw in the rectangles they control and respond to
user actions directed at that space.
 Activity Views
• Views are where the activity's interaction with the
user takes place. A view might display a small image
and respond when the user taps that image.
• Android has a number of ready-made views that you
can use — including buttons, text fields, scroll bars,
menu items, check boxes, and more.
• A view hierarchy is placed within an activity's
window by the Activity.setContentView() method.
• The content view is the View object at the root of the
hierarchy.
 Four Component Types
Services
• A service doesn't have a visual user interface, but rather runs
in the background for an indefinite period of time.
• Each service extends the Service base class.
• A good example of a service is a media player playing songs.
One or more player activities would allow the user to choose
songs and start playing them. The music playback itself would
not be handled by an activity (users will expect the music to
keep playing ). The media player activity could start a service
to run in the background.
 Services
• It's possible to connect to (bind to) an ongoing service (and
start the service if it's not already running). While connected,
you can communicate with the service through an interface
that the service exposes. For the music service, this interface
might allow users to pause, rewind, stop, and restart the
playback.
• Like activities and the other components, services run in the
main thread of the application process. So that they won't
block other components or the user interface, they often
spawn another thread for time-consuming tasks (like music
playback).
 Four Component Types
Broadcast receivers
• A broadcast receiver is a component that does nothing but
receive and react to broadcast announcements.
• Many broadcasts originate in system code — for example,
announcements that the timezone has changed, that the
battery is low, that a picture has been taken, or that the user
changed a language preference.
• Applications can also initiate broadcasts — for example, to let
other applications know that some data has been
downloaded to the device and is available for them to use.
 Broadcast Receiver
• An application can have any number of broadcast receivers to
respond to any announcements it considers important. All
receivers extend the BroadcastReceiver base class.
• Broadcast receivers do not display a user interface. However,
they may start an activity in response to the information they
receive, or they may use the NotificationManager to alert the
user.
• Notifications can get the user's attention in various ways —
flashing the backlight, vibrating the device, playing a sound,
and so on. They typically place a persistent icon in the status
bar, which users can open to get the message.
 Four Component Types
Content providers
• A content provider makes a specific set of the application's
data available to other applications. The data can be stored in
the file system, in an SQLite database, or in any other manner
that makes sense.
• The content provider extends the ContentProvider base class
to implement a standard set of methods that enable other
applications to retrieve and store data of the type it controls.
• Applications do not call these methods directly. Rather they
use a ContentResolver object and call its methods instead. A
ContentResolver can talk to any content provider; it
cooperates with the provider to manage any interprocess
communication that's involved.
 Activating components: intents
• Content providers are activated when they're
targeted by a request from a ContentResolver.
• Activities, services, and broadcast receivers —
are activated by asynchronous messages
called intents.
• An intent is an Intent object that holds the
content of the message.
 Intents
• For activities and services, the Intent names the
action being requested and specifies the URI of the
data to act on. For example, it might convey a
request for an activity to present an image to the
user or let the user edit some text.
• For broadcast receivers, the Intent object names the
action being announced. For example, it might
announce to interested parties that the camera
button has been pressed.
 Methods for Activating an Activity
• An activity is launched (or given something new to
do) by passing an Intent object to
Context.startActivity() or
Activity.startActivityForResult().
• The responding activity can look at the initial intent
that caused it to be launched by calling its getIntent()
method.
• Android calls the activity's onNewIntent() method to
pass it any subsequent intents.
 Methods for Activating an Activity
• One activity often starts the next one. If it
expects a result back from the activity it's
starting, it calls startActivityForResult() instead
of startActivity(). For example, if it starts an
activity that lets the user pick a photo, it might
expect to be returned the chosen photo. The
result is returned in an Intent object that's
passed to the calling activity's
onActivityResult() method.
 Methods for Activating a Service
• A service is started (or new instructions are given to an
ongoing service) by passing an Intent object to
Context.startService().
• Android calls the service's onStart() method and passes
it the Intent object.
• Similarly, an intent can be passed to
Context.bindService() to establish an ongoing
connection between the calling component and a
target service. The service receives the Intent object in
an onBind() call. (If the service is not already running,
bindService() can optionally start it.)
 Methods for Activating a Service
• For example, an activity might establish a connection with the
music playback service mentioned earlier so that it can
provide the user with the means (a user interface) for
controlling the playback. The activity would call bindService()
to set up that connection, and then call methods defined by
the service to affect the playback.
• An application can initiate a broadcast by passing an Intent
object to methods like Context.sendBroadcast(),
Context.sendOrderedBroadcast(), and
Context.sendStickyBroadcast() in any of their variations.
• Android delivers the intent to all interested broadcast
receivers by calling their onReceive() methods.
 Shutting down components
• Content providers and broadcast receivers don’t need to be
explicitly shut down.
• A content provider is active only while it's responding to a
request from a ContentResolver.
• A broadcast receiver is active only while it's responding to a
broadcast message.
• Activities, on the other hand, provide the user interface.
They're in a long-running conversation with the user and
may remain active, even when idle, as long as the
conversation continues.
• Services may also remain running for a long time. Android
has methods to shut down activities and services in an
orderly way.
 Shutting down components
• An activity can be shut down by calling its finish()
method. One activity can shut down another
activity (one it started with
startActivityForResult()) by calling finishActivity().
• A service can be stopped by calling its stopSelf()
method, or by calling Context.stopService().
• Components might also be shut down by the
system when they are no longer being used or
when Android must reclaim memory for more
active components.
 The Manifest File
• Before Android can start an application component, it must
learn that the component exists. Therefore, applications
declare their components in a manifest file that's bundled
into the Android package, the .apk file that also holds the
application's code, files, and resources.
• The manifest is a structured XML file and is always named
AndroidManifest.xml for all applications.
• It does a number of things in addition to declaring the
application's components, such as naming any libraries the
application needs to be linked against (besides the default
Android library) and identifying any permissions the
application expects to be granted.
 Example Manifest with Activity
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<manifest . . . >
<application . . . >
<activity
android:name="com.example.project.FreneticActivity"
android:icon="@drawable/small_pic.png"
android:label="@string/freneticLabel"
. . . >
</activity>
. . .
</application>
</manifest>
• The name attribute of the <activity> element names the Activity
subclass that implements the activity.
• The icon and label attributes point to resource files containing an
icon and label that can be displayed to users to represent the
activity.
 Example Manifest with Activity
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<manifest . . . >
<application . . . >
<activity android:name="com.example.project.FreneticActivity"
android:icon="@drawable/small_pic.png"
android:label="@string/freneticLabel"
. . . >
</activity>
. . .
</application>
</manifest>
• The other components are declared in a similar way — <service> elements for
services, <receiver> elements for broadcast receivers, and <provider> elements for
content providers.
• Activities, services, and content providers that are not declared in the manifest are
not visible to the system and are consequently never run.
• Broadcast receivers can either be declared in the manifest, or they can be created
dynamically in code (as BroadcastReceiver objects) and registered with the system
by calling Context.registerReceiver().
 Intent Filters
• An Intent object can explicitly name a target
component. If it does, Android finds that component
(based on the declarations in the manifest file) and
activates it.
• If a target is not explicitly named, Android must locate
the best component to respond to the intent.
• Android does so by comparing the Intent object to the
intent filters of potential targets.
• A component's intent filters inform Android of the
kinds of intents the component is able to handle. Like
other essential information about the component,
they're declared in the manifest file.
 Intent Filters in a Manifest
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<manifest . . . >
<application . . . >
<activity android:name="com.example.project.FreneticActivity"
android:icon="@drawable/small_pic.png"
android:label="@string/freneticLabel"
. . . >
<intent-filter . . . >
<action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />
<category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />
</intent-filter>
<intent-filter . . . >
<action android:name="com.example.project.BOUNCE" />
<data android:mimeType="image/jpeg" />
<category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT" />
</intent-filter>
</activity>
. . .
</application>
</manifest>
• The first filter — the combination of the action "android.intent.action.MAIN" and the category
"android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" — marks the activity as one that should be represented in the application
launcher, the screen listing applications users can launch on the device.
• The activity is the entry point for the application, the initial one users would see when they choose the application
in the launcher.
 Intent Filters in a Manifest
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<manifest . . . >
<application . . . >
<activity android:name="com.example.project.FreneticActivity"
android:icon="@drawable/small_pic.png"
android:label="@string/freneticLabel"
. . . >
<intent-filter . . . >
<action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />
<category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />
</intent-filter>
<intent-filter . . . >
<action android:name="com.example.project.BOUNCE" />
<data android:mimeType="image/jpeg" />
<category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT" />
</intent-filter>
</activity>
. . .
</application>
</manifest>
• The second filter declares an action that the activity can perform on a particular type of data.
• A component can have any number of intent filters, each one declaring a different set of capabilities. If it doesn't
have any filters, it can be activated only by intents that explicitly name the component as the target.
• For a broadcast receiver that's created and registered in code, the intent filter is instantiated directly as an
IntentFilter object. All other filters are set up in the manifest.
 Intent Filters in a Manifest
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<manifest . . . >
<application . . . >
<activity android:name="com.example.project.FreneticActivity"
android:icon="@drawable/small_pic.png"
android:label="@string/freneticLabel"
. . . >
<intent-filter . . . >
<action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />
<category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />
</intent-filter>
<intent-filter . . . >
<action android:name="com.example.project.BOUNCE" />
<data android:mimeType="image/jpeg" />
<category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT" />
</intent-filter>
</activity>
. . .
</application>
</manifest>
• The second filter declares an action that the activity can perform on a particular type of data.
• A component can have any number of intent filters, each one declaring a different set of capabilities. If it doesn't
have any filters, it can be activated only by intents that explicitly name the component as the target.
• For a broadcast receiver that's created and registered in code, the intent filter is instantiated directly as an
IntentFilter object. All other filters are set up in the manifest.
 Activities and Tasks
• One activity can start another, including one defined in
a different application.
• Your activity can build an Intent object with the
required information and pass it to startActivity() (say a
map viewer) in a different application. The map viewer
will display the map. When the user hits the BACK key,
your activity will reappear on screen.
• Users are unaware that the activities are in different
applications.
• Android maintains this user experience by keeping
both activities in the same task.
 Activities and Tasks
• A task is a group of related activities, arranged in a
stack. The root activity in the stack is the one that
began the task — typically, it's an activity the user
selected in the application launcher.
• The activity at the top of the stack is one that's
currently running — the one that is the focus for user
actions. When one activity starts another, the new
activity is pushed on the stack; it becomes the running
activity. The previous activity remains in the stack.
When the user presses the BACK key, the current
activity is popped from the stack, and the previous one
resumes as the running activity.
 Activities and Tasks
• The stack contains objects, so if a task has more than
one instance of the same Activity subclass open —
multiple map viewers, for example — the stack has a
separate entry for each instance. Activities in the stack
are never rearranged, only pushed and popped.
• A task is a stack of activities, not a class or an element
in the manifest file. So there's no way to set values for
a task independently of its activities.
• Values for the task as a whole are set in the root
activity.
 Activities and Tasks
• All the activities in a task move together as a unit. The entire task (the entire
activity stack) can be brought to the foreground or sent to the background.
• Senario:
– The current task has four activities in its stack — three under the current activity.
– The user presses the HOME key, goes to the application launcher, and selects a new
application (actually, a new task).
– The current task goes into the background and the root activity for the new task is displayed.
Then, after a short period, the user goes back to the home screen and again selects the
previous application (the previous task).
– That task, with all four activities in the stack, comes forward. When the user presses the BACK
key, the screen does not display the activity the user just left (the root activity of the previous
task). Rather, the activity on the top of the stack is removed and the previous activity in the
same task is displayed.
• The behavior just described is the default behavior for activities and tasks. But
there are ways to modify almost all aspects of it. The association of activities with
tasks, and the behavior of an activity within a task, is controlled by the interaction
between flags set in the Intent object that started the activity and attributes set in
the activity's <activity> element in the manifest. Both requester and respondent
have a say in what happens.
 Intent Flags
The principal Intent flags are:
• FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK
• FLAG_ACTIVITY_CLEAR_TOP
• FLAG_ACTIVITY_RESET_TASK_IF_NEEDED
• FLAG_ACTIVITY_SINGLE_TOP
The principal <activity> attributes are:
• taskAffinity
• launchMode
• allowTaskReparenting
• clearTaskOnLaunch
• alwaysRetainTaskState
• finishOnTaskLaunch
 Affinities and New Tasks
• By default, all the activities in an application have an
affinity for each other — that is, there's a preference for
them all to belong to the same task.
• An individual affinity can be set for each activity with the
taskAffinity attribute of the <activity> element.
• Activities defined in different applications can share an
affinity, or activities defined in the same application can be
assigned different affinities.
• The affinity comes into play in two circumstances:
1) When the Intent object that launches an activity contains the
FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK flag,
2) When an activity has its allowTaskReparenting attribute set to
"true".
 FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK
• A new activity is, by default, launched into the task of
the activity that called startActivity(). It's pushed onto
the same stack as the caller.
• If the Intent object passed to startActivity() contains
the FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK flag, the system looks
for a different task to house the new activity. Often, as
the name of the flag implies, it's a new task. However,
it doesn't have to be.
• If there's already an existing task with the same affinity
as the new activity, the activity is launched into that
task. If not, it begins a new task.
 allowTaskReparenting Attribute
• If an activity has its allowTaskReparenting attribute set to "true", it
can move from the task it starts in to the task it has an affinity for
when that task comes to the fore.
• Scenario:
– An activity that reports weather conditions in selected cities is defined
as part of a travel application. It has the same affinity as other
activities in the same application (the default affinity) and it allows
reparenting.
– One of your activities starts the weather reporter, so it initially belongs
to the same task as your activity. However, when the travel application
next comes forward, the weather reporter will be reassigned to and
displayed with that task.
– If an .apk file contains more than one "application" from the user's
point of view, you will probably want to assign different affinities to
the activities associated with each of them.
 Launch modes
• There are four different launch modes that
can be assigned to an <activity> element's
launchMode attribute:
1) "standard" (the default mode)
2) "singleTop"
3) "singleTask"
4) "singleInstance"
 Launch modes
The modes differ from each other on these four points:
• Which task will hold the activity that responds to the intent. For the
"standard" and "singleTop" modes, it's the task that originated the intent
(and called startActivity()) — unless the Intent object contains the
FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK flag. In that case, a different task is chosen.
In contrast, the "singleTask" and "singleInstance" modes mark activities
that are always at the root of a task. They define a task; they're never
launched into another task.
• Whether there can be multiple instances of the activity. A "standard" or
"singleTop" activity can be instantiated many times. They can belong to
multiple tasks, and a given task can have multiple instances of the same
activity.
In contrast, "singleTask" and "singleInstance" activities are limited to just
one instance. Since these activities are at the root of a task, this limitation
means that there is never more than a single instance of the task on the
device at one time.
 Launch modes
• Whether the instance can have other activities in its
task. A "singleInstance" activity stands alone as the
only activity in its task. If it starts another activity, that
activity will be launched into a different task regardless
of its launch mode — as if FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK
was in the intent. In all other respects, the
"singleInstance" mode is identical to "singleTask".
The other three modes permit multiple activities to
belong to the task. A "singleTask" activity will always be
the root activity of the task, but it can start other
activities that will be assigned to its task. Instances of
"standard" and "singleTop" activities can appear
anywhere in a stack.
 Launch modes
• Whether a new instance of the class will be launched to handle a new intent. For
the default "standard" mode, a new instance is created to respond to every new
intent. Each instance handles just one intent. For the "singleTop" mode, an existing
instance of the class is re-used to handle a new intent if it resides at the top of the
activity stack of the target task. If it does not reside at the top, it is not re-used.
Instead, a new instance is created for the new intent and pushed on the stack.
• For example, suppose a task's activity stack consists of root activity A with
activities B, C, and D on top in that order, so the stack is A-B-C-D. An intent arrives
for an activity of type D. If D has the default "standard" launch mode, a new
instance of the class is launched and the stack becomes A-B-C-D-D. However, if D's
launch mode is "singleTop", the existing instance is expected to handle the new
intent (since it's at the top of the stack) and the stack remains A-B-C-D.
• If, on the other hand, the arriving intent is for an activity of type B, a new instance
of B would be launched no matter whether B's mode is "standard" or "singleTop"
(since B is not at the top of the stack), so the resulting stack would be A-B-C-D-B.
 Launch modes
• There's never more than one instance of a "singleTask" or "singleInstance"
activity, so that instance is expected to handle all new intents. A
"singleInstance" activity is always at the top of the stack (since it is the
only activity in the task), so it is always in position to handle the intent.
• A "singleTask" activity may or may not have other activities above it in the
stack. If it does, it is not in position to handle the intent, and the intent is
dropped. (Even though the intent is dropped, its arrival would have caused
the task to come to the foreground, where it would remain.)
• When an existing activity is asked to handle a new intent, the Intent object
is passed to the activity in an onNewIntent() call. (The intent object that
originally started the activity can be retrieved by calling getIntent().)
• When a new instance of an Activity is created to handle a new intent, the
user can always press the BACK key to return to the previous state (to the
previous activity). But when an existing instance of an Activity handles a
new intent, the user cannot press the BACK key to return to what that
instance was doing before the new intent arrived.
 Clearing the stack
• If the user leaves a task for a long time, the
system clears the task of all activities except
the root activity. When the user returns to the
task again, it's as the user left it, except that
only the initial activity is present.
• The idea is that, after a time, users will likely
have abandoned what they were doing before
and are returning to the task to begin
something new.
 Clearing the stack
There are some activity attributes that can be used to
control this behavior and modify it:
• The alwaysRetainTaskState attribute
– If this attribute is set to "true" in the root activity of a task,
the default behavior does not happen. The task retains all
activities in its stack even after a long period.
• The clearTaskOnLaunch attribute
– If this attribute is set to "true" in the root activity of a task,
the stack is cleared down to the root activity whenever the
user leaves the task and returns to it. In other words, it's
the polar opposite of alwaysRetainTaskState. The user
always returns to the task in its initial state, even after a
momentary absence.
 Clearing the stack
• The finishOnTaskLaunch attribute
– This attribute is like clearTaskOnLaunch, but it operates on a single activity, not an entire task.
And it can cause any activity to go away, including the root activity. When it's set to "true", the
activity remains part of the task only for the current session. If the user leaves and then
returns to the task, it no longer is present.
• There's another way to force activities to be removed from the stack. If an Intent
object includes the FLAG_ACTIVITY_CLEAR_TOP flag, and the target task already
has an instance of the type of activity that should handle the intent in its stack, all
activities above that instance are cleared away so that it stands at the top of the
stack and can respond to the intent. If the launch mode of the designated activity
is "standard", it too will be removed from the stack, and a new instance will be
launched to handle the incoming intent. That's because a new instance is always
created for a new intent when the launch mode is "standard".
• FLAG_ACTIVITY_CLEAR_TOP is most often used in conjunction with
FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK. When used together, these flags are a way of locating
an existing activity in another task and putting it in a position where it can respond
to the intent.
 Starting tasks
• An activity is set up as the entry point for a task
by giving it an intent filter with
"android.intent.action.MAIN" as the specified
action and "android.intent.category.LAUNCHER"
as the specified category.
• A filter of this kind causes an icon and label for
the activity to be displayed in the application
launcher, giving users a way both to launch the
task and to return to it at any time after it has
been launched.
 Starting tasks
• Icon access is important: Users must be able to leave a task
and then come back to it later.
• For this reason, the two launch modes that mark activities
as always initiating a task, "singleTask" and
"singleInstance", should be used only when the activity has
a MAIN and LAUNCHER filter.
• Scenario - Assume the filter is missing :
– An intent launches a "singleTask" activity, initiating a new task,
and the user spends some time working in that task.
– The user then presses the HOME key.
– The task is now ordered behind and obscured by the home
screen. Because it is not represented in the application launcher,
the user has no way to return to it.
 Starting tasks
• A similar difficulty attends the FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK flag. If
this flag causes an activity to begin a new task and the user presses
the HOME key to leave it, there must be some way for the user to
navigate back to it again. Some entities (such as the notification
manager) always start activities in an external task, never as part of
their own, so they always put FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK in the
intents they pass to startActivity(). If you have an activity that can
be invoked by an external entity that might use this flag, take care
that the user has a independent way to get back to the task that's
started.
• For those cases where you don't want the user to be able to return
to an activity, set the <activity> element's finishOnTaskLaunch to
"true". See Clearing the stack, earlier.
 Processes and Threads
• When the first of an application's components
needs to be run, Android starts a Linux process
for it with a single thread of execution.
• By default, all components of the application run
in that process and thread.
• You can arrange for components to run in other
processes.
• You can spawn additional threads for any process.
 Processes
• The process where a component runs is controlled by the manifest
file.
• The component elements — <activity>, <service>, <receiver>, and
<provider> — each have a process attribute that can specify a
process where that component should run.
• These attributes can be set so that each component runs in its own
process, or so that some components share a process while others
do not.
• The attributes can also be set so that components of different
applications run in the same process — provided that the
applications share the same Linux user ID and are signed by the
same authorities.
• The <application> element also has a process attribute, for setting a
default value that applies to all components.
 Processes
• All components are instantiated in the main thread of
the specified process, and system calls to the
component are dispatched from that thread. Separate
threads are not created for each instance.
• No component should perform long or blocking
operations (such as networking operations or
computation loops) when called by the system, since
this will block any other components also in the
process.
• You can spawn separate threads for long operations.
 Processes
• Android may decide to shut down a process at
some point, when memory is low and
required by other processes that are more
immediately serving the user.
• Application components running in the
process are consequently destroyed.
• A process is restarted for those components
when there's again work for them to do.
 Processes
• When deciding which processes to terminate,
Android weighs their relative importance to the
user.
• For example, it more readily shuts down a
process with activities that are no longer visible
on screen than a process with visible activities.
• The decision whether to terminate a process,
therefore, depends on the state of the
components running in that process.
 Threads
• There will likely be times when you will need to
spawn a thread to do some background work.
• Since the user interface must always be quick to
respond to user actions, the thread that hosts an
activity should not also host time-consuming
operations like network downloads.
• Anything that may not be completed quickly
should be assigned to a different thread.
 Threads
• Threads are created in code using standard
Java Thread objects.
• Android provides a number of convenience
classes for managing threads:
– Looper for running a message loop within a
thread,
– Handler for processing messages
– HandlerThread for setting up a thread with a
message loop.
 Component Lifecycles
• Application components have a lifecycle — a
beginning when Android instantiates them to
respond to intents through to an end when
the instances are destroyed.
• In between, they may sometimes be active or
inactive,or, in the case of activities, visible to
the user or invisible.
 Component Lifecycles - Active
• An activity has essentially three states:
1) It is active or running when it is in the
foreground of the screen (at the top of the
activity stack for the current task). This is the
activity that is the focus for the user's actions.
 Component Lifecycles - Paused
• An activity has essentially three states:
2) It is paused if it has lost focus but is still visible to
the user. That is, another activity lies on top of it and
that activity either is transparent or doesn't cover the
full screen, so some of the paused activity can show
through.
A paused activity is completely alive (it maintains all
state and member information and remains attached
to the window manager), but can be killed by the
system in extreme low memory situations.
 Component Lifecycles - Paused
• An activity has essentially three states:
3) It is stopped if it is completely obscured by
another activity.
It still retains all state and member
information. However, it is no longer visible to
the user so its window is hidden and it will
often be killed by the system when memory is
needed elsewhere.
 Component Lifecycles
• If an activity is paused or stopped, the system
can drop it from memory either by asking it to
finish (calling its finish() method), or simply
killing its process. When it is displayed again
to the user, it must be completely restarted
and restored to its previous state.
 Lifecycles Notifications
• As an activity transitions from state to state, it is
notified of the change by calls to the following
protected methods:
• void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState)
void onStart()
void onRestart()
void onResume()
void onPause()
void onStop()
void onDestroy()
 Lifecycles Notifications
• All of these methods are hooks that you can
override to do appropriate work when the
state changes.
• All activities must implement onCreate() to do
the initial setup when the object is first
instantiated.
• Many will also implement onPause() to
commit data changes and otherwise prepare
to stop interacting with the user.
 Activity Lifetime
• The entire lifetime of an activity happens
between the first call to onCreate() through to a
single final call to onDestroy().
• An activity does all its initial setup of "global"
state in onCreate(), and releases all remaining
resources in onDestroy().
• For example, if it has a thread running in the
background to download data from the network,
it may create that thread in onCreate() and then
stop the thread in onDestroy().
 Visible Lifetime
• The visible lifetime of an activity happens between a call to
onStart() until a corresponding call to onStop(). During this
time, the user can see the activity on-screen, though it may
not be in the foreground and interacting with the user.
• Between these two methods, you can maintain resources
that are needed to show the activity to the user. For
example, you can register a BroadcastReceiver in onStart()
to monitor for changes that impact your UI, and unregister
it in onStop() when the user can no longer see what you are
displaying.
• The onStart() and onStop() methods can be called multiple
times, as the activity alternates between being visible and
hidden to the user.
 Foreground Lifetime
• The foreground lifetime of an activity happens
between a call to onResume() until a corresponding call
to onPause().
• During this time, the activity is in front of all other
activities on screen and is interacting with the user.
• An activity can frequently transition between the
resumed and paused states — for example, onPause()
is called when the device goes to sleep or when a new
activity is started, onResume() is called when an
activity result or a new intent is delivered.
• Therefore, the code in these two methods should be
fairly lightweight.
 onCreate()
• Called when the activity is first created.
• This is where you should do all of your normal
static set up — create views, bind data to lists,
and so on.
• Passed a Bundle object containing the
activity's previous state, if that state was
captured.
• Always followed by onStart().
• Not killable.
 onRestart()
• Called after the activity has been stopped, just
prior to it being started again.
• Always followed by onStart().
• Not killable.
 onResume()
• Called just before the activity starts interacting
with the user. At this point the activity is at the
top of the activity stack, with user input going
to it.
• Always followed by onPause().
• Not killable.
 onPause()
• Called when the system is about to start resuming
another activity.
• This method is typically used to commit unsaved
changes to persistent data, stop animations and
other things that may be consuming CPU, and so on.
• It should do whatever it does very quickly, because
the next activity will not be resumed until it returns.
• Followed either by onResume() if the activity returns
back to the front, or by onStop() if it becomes
invisible to the user.
• Killable.
 onStop()
• Called when the activity is no longer visible to
the user. This may happen because it is being
destroyed, or because another activity (either
an existing one or a new one) has been
resumed and is covering it.
• Followed either by onRestart() if the activity is
coming back to interact with the user, or by
onDestroy() if this activity is going away.
• Killable.
 onDestroy()
• Called before the activity is destroyed. This is
the final call that the activity will receive.
• It could be called either because the activity is
finishing (someone called finish() on it), or
because the system is temporarily destroying
this instance of the activity to save space.
• You can distinguish between these two
scenarios with the isFinishing() method.
• Killable.
 Killable
• A process is killable if the system can kill the
process hosting the activity at any time after
the method returns, without executing
another line of the activity's code.
• Three methods are killable.
– onPause()
– onStop()
– onDestroy()
 Killable
• Because onPause() is the first of the three, it's the only one
that's guaranteed to be called before the process is killed.
• You should use onPause() to write any persistent data (such as
user edits) to storage.
• An activity is in a killable state from the time onPause()
returns to the time onResume() is called. It will not again be
killable until onPause() again returns.
• An activity that's not technically "killable" by this definition
might still be killed by the system — but that would happen
only in extreme and dire circumstances when there is no
other recourse.
 Saving activity state
• When the system, rather than the user, shuts
down an activity to conserve memory, the
user may expect to return to the activity and
find it in its previous state.
• To capture that state you can implement an
onSaveInstanceState() method for the activity.
• Android calls this method before making the
activity vulnerable to being destroyed— that
is, before onPause() is called.
 Saving activity state
• Android passes the method a Bundle object where
you can record the dynamic state of the activity as
name-value pairs.
• When the activity is again started, the Bundle is
passed both to onCreate() and to a method that's
called after onStart(), onRestoreInstanceState(), so
that either or both of them can recreate the
captured state.
• Methods onSaveInstanceState() and
onRestoreInstanceState() are not lifecycle methods.
They are not always called.
 Saving activity state
• For example, Android calls onSaveInstanceState()
before the activity becomes vulnerable to being
destroyed by the system, but does not bother calling
it when the instance is actually being destroyed by a
user action (such as pressing the BACK key). In that
case, the user won't expect to return to the activity,
so there's no reason to save its state.
• Because onSaveInstanceState() is not always called,
you should use it only to record the transient state of
the activity, not to store persistent data. Use
onPause() for that purpose instead.
 Coordinating activities
• When one activity starts another, they both
experience lifecycle transitions. One pauses and may
stop, while the other starts up.
• The order of lifecycle callbacks is well defined,
particularly when the two activities are in the same
process:
– The current activity's onPause() method is called.
– Next, the starting activity's onCreate(), onStart(), and
onResume() methods are called in sequence.
– Then, if the starting activity is no longer visible on screen,
its onStop() method is called.
 Service lifecycle
• A service can be used in two ways:
– It can be started and allowed to run until someone stops it or it stops
itself. In this mode, it's started by calling Context.startService() and
stopped by calling Context.stopService(). It can stop itself by calling
Service.stopSelf() or Service.stopSelfResult(). Only one stopService()
call is needed to stop the service, no matter how many times
startService() was called.
– It can be operated programmatically using an interface that it defines
and exports. Clients establish a connection to the Service object and
use that connection to call into the service. The connection is
established by calling Context.bindService(), and is closed by calling
Context.unbindService(). Multiple clients can bind to the same service.
If the service has not already been launched, bindService() can
optionally launch it.
 Service Lifecycle
• The two modes are not entirely separate. You can
bind to a service that was started with startService().
• For example, a background music service could be
started by calling startService() with an Intent object
that identifies the music to play.
• When the user wants to exercise some control over
the player or get information about the current song,
an activity would establish a connection to the
service by calling bindService(). In cases like this,
stopService() will not actually stop the service until
the last binding is closed.
 Service Methods
• Like an activity, a service has lifecycle methods
that you can implement to monitor changes in
its state.
• But they are fewer than the activity methods
— only three — and they are public, not
protected:
– void onCreate()
– void onStart(Intent intent)
– void onDestroy()
 Definitions
• The entire lifetime of a service happens between the time
onCreate() is called and the time onDestroy() returns. Like an
activity, a service does its initial setup in onCreate(), and
releases all remaining resources in onDestroy(). For example,
a music playback service could create the thread where the
music will be played in onCreate(), and then stop the thread in
onDestroy().
• The active lifetime of a service begins with a call to onStart().
This method is handed the Intent object that was passed to
startService(). The music service would open the Intent to
discover which music to play, and begin the playback.
• There's no equivalent callback for when the service stops —
no onStop() method.
 Bind/Unbind Methods
• If a service permits others to bind to it, there are additional
callback methods for it to implement:
– IBinder onBind(Intent intent)
– boolean onUnbind(Intent intent)
– void onRebind(Intent intent)
• The onBind() callback is passed the Intent object that was
passed to bindService and onUnbind() is handed the intent
that was passed to unbindService().
• If the service permits the binding, onBind() returns the
communications channel that clients use to interact with the
service.
• The onUnbind() method can ask for onRebind() to be called if
a new client connects to the service.
 Broadcast receiver lifecycle
• A broadcast receiver has single callback method:
– void onReceive(Context curContext, Intent broadcastMsg)
• When a broadcast message arrives for the receiver,
Android calls its onReceive() method and passes it
the Intent object containing the message. The
broadcast receiver is considered to be active only
while it is executing this method.
• When onReceive() returns, it is inactive.
 Broadcast receiver lifecycle
• A process with an active broadcast receiver is protected from being killed.
But a process with only inactive components can be killed by the system at
any time, when the memory it consumes is needed by other processes.
• This presents a problem when the response to a broadcast message is
time consuming and, therefore, something that should be done in a
separate thread, away from the main thread where other components of
the user interface run.
• If onReceive() spawns the thread and then returns, the entire process,
including the new thread, is judged to be inactive (unless other application
components are active in the process), putting it in jeopardy of being
killed.
• The solution to this problem is for onReceive() to start a service and let
the service do the job, so the system knows that there is still active work
being done in the process.
 Processes and lifecycles

• The Android system tries to maintain an application

process for as long as possible, but eventually it will
need to remove old processes when memory runs
low.
• To determine which processes to keep and which to
kill, Android places each process into an "importance
hierarchy" based on the components running in it
and the state of those components. Processes with
the lowest importance are eliminated first, then
those with the next lowest, and so on.
• There are five levels in the hierarchy.
 Process Level 1
• A foreground process is one that is required for what
the user is currently doing. A process is considered to
be in the foreground if any of the following
conditions hold:
– It is running an activity that the user is interacting with
(the Activity object's onResume() method has been called).
– It hosts a service that's bound to the activity that the user
is interacting with.
– It has a Service object that's executing one of its lifecycle
callbacks (onCreate(), onStart(), or onDestroy()).
– It has a BroadcastReceiver object that's executing its
onReceive() method.
 Process Level 1
• Only a few foreground processes will exist at
any given time. They are killed only as a last
resort — if memory is so low that they cannot
all continue to run. Generally, at that point,
the device has reached a memory paging
state, so killing some foreground processes is
required to keep the user interface
responsive.
 Process Level 2
• A visible process is one that doesn't have any
foreground components, but still can affect what the
user sees on screen. A process is considered to be
visible if either of the following conditions holds:
– It hosts an activity that is not in the foreground, but is still
visible to the user (its onPause() method has been called).
This may occur, for example, if the foreground activity is a
dialog that allows the previous activity to be seen behind
it.
– It hosts a service that's bound to a visible activity.
 Process Level 2
• A visible process is considered extremely
important and will not be killed unless doing
so is required to keep all foreground processes
running.
 Process Level 3
• A service process is one that is running a service that
has been started with the startService() method and
that does not fall into either of the two higher
categories.
• Service processes are generally doing things that the
user cares about (such as playing an mp3 in the
background or downloading data on the network), so
the system keeps them running unless there's not
enough memory to retain them along with all
foreground and visible processes.
 Process Level 4
• A background process is one holding an activity that's not
currently visible to the user (the Activity object's onStop()
method has been called).
• These processes have no direct impact on the user
experience, and can be killed at any time to reclaim memory
for a foreground, visible, or service process.
• Usually there are many background processes running, so
they are kept in an LRU (least recently used) list to ensure that
the process with the activity that was most recently seen by
the user is the last to be killed.
• If an activity implements its lifecycle methods correctly, and
captures its current state, killing its process will not have a
deleterious effect on the user experience.
 Process Level 5
• An empty process is one that doesn't hold any
active application components.
• The only reason to keep such a process
around is as a cache to improve startup time
the next time a component needs to run in it.
• The system often kills these processes in order
to balance overall system resources between
process caches and the underlying kernel
caches.
 Considerations
• Android ranks a process at the highest level it can, based upon
the importance of the components currently active in the
process.
• For example, if a process hosts a service and a visible activity,
the process will be ranked as a visible process, not a service
process.
• In addition, a process's ranking may be increased because
other processes are dependent on it. A process that is serving
another process can never be ranked lower than the process
it is serving. For example, if a content provider in process A is
serving a client in process B, or if a service in process A is
bound to a component in process B, process A will always be
considered at least as important as process B.
 Considerations
• In addition, a process's ranking may be increased
because other processes are dependent on it.
• A process that is serving another process can never
be ranked lower than the process it is serving.
• For example, if a content provider in process A is
serving a client in process B, or if a service in process
A is bound to a component in process B, process A
will always be considered at least as important as
process B.
 Considerations
• Because a process running a service is ranked higher
than one with background activities, an activity that
initiates a long-running operation might do well to
start a service for that operation, rather than simply
spawn a thread — particularly if the operation will
likely outlast the activity.
• Examples of this are playing music in the background
and uploading a picture taken by the camera to a
web site.
• Using a service guarantees that the operation will
have at least "service process" priority, regardless of
what happens to the activity.