Android “Best Practice” returning values from a dialog

Question

What is the \"correct\" way to return the values to the calling activity from a complex custom dialog - say, text fields, date or time picker, a bunch of radio buttons, etc,

Answer 1

For my MIDI app I needed yes/no/cancel confirmation dialogs, so I first made a general StandardDialog class:

public class StandardDialog {

    import android.app.Activity;
    import android.app.AlertDialog;
    import android.content.DialogInterface;
    import android.os.Handler;

    public class StandardDialog {
    public static final int dlgResultOk         = 0;
    public static final int dlgResultYes        = 1;
    public static final int dlgResultNo         = 2;
    public static final int dlgResultCancel     = 3;

    public static final int dlgTypeOk           = 10;
    public static final int dlgTypeYesNo        = 11;
    public static final int dlgTypeYesNoCancel  = 12;

    private Handler mResponseHandler;
    private AlertDialog.Builder mDialogBuilder;
    private int mDialogId;

    public StandardDialog(Activity parent, 
                          Handler reponseHandler, 
                          String title, 
                          String message, 
                          int dialogType, 
                          int dialogId) {

        mResponseHandler = reponseHandler;
        mDialogId = dialogId;
        mDialogBuilder = new AlertDialog.Builder(parent);
        mDialogBuilder.setCancelable(false);
        mDialogBuilder.setTitle(title);
        mDialogBuilder.setIcon(android.R.drawable.ic_dialog_alert);
        mDialogBuilder.setMessage(message);
        switch (dialogType) {
        case dlgTypeOk:
            mDialogBuilder.setNeutralButton("Ok", new DialogInterface.OnClickListener() {
                public void onClick(DialogInterface dialog, int which) {
                    mResponseHandler.sendEmptyMessage(mDialogId + dlgResultOk);
                }
            });         
            break;

        case dlgTypeYesNo:
        case dlgTypeYesNoCancel:
            mDialogBuilder.setPositiveButton("Yes", new DialogInterface.OnClickListener() {
                public void onClick(DialogInterface dialog, int which) {
                    mResponseHandler.sendEmptyMessage(mDialogId + dlgResultYes);
                }
            });         
            mDialogBuilder.setNegativeButton("No", new DialogInterface.OnClickListener() {
                public void onClick(DialogInterface dialog, int which) {
                    mResponseHandler.sendEmptyMessage(mDialogId + dlgResultNo);
                }
            });         
            if (dialogType == dlgTypeYesNoCancel) {
                mDialogBuilder.setNeutralButton("Cancel", new DialogInterface.OnClickListener() {
                    public void onClick(DialogInterface dialog, int which) {
                        mResponseHandler.sendEmptyMessage(mDialogId + dlgResultCancel);
                    }
                });         
            }
            break;
        }
        mDialogBuilder.show();
    }
}

Next, in my main activity I already had a message handler for the UI updates from other threads, so I just added code for processing messages from the dialogs. By using a different dialogId parameter when I instantiate the StandardDialog for various program functions, I can execute the proper code to handle the yes/no/cancel responses to different questions. This idea can be extended for complex custom dialogs by sending a Bundle of data though this is much slower than a simple integer message.

private Handler uiMsgHandler = new Handler() {

    @Override
    public void handleMessage(Message msg) {
        if (msg != null) {

            // {Code to check for other UI messages here}

            // Check for dialog box responses
            if (msg.what == (clearDlgId + StandardDialog.dlgResultYes)) {
                doClearDlgYesClicked();
            }
            else if (msg.what == (recordDlgId + StandardDialog.dlgResultYes)) {
                doRecordDlgYesClicked();
            }
            else if (msg.what == (recordDlgId + StandardDialog.dlgResultNo)) {
                doRecordDlgNoClicked();
            }
        }
    }
};

Then all I need to do is define the do{Whatever}() methods in the activity. To bring up a dialog, as an example I have a method responding to a "clear recorded MIDI events" button and confirm it as follows:

public void onClearBtnClicked(View view) {
    new StandardDialog(this, uiMsgHandler, 
        getResources().getString(R.string.dlgTitleClear),
        getResources().getString(R.string.dlgMsgClear), 
        StandardDialog.dlgTypeYesNo, clearDlgId);
}

clearDlgId is defined as a unique integer elsewhere. This method makes a Yes/No dialog pop up in front of the activity, which loses focus until the dialog closes, at which time the activity gets a message with the dialog result. Then the message handler calls the doClearDlgYesClicked() method if the "Yes" button was clicked. (I didn't need a message for the "No" button since no action was needed in that case).

Anyway, this method works for me, and makes it easy to pass results back from a dialog.