Here is a scenario on which i done a lot of research on google but hopeless. the scenario is, i am going to develop a 2D game in which i want to use multiple backgrounds and i want to translate them as they are moving forward, it must look like one background is near and translating/moving fast and the other background is a bit far and translating/moving a little slow. the nearer background have almost full intensity and the farer background have a bit low intensity. you can say they have different transparency levels. the question is, how can i get this task done or is this possible to use multiple backgrounds.
any suggestion will be appreciated.
as an example, see the image of BADLAND game bellow.
I think as far as I got your question you want to put two or more images one over another. I mean if you are trying to overlap the multiple backgrounds and asking for it yes it can be done easily.
What you need to do is to use the FrameLayout. as
"FrameLayout represents a simple layout for the user interface of
Android applications. It is usually used for displaying single Views
at a specific area on the screen or overlapping its child views."
and then you can implements the animations on them and translate them You can find different types of translation over them.
Here is all about using the frame layout frameLayout1 framelayout2 and for animations and translation here are links. link , link2 , link3
Related
I'm trying to develop a Java program that does the following:
uses a background picture of a network diagram of clients
positions an image of a bandwidth graph to respective client
refreshes the image of graph every 5 seconds which it fetches from another program that constantly produces snapshots of bandwidth
Now, I can set the background picture and I'm pretty confident that I will be able to refresh the images by using a timer. What I am trying to plan out is how I am going to position these images to the respective clients which is displayed in the background picture. I did some research and it appears that I have several options but I want to make sure I am choosing the right one before I run into problems further down the line.
It seems to me that using a GridBagLayout would be the choice for me, however I would like a second opinion for a more experienced population. If using a GridBagLayout is the correct choice, could you recommend any good tutorials that would help me understand this Layout Manager? Please keep in mind that I have limited experience with Java, especially with GUI oriented Java.
EDIT: If I am not explaining the concept well enough please let me know.
check this out-
http://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/uiswing/layout/visual.html
GridLayout is likely to meet your needs and it is easy to use - the assumption I make is that image of bandwidth graph is the same/fixed ...
Look for an example here
http://www.roseindia.net/tutorialsearch/?t=java+gridlayout+color
Try Google the keyword "GridLayout" - there are plenty of hits ...
If you want to do advanced layouts, you should take a look at MigLayout.
It's an extremely flexible layout manager that can pretty much act as a replacement for any/all of the existing Swing layout managers. It's worth using if you want to do difficult / complex layouts.
It feels more like a HTML table layout tool, enabling multi-column spans etc. and arbitrary scaling rules.
The "Quick Start Guide" is very good with lots of examples - I'd suggest taking a look at that if you want to evaluate MigLayout for your project.
If the 'bandwidth graph' image(s) is on top of the BG image, look to OverlayLayout
A layout manager to arrange components over the top of each other. ..
OTOH I would not use a layout strategy for this, instead..
Create a BufferedImage the size of the BG.
Paint the BG to the image.
Display the image in a label.
When it comes time to paint the graphs, get a Graphics instance for the image in the label, and paint them to that. If the graphs are always the same size and shape and do not have transparency, you can simply paint them. Otherwise, draw the BG first.
This is my first post and i have (i think) a uncommon request...
I'm programming on the last Eclipse Mac, for every android SDK, and i'm using more XML for layout than runtime... So i search a solution in XML if possible.
Here is the situation: i work with an image background wich simulate item like buttons, image, text... etc. On this image, i put buttons, image, and text (buttonview textview etc...) and place it precisely on their places on the image. This solution is very powerful to have good design BUT, if i change the resolution of the screen, and/or its size, each item won't be at its place, and will be translated (horiz and/or vertic) for some "dp"... (and yes i use dp, not mm or px or whatever)
I'm really embarrased because i think thanks to "dp" it keep proportionnality but.. not !
My question is how can i fix my items at their places on the image background, for different screen size/resolution !!
Thanks in advance everyone,
My Best From Lyon,France
First realise that if you want to make it pixel perfect for all screen sizes your out of luck.
Second accept that you can't make it perfect for all screen sizes.
Third you can get far with creating different layout for different screen sizes. You can read a lot about supporting multiple screen sizes here. One important thing to take from here is that you can make layout for the different screen sizes or different density sizes.
When designing an UI, we need to target many android mutations and various screen resolutions.
How to differentiate layout for 480 * 800 and 480 * 854 screen resolutions in android?
how to layout support for various screen in android?
Both questions above recommend to use different Layout code for different screens. Is it really necessary?
http://developer.android.com/guide/practices/screens_support.html
recommends to
Provide different layouts for different screen sizes
Provide different bitmap drawables for different screen densities
But I still think, we can support multiple screens without creating standalone layout for each screen resolution. Or am I wrong?
I know, and I do use, 9-patch for scalable background images (or form inputs, and so on)
and I do use dp (density pixel) to declare sizes relatively to screen density
But what are next best practices ?
I think the answer to this has changed recently, but I'll go over historical solutions.
Pre-Honeycomb, the solution was to create a dynamic layout that could adjust itself to the size of the screen (using 9-patches, dips, layouts that expand/shrink, etc.). This meant that none of your Views could be "pixel perfect", but you could adjust to different aspect ratios that you encounter. Sometimes you would come up with different layouts for landscape and portrait, but beyond that customization wasn't necessary.
With the release of Honeycomb, the problem got a lot more complex. Now you've got dramatically different screen sizes, where your app stretching doesn't look good at all. You've got tablets that stretch from 7" to 10" - which one is "large" vs. "xlarge"? 3.0 and 3.1 were an awkward period, where you had to detect the API version/screen size and configure your app accordingly (supposing your app supports both phones and tablets).
However, everything's changed in 3.2 and beyond. Now, the best practice can be described thus: think like a web designer, not an Android designer. Instead of thinking about phone vs. tablet vs. landscape vs. portrait layouts, think instead of layouts that work on particular screen sizes.
This thought process is detailed by this blog post, and these slides, but I think it's best demonstrated by going to some sample web pages and seeing it in action. Try visiting this page (or this page, or this page) and changing the size of your browser. Notice how they dynamically change layout based on the width - this is what you want in Android as well.
So now you've got a layout that works between screen width 150dp and 400dp; another one that works between 401dp and 800dp; a third that handles 800dp and 1000dp, etc. This way of thinking does not end up with you, as a developer, doing too much more work than before - instead of defining a phone layout, a tablet layout (each with a portrait/landscape layout), you just define a few layouts that work with different widths.
Right now we're in an awkward transitional stage as most people don't have devices that support this practice. So "best practice" is essentially all of the above. In a few years, when everyone's got ICS and beyond, then we can all breath a sigh of relief.
(I apologize if you were looking for specific solutions; this answer ended up being relatively theoretical rather than having concrete answers, mostly because I felt the question was pretty open-ended. If you've got a specific problem you want to solve, I can try to address that elsewhere.)
If you build your views using "dp" it would, basically, be the same size for eack screen size.
In most cases you will prefer that your view will resize itself proportional to the screen size.
Of course, in most cases you will need to build separate layouts for tablets.
But, besides I can recommend you to do the next steps:
1. Add this library to your project.
2. Now in your layout you can write views like that:
<TextView
android:layout_width="wrap_content"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:text="I'm scalable!"
android:textSize="#dimen/_12sdp"/>
In this example your TextView will scale on each screen size.
These are some suggestions, in random order:
Avoid AbsoluteLayout, I know that it is deprecated, but you can still use it; forget it and use LinearLayout and RelativeLayout instead
Use 9-patch to create buttons and backgrounds, so that they will appear the same for each resolution
Use DisplayMetrics() to get informations about the screen, to show different things in different screens (i.e. to show AdMob "Banner" in smartphones and AdMob "Leaderboard" in tablets)
Create WVGA layout first (this is only a personal opinion, but I've found it a nice way of working): as far as I know the most smartphones are WVGA or at least HVGA (QVGA is not so frequent), so creating a perfect WVGA layout will make you able to satisfy lots of phones, than you can create a different layout for lpdi-screen and tablets (that are a market-share minority too, at the moment)
In conclusion I recommend you to create a layout for phones and on for tablets, that can adjust itself to screen resolution: this will fit the most devices; for borderline devices (i.e. 7" tablets or 5.3" phone) I'd work with different drawables/different XML layouts.
I would suggest as much as possible use Relative calculations rather than Absolute. Avoid Hard coding of numbers for padding, margins etc. Simply give them a value in relation to desired property like Width, height of screen or any component.
I can't understand how to animate a single figure in Java applet, while the context remains the same (for example rotate a polygon while other figures drawn remain the same).
Is there another solution besides repainting the object and the whole context? I am asking because it would be hard to have for example a number of figures that would need to be animated when clicked.
Could you please point me towards the topics I need to understand, as well maybe an example to see things more clearly?
The technology you want is sprites. There's a short intro video here and you can search the web for oodles of info about implementing them in Java.
I would like to learn from experienced developers Android, as you develop a UI for different screens? For example, now I have this problem:
I have an element (TextView), which should be placed as nearly aligned to the left, but not back to back, but with a slight indentation. Accordingly, the bigger the screen, so this should become more padding. If it is set fixed (px / dp), as layout_marginLeft, it will remain so for all screens.
Or, like I have a button, which should take approximately the width of the percent of 60, while the remaining 40 percent are left blank. How can this be done without specifying a fixed size?
Is it possible to design a universal screen, which will stretch to compress the distance between the elements (as in my case), and do other similar things? Or is it necessary for each screen to create a resource directory and a separate design for each screen? How do you usually do that?
Thank you in advance for your reply, it is very important to me.
Some tips :
Use RelativeLayout when you want Views to be aligned with respect to each other.
Use LinearLayout with weight when you want that 60% - 40% thing
Use Custom Layouts when none of the above layouts work for you, i.e you want to customize its look and feel
It is alright to use different layouts for different screen sizes
Always use dip, - device independant pixels - instead of px
Read this article - Think like a web designer
Lastly read this article about supporting multiple screens.