How to detect when an Android app goes to the background and come back to the foreground

Question

I am trying to write an app that does something specific when it is brought back to the foreground after some amount of time. Is there a way to detect when an app is sent to

Answer 1

We can expand this solution using LiveData:

class AppForegroundStateLiveData : LiveData() {

    private var lifecycleListener: LifecycleObserver? = null

    override fun onActive() {
        super.onActive()
        lifecycleListener = AppLifecycleListener().also {
            ProcessLifecycleOwner.get().lifecycle.addObserver(it)
        }
    }

    override fun onInactive() {
        super.onInactive()
        lifecycleListener?.let {
            this.lifecycleListener = null
            ProcessLifecycleOwner.get().lifecycle.removeObserver(it)
        }
    }

    internal inner class AppLifecycleListener : LifecycleObserver {

        @OnLifecycleEvent(Lifecycle.Event.ON_START)
        fun onMoveToForeground() {
            value = State.FOREGROUND
        }

        @OnLifecycleEvent(Lifecycle.Event.ON_STOP)
        fun onMoveToBackground() {
            value = State.BACKGROUND
        }
    }

    enum class State {
        FOREGROUND, BACKGROUND
    }
}

Now we can subscribe to this LiveData and catch the needed events. For example:

appForegroundStateLiveData.observeForever { state ->
    when(state) {
        AppForegroundStateLiveData.State.FOREGROUND -> { /* app move to foreground */ }
        AppForegroundStateLiveData.State.BACKGROUND -> { /* app move to background */ }
    }
}