CODEWITHSUNDEEP
androidxmlcachingrssfeed
emar
emar

Reputation: 43

Android: Cache XML File from RSS Feed

I just started doing my first Android app which happens to be an RSS Reader. I did a bit of googling about this but haven't seen a clear reference though. What I want to do is cache my xml file (the feed file) to the sdcard so when the phone is offline, the user can still view the feed by automatically telling the application to look for it when no network is detected. What I have now is the mechanism to cache the image but I wonder how to use this for other files since it was specified only for images that converts it to Bitmap using the HashMap().

Upvotes: 4

Views: 3038

Answers (1)

dbm
dbm

Reputation: 10485

I think the preferred way is (just as Umakant Patil commented on your question) to store data in an SQLite database. You would typically write a background service which every now and then refreshes your database with the server side data. Your application will always read only from your SQLite database. Note that the service and the application will typically live their own lives, independently from each other (your application will never communicate directly with your service).

This procedure is also somewhat safer from an architectural perspective. Your application will never depend on network connectivity or timing issues due to network traffic. It will only rely on data and database access on your local device.

TIP #1: You could pass an entry to the AlarmManager which will wake up your service at a given interval. Your service will synchronize your database with the RSS source and then kill itself (saving resources is always good :-)

There is a good example of Services in Android here: http://developer.android.com/reference/android/app/Service.html

And about Content Providers here: http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/providers/content-providers.html

TIP #2: Note that you don't necessarily need a content provider to communicate with your database. The content provider is good to have if you wish to "standardize" your database communication. Perhaps several components of your application need to access it or even several applications, then it's good to use an already defined "de facto standard" way of accessing the database.

Upvotes: 4

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