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Jump to Section Table of Contents CodePath Android Cliffnotes Motivation Overview Getting Started Structure Views and Layouts Designing and Styling Views AdapterViews Custom Views Interaction Navigation Networking and Models Persistence Images Fragments Sensors and Device SDKs Services Testing Libraries Production Workflow Contributing CodePath Android Cliffnotes Welcome to the open-source CodePath Android Cliffnotes! Our goal is to become the central crowdsourced resource for complete and up-to-date practical Android developer guides for any topic. Just take me to the notes ! We have Android guides for everyone whether you are a beginner, intermediate or expert . Want to learn how to use the ActionBar or the ins and outs of fragments ? We got that. Want to learn about automated unit testing or how to build flexible user interfaces for multiple devices ? We got you covered. We don't waste time with the "theoretical approach" you might get from a book. We cover exactly the things we use every day as we are developing apps for contracts. Need Help? Please join this gitter real-time chat or the google groups for these guides where you can post related questions. You can also get 1:1 mentorship online through codementor. Motivation Ever been frustrated finding information on outdated one-off blog posts and tutorials that have long since become irrelevant? How many times have you been googling to find your answer only exists on an obscure 2 year old StackOverflow post ? We believe there's got to be a better way. Why not have the community work together to create useful and detailed documentation for every aspect of Android (or any platform)? There's absolutely no reason that we should have to make do with vague and outdated content anymore. Read about our mission to change the way engineers learn new technologies and check out how you can get involved ! In addition, we are at present a fledgling startup so if you like this guide and what we are trying to do, please consider following us on twitter @codepath ! Overview The cliffnotes below are categorized by their topic , so you can easily find guides on related topics whether that is views, styling, testing, or using sensors. If you see an error, incorrect explanation or deprecated solution, why not contribute back and make these cliffnotes better for the next person? That in a nutshell is the core spirit of this initiative. Check out the list of contributors to this project. Disclaimer: We have scoured the web endlessly for content while creating these guides and adapted content from many source including the Google Official Docs , Vogella Tutorials and countless other sources that had hidden gems of information. At the bottom of each guide, there are citations for the content we used. We don't claim the content is original (although we did develop quite a bit ourselves), but unlike those other sources listed, it is freely community editable. We have openly adapted, modified and brought together this content from all the sources we could find for the benefit of every engineer. Read more about us and our vision for CodePath . If you want to contribute to this guide , please read the Contributing Guidelines . Getting Started Totally new to Android? Start here. Getting Started as a Developer (New to programming?) Getting Started with Android (Detailed Post With Many Links) Setting up Android Studio (Installation Slides) or Setting up IntelliJ IDEA Running Apps on Your Device (Hardware device setup) Developing our First App Using Android Studio (Step-by-Step Todo App) Architecture of Mobile Apps (Concept Slides) Mobile Screen Archetypes (Common mobile app screen categories) Todo App Guide (Todo App steps in guide format) Sample Android Apps (Code repositories) Keeping Updated with Android (Podcasts, blogs, newsletters) Effective Java for Android (Java best practices) Using Kotlin for Android development (Alternative syntax to Java) Debugging Android . Debug and troubleshoot issues. Debugging Exceptions within your App (App crashing?) Debugging Android App Slides Troubleshooting Common Issues (Running into problems?) Troubleshooting API Calls (how to inspect network traffic) External Resources . Great external content to explore. Android Resources List Ultimate Android Reference Android Tips and Tricks Repo Google Android Interactive Codelabs Google Android Glossary (Defining Common Terms) Android Resources Aggregated Android Learning Resources Awesome Android Complete Reference Free Android Curriculum (Additional Android resources and slides) Notate: Annotated YouTube Lectures Structure Exploring the core of app development: Using Context (What is context and how is it used?) Android Directory Structure (Files and Folders for Android apps) Organizing your Source Files (Cleaning up source of your apps) Architecture of Android Apps (Understanding how apps should be structured) Understanding App Resources (Understanding Strings and Resources) Understanding the Activity Lifecycle (How does an activity work?) Handling Configuration Changes (Screen Rotation) Migrating to the AppCompat Library (Using the Support Libraries) App Permissions (How to request the permissions you need) Managing Runtime Permissions with PermissionsDispatcher Replacing Enums with Enumerated Annotations (StringDef, IntDef for validated types) Understanding the Android Application Class (Custom application object) Views and Layouts Exploring the gritty details of views, layout, styling and common UI patterns: Constructing View Layouts (How to layout views) Defining Views and their Attributes (Gravity, Margin, Padding, etc) Working with the TextView (Properties, Drawables, Custom Fonts) Working with the EditText (Properties) Working with the ImageView (Drawables, Size and Scale, Density, Raw Bitmaps) Working with Input Views (Spinner, RatingBar, etc) Working with the Soft Keyboard Working with the WebView Working with the ScrollView Applying Data Binding for Views (Data binding library) Designing and Styling Views Drawables (and how to polish UI views) Styles and Themes (Consolidating view styles) Animations (Animating views, layouts, activities and more) Polishing a UI Tips and Tools (Links to key resources) Android Design Guidelines (Overview of Android design standards) Styling UI Screens FAQ (Answers to common questions around building screens) Cloning a Login Screen Layout Guide (Creating attractive UIs, Q&A) Developing Custom Themes (Integrating drawables, styles and themes) Material Design Primer (Lollipop Design Overview) Dynamic Color using Palettes (Adaptive colors, Android 5.0) Ripple Animation (Android 5.0) Shared Element Activity Transition (Android 5.0) Circular Reveal Animation (Android 5.0) Design Support Library (Material Design Library) View Hierarchy Animations (Android 4.0) Chrome Custom Tabs AdapterViews Using an ArrayAdapter with ListView (with custom list items) Paging Library Guide (Infinite pagination) Endless Scrolling with AdapterViews and RecyclerView (Infinite pagination) Implementing Pull to Refresh Guide Implementing a Horizontal ListView Guide (Scrolls horizontally) Implementing a Heterogenous ListView (with different item types) Using the RecyclerView (Android 5.0) Heterogeneous Layouts inside RecyclerView (Android 5.0) Using the CardView (Android 5.0) Using a BaseAdapter with ListView (alternate to ArrayAdapter) Custom Views Basic Painting with Views (Simple drawing app tutorial) Defining Custom Views ( Needs Attention ) Extending SurfaceView ( Needs Attention ) Drawing with OpenGL and GLSurfaceView ( Needs Attention ) Building a Custom Animated Progress Bar (Exercise) Interaction Exploring how to allow user interaction and navigation within an app: View Event Listeners (Clicks, Key Presses, Updates) Creating Custom Listeners (Defining, setting and triggering events) Displaying Toasts (Quick notices and includes custom views) Displaying the Snackbar (Quick notices with actions) Exploring the ActionBar (...