CODEWITHSUNDEEP
androidandroid-intentandroid-manifest
Jeremie D
Jeremie D

Reputation: 4204

Android manifest for USBAccesory

I am making an app that communicates with a piece of usb hardware made by my company (this is the only app allowed to talk to the usb accessory, it's not a public api). I am having difficulties setting up the proper launch modes in the manifest.

There are three components to the app: the main activity, a login activity, and the USBService.

I'm assuming the intent for the main goes to the login activity, and the intent for the usb goes to the USBService, but I am not sure if I do this, will this start the service if the app is not running? More over, if it does, how do I fetch an already existing service?

What type of structure should I be looking at for the manifest file? (specifically, intent-filters, and appropriate launch modes... I've read a few documents about the launch modes but I am still not sure I quite understand... There should only ever be at most one instance of each activity/service, and they need to communicate together.

edit: it is not necessary for communications to start before the app is open, nor is it necessary to launch the app automatically when the usb is connected.

edit: my manifest as it stands, looks like:

<uses-feature android:name="android.hardware.usb.accessory" />

<uses-sdk
    android:minSdkVersion="15"
    android:targetSdkVersion="17" />

<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.INTERNET" />
<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.ACCESS_NETWORK_STATE" />

<application
    android:icon="@drawable/ic_launcher"
    android:label="@string/app_name" >
    <activity
        android:name="mainpackage.MainActivity"
        android:label="@string/app_name" 
        android:launchMode="singleTop">
        <intent-filter> 
            <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />
            <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />
        </intent-filter>
        <intent-filter>
            <action android:name="android.hardware.usb.action.USB_ACCESSORY_ATTACHED" />
        </intent-filter>
            <meta-data
            android:name="android.hardware.usb.action.USB_ACCESSORY_ATTACHED"
            android:resource="@xml/accessory_filter" />

    </activity>
    <activity
        android:name="mainpackage.LoginActivity"
        android:label="@string/title_activity_login"
        android:windowSoftInputMode="adjustResize|stateVisible" >
    </activity>

    <service android:name="updater.USBService"
        android:exported="false" >

        <!--  

            -->
    </service>

</application>

Upvotes: 2

Views: 6059

Answers (3)

Phil
Phil

Reputation: 1577

Your manifest looks good,

I think you make a good choice for putting the intent-filter "android.hardware.usb.action.USB_ACCESSORY_ATTACHED" in the mainActivity and start the application in this activity,

and again I think it's a good choice to start your mainActivity in SingleTop launch mode, because if an instance of the mainActivity already exists at the top of the current task, the system going to launch this activity, no new instance of this activity will be created.

For a best understanding of the different launch mode available in android,
I think this link may help you :

http://www.intridea.com/blog/2011/6/16/android-understanding-activity-launchmode

To make a long story short I think you'll be all set with this manifest as is.

Upvotes: 1

Shankar Regmi
Shankar Regmi

Reputation: 874

To Use Android Devices min SDK version should be set to 12 and need to declare following line in AndroidManifest.xml file <> 

<uses-sdk android:minSdkVersion="<version>" />
...
<application>
  <uses-library android:name="com.android.future.usb.accessory" />
    <activity ...>
        ...
        <intent-filter>
            <action android:name="android.hardware.usb.action.USB_ACCESSORY_ATTACHED" />
        </intent-filter>

        <meta-data android:name="android.hardware.usb.action.USB_ACCESSORY_ATTACHED"
            android:resource="@xml/accessory_filter" />
    </activity>
</application>

Upvotes: 0

Lucian Novac
Lucian Novac

Reputation: 1265

in your manifest add

<manifest ...>
    <uses-feature android:name="android.hardware.usb.host" />
    <uses-sdk android:minSdkVersion="12" />

In this case, the following resource file should be saved in res/xml/device_filter.xml and specifies that any USB device with the specified attributes should be filtered:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>

<resources>
    <usb-device vendor-id="1234" product-id="5678" class="255" subclass="66" protocol="1" />
</resources>

Hope this help.

Upvotes: 1

Related Questions