Setting the menu background to be opaque

Question

I\'m trying to set the background of the menu pane to be opaque. After a lot of searching and trying out things I can almost get it working by setting \'panelFullBackground\

Answer 1

As Suggested by Louis Semprini here::

@SuppressWarnings("rawtypes")
static Class       IconMenuItemView_class = null;
@SuppressWarnings("rawtypes")
static Constructor IconMenuItemView_constructor = null;

// standard signature of constructor expected by inflater of all View classes
@SuppressWarnings("rawtypes")
private static final Class[] standard_inflater_constructor_signature = 
new Class[] { Context.class, AttributeSet.class };

protected void addOptionsMenuHackerInflaterFactory()
{

final LayoutInflater infl = getLayoutInflater();

infl.setFactory(new Factory()
{
    public View onCreateView(final String name, 
                             final Context context,
                             final AttributeSet attrs)
    {
        if (!name.equalsIgnoreCase("com.android.internal.view.menu.IconMenuItemView"))
            return null; // use normal inflater

        View view = null;

        // "com.android.internal.view.menu.IconMenuItemView" 
        // - is the name of an internal Java class 
        //   - that exists in Android <= 3.2 and possibly beyond
        //   - that may or may not exist in other Android revs
        // - is the class whose instance we want to modify to set background etc.
        // - is the class we want to instantiate with the standard constructor:
        //     IconMenuItemView(context, attrs)
        // - this is what the LayoutInflater does if we return null
        // - unfortunately we cannot just call:
        //     infl.createView(name, null, attrs);
        //   here because on Android 3.2 (and possibly later):
        //   1. createView() can only be called inside inflate(),
        //      because inflate() sets the context parameter ultimately
        //      passed to the IconMenuItemView constructor's first arg,
        //      storing it in a LayoutInflater instance variable.
        //   2. we are inside inflate(),
        //   3. BUT from a different instance of LayoutInflater (not infl)
        //   4. there is no way to get access to the actual instance being used
        // - so we must do what createView() would have done for us
        //
        if (IconMenuItemView_class == null)
        {
            try
            {
                IconMenuItemView_class = getClassLoader().loadClass(name);
            }
            catch (ClassNotFoundException e)
            {
                // this OS does not have IconMenuItemView - fail gracefully
                return null; // hack failed: use normal inflater
            }
        }
        if (IconMenuItemView_class == null)
            return null; // hack failed: use normal inflater

        if (IconMenuItemView_constructor == null)
        {
            try
            {
                IconMenuItemView_constructor = 
                IconMenuItemView_class.getConstructor(standard_inflater_constructor_signature);
            }
            catch (SecurityException e)
            {
                return null; // hack failed: use normal inflater
            }
            catch (NoSuchMethodException e)
            {
                return null; // hack failed: use normal inflater
            }
        }
        if (IconMenuItemView_constructor == null)
            return null; // hack failed: use normal inflater

        try
        {
            Object[] args = new Object[] { context, attrs };
            view = (View)(IconMenuItemView_constructor.newInstance(args));
        }
        catch (IllegalArgumentException e)
        {
            return null; // hack failed: use normal inflater
        }
        catch (InstantiationException e)
        {
            return null; // hack failed: use normal inflater
        }
        catch (IllegalAccessException e)
        {
            return null; // hack failed: use normal inflater
        }
        catch (InvocationTargetException e)
        {
            return null; // hack failed: use normal inflater
        }
        if (null == view) // in theory handled above, but be safe... 
            return null; // hack failed: use normal inflater


        // apply our own View settings after we get back to runloop
        // - android will overwrite almost any setting we make now
        final View v = view;
        new Handler().post(new Runnable()
        {
            public void run()
            {
                v.setBackgroundColor(Color.BLACK);

                try
                {
                    // in Android <= 3.2, IconMenuItemView implemented with TextView
                    // guard against possible future change in implementation
                    TextView tv = (TextView)v;
                    tv.setTextColor(Color.WHITE);
                }
                catch (ClassCastException e)
                {
                    // hack failed: do not set TextView attributes
                }
            }
        });

        return view;
    }
});
}

To use this code, call addOptionsMenuHackerInflaterFactory() ONCE from your activity onCreate() or your activity onCreateOptionsMenu().

The Code works perfect ! Hope this helps !!

Answer 2

You can value from @color to @drawable like below which worked for me:

<style name="MyTheme" parent="@android:style/Theme.Holo.Light">

    <!-- Menu Style -->
    <item name="android:panelBackground">@drawable/blue_background</item>

</style>

Answer 3

Try this simple tutorial Android-Menus-My-Way i found on Codeproject, may found useful to you

Answer 4

You can change the background of android menu options. It will look only in the default manner. If you want to change the look and feel of them, consider building a custom view for menu.