Android Application Development Tutorial - 56 - Creating a PreferenceActivity

sup guys welcome to your 56th androids
toil for the new boss in we're going to
do this tutorial is basically set up in
a class that's going to handle all of
our preferences and then we can set it
to open when we use our little menu
inflator for the most part before we're
going to get before getting into this
again I just kind of want to talk about
what the preferences are as we as you
guys can see we set up this list
preference you guys don't know really
what that is yet because we haven't run
it on our emulator but uh basically it's
going to create a list with like four
radio buttons because we set up four
options within our array XML and so it's
going to give us four options and
depending on those options we wanted to
have a value of some sort so that's why
we set up a second array that holds the
value and so basically we can refer to
this within whatever class we want for
example if we wanted the text to have a
certain size according to the
preferences we could have this array
like if the first option was selected
it's going to have the value of one the
second option it's going to be a value
of two and three and four etc like that
and then we can refer to that value and
if it has value of three we can set the
text to like 20 DP if it has the value
of 425 DP etc so basically this is again
going to save all of our data for the
most part but basically I didn't know if
you guys got confused with the entries
in the entry values so basically this is
what they're going to see once they
select one of those options it's going
to give us the value for that option for
the most part but listen let's create
our class that's going to be your
preferences so we're going to right
click on our folder go to new class and
we're going to call this prefs for
preferences preferences and uh there we
go now this is going to be a little
different um if you guys remember right
at the beginning where I probably
confuse the crap out of you we extended
you know the other list activity for the
most part but this time what we have
been doing is extending activity but for
the Preferences we want to extend
something else so this might be kind of
confusing because this is only
second time we've done it and besides
the first time when we set up that list
activity so we're going to extend
something called preference activity
because we're working with preferences
and we're going to still have all the
access to our activity class so we're
going to right-click around so I just
hover over that and import it and there
we go we have our preferences class
setup for the most part and anytime we
have inactivity when we want to have on
create method so we're going to going to
right click source override implement
methods and as you can see there is all
of our choices again we can say on
create bundle which is what we want and
instead of saying set content view we're
basically going to setup our preference
setup our preference from the resource
basically that really makes sense but
that's what the method is called so it's
going to access where we set up our
preferences tab so we're just going to
say add preference and this again is a
method a method so you guys have to use
this method add preferences from
resource and then we're going to access
where we set up our preferences which
was our dot XML dot prefs
so there we go we basically set up our
preferences and now what we have to do
is basically open this activity so what
we're going to do is go back into our
menu class where we set up our menu
inflator and our menu options we have
this one if the Preferences was clicked
I'm also going to copy this real quickly
paste it since I added that other
resource that other item I'm sorry which
was called exit so there we go
control shift format and now what we're
going to do is set up a new intent
that's going to open our preferences and
also our exit which is going to just
finish application because at this time
only the menu class will be running for
the most part since our splash activity
finished
every time we get back those activities
finish as well so we want to have a
option for them just the closer
application so we're just going to say
finish there and then we just need to
set up our intent so we're going to say
intent I actually I'm just going to copy
and paste this nothing too new for the
most part again we're going to call this
one prefs right here all upcase and then
all we have to do is set up or
preference activity within our within
our Java or within our Android manifest
also we need to change this to like
something like P will say for
preferences because we're going to
duplicate entry within the same method
so then what we have to do again is just
set up our preference activity that we
set up that we created for the most part
so I'm going to copy one of those
default ones and change it to prefs
again that's the action name that we
referred to right there in our menu Java
and then we just need to change this to
our class name which was also prefs like
that so there we go
basically we have a preferences set up
we're going to run the application make
sure it works and I'll show you guys how
we can use those preferences because
right now we can select them it'll save
but they aren't doing anything so we can
access those preferences within a class
of some sort we're within an activity so
that's what I'm going to show you guys
probably in the next tutorial because
you know the splash activity
the sound on it is driving me insane so
I'm going to show you guys how to mute
that for the most part and then we hit
our menu hit preferences and as you can
see we have our default value of the
checkbox as checked
let's uncheck that just to make sure our
activity works we're going to type in a
name Travis as you guys excuse me as you
guys can see this is our title and I'm
just gonna hit OK and as you can see
that's our title and we also have the
summary right here
that's what we were setting up and then
here's our list preference that we set
up auction one two three or four run
head three and then as we check it down
you can see three is selected let's go
back
hitter menu hit exit which will exit out
of a program let's open it back up and
see if those preferences saved so go
back to preferences edit text has Travis
saved within our application the
checkbox is unchecked and also option
three is selected even after we exit our
application so that's what's that's the
benefit of preferences for the most part
and I'll show you guys how to actually
access those preferences so they do
something for for our application in the
next tutorial so I'll see you guys then
have a good one