Why use SQLiteOpenHelper over SQLiteDatabase?

Question

In my activity I have for example

SQLiteDatabase db = openOrCreateDatabase(Preferences.DB_NAME, Context.MODE_PRIVATE, null);
db.execSQL(\"CREATE TABLE IF NOT         


        

Answer 1

SQLiteOpenHelper provides utilities to simplify the tasks of creating and initialising the database if it's not already created and converting the contents of the database when your application is upgrading and the database schema changes.

If you have a very simple database schema, then it doesn't really get you much, but for anything complicated it's a definite help. It makes sure that all the fiddly edge conditions are covered so that you don't have to, such as putting transactions in all the right places to avoid database corruption.