Archiv for ‘Android’


published: February 6th, 2009

Export an Android SQLite db to an XML file on the SD Card

I’m pretty syched about this code.  It took some figuring out and some hunting and asking questions on Google’s Android forum.  But thanks to the following posts

 File permissions for world read/write

SQLite3 sql command to show tables in database

I pieced together the beginnings of some code that will take an Android SQLite db and export it to XML data within a file on the SD Card.  This has a couple potential uses,

(more…)

published: February 4th, 2009

PostBot Android app uploads images

Trying out the feature in PostBot which let’s you add an image to your post.


thumbnail

published: February 3rd, 2009

First post from PostBot Android app

Thanks to @bakebrain on Twitter I’m writing this post on my HTC G1 via PostBot. Let’s see how it does.

published: February 3rd, 2009

New Google Developers Blog Post about RC33…there…then gone??

I got the following post in my news reader from the Google Android Blog,

It’s no Cupcake, but T-Mobile G1 customers will receive newer firmware this week. Starting Thursday, February 5, T-Mobile will send subscribers an over-the-air update that adds:

Google Voice Search
The ability to save MMS messages/files
A feature that searches for system updates
Bug fixes and new features that address known issues

(more…)

published: February 2nd, 2009

Use DDMS to capture screen shots from device

HTC G1 homescreen shot Thanks to Christina’s article at Download Squad I now know that I can use the DDMS tool to capture screen shots directly from the phone.  I haven’t used the tool much because I usually just use the console and ./adb logcat to display logs.  Guess I should have dug a little deeper into what the tool can do, just shows that an old dog can learn new tricks!

published: January 30th, 2009

Android Developers: What syntax do you always seem to forget?

Thought I’d through a question out the to all the Android Developers and ask: What syntax or parts of the development process do you always seem to forget or relearn?

I’ve got 3 that I always have to look up or when I try to debug what I’ve just done, it never seems to work the first (or second time).

1. The show() part of a Toast.

I get the,

Toast.makeText( this, “Some text”, Toast.LENGTH_SHORT )

but I just never remember the show() on the end.  Then I go and run the behavior and mull over it for 5 minutes before I finally remember.

2. Entering new Activities into the manifest file, at least this one gives you an error.

3. For whatever reason, I can never remember the Android reference syntax the first time.  Is it R.android.id or android.R.id…thanks to Eclipse code completion this isn’t to big of an issue.

So what always seems to stump you about the Android API or syntax??  Leave a comment or you can you this for fodder for your own blog.

(Updated 1/30/09 7:55am : corrected some grammar…syntax errors)

published: January 28th, 2009

Use Math.round not (int) - I never claimed to be perfect!

Well this post will show my ignorance towards floating point math.  So my new Android Application, which I hope to put up on the Market soon, is a shopping list which allows you to track how much you’ve spent as your are shopping.  This obviously deals with the price of the products you are purchasing so I expect the user to enter floating point values, but I convert to integers to make math functions go faster.

(more…)

published: January 17th, 2009

Hello to “Hello, Android”

Guess I’m on a book “review” kick lately.  I wasn’t planning on posting back to back about the two Android books I’ve bought, but I just received my bound copy of “Hello, Android” by Ed Burnette the other day.  Call me old school, but I still prefer a bound book to a pdf.  I’ve had a pre-release pdf copy for a couple of months now, and wrote about it in a previous post, but just haven’t been able to bring myself to get all my thoughts down on “paper” till I got the actual book.  So here’s my take…
(more…)

published: January 6th, 2009

Thoughts on “Professional Android Application Development”

I am by no means a very good critique and haven’t written a book report since high school, but I have wanted to write my impression so far of the book “Professional Android Application Development” by Reto Meier.  First let me say I have great respect for anyone willing to author a book on software development.  Just writing development posts for this blog has been a huge learning curve for me, I don’t pretend to be the best technical writer!

(more…)

published: January 6th, 2009

Four different ways of opening a web page in Android

FIRST POST OF 2009!!

Threw this Android Activity together really quickly to see if I understood the different ways of getting a web page to launch.  The first three examples perform the same functionality, the Linkify.addLink call builds a means of launching an Intent.ACTION_VIEW.  The fourth example loads the url into a WebView in the layout.

(more…)