Beginning Android 4

Chapter 14

Still More Widgets and Containers

This book has covered a number of widgets and containers so far. This chapter is the last that focuses exclusively on widgets and containers, covering a number of popular options, from date and time widgets to tabs. Subsequent chapters introduce new widgets occasionally, but in the context of some other topic, such as introducing the ProgressBar in Chapter 20 (covering threads).

Pick and Choose

With limited-input devices like phones, having widgets and dialog boxes that are aware of the type of stuff a user is supposed to be entering is very helpful. They minimize keystrokes and screen taps and reduce the chance that a user will make some sort of error (e.g., entering a letter somewhere only numbers ...