Tab Layout
To create a tabbed UI, you need to use a TabHost
and a TabWidget
. The TabHost
must be the root node for the layout, which contains both the TabWidget
for displaying the tabs and aFrameLayout
for displaying the tab content.
You can implement your tab content in one of two ways: use the tabs to swap View
s within the same Activity
, or use the tabs to change between entirely separate activities. Which method you want for your application will depend on your demands, but if each tab provides a distinct user activity, then it probably makes sense to use a separate Activity
for each tab, so that you can better manage the application in discrete groups, rather than one massive application and layout.
In this tutorial, you'll create a tabbed UI that uses a separate Activity
for each tab.
- Start a new project named HelloTabWidget.
- First, create three separate
Activity
classes in your project: ArtistsActivity
, AlbumsActivity
, and SongsActivity
. These will each represent a separate tab. For now, make each one display a simple message using a TextView
. For example:publicclassArtistsActivityextendsActivity{
publicvoid onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState){
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
TextView textview =newTextView(this);
textview.setText("This is the Artists tab");
setContentView(textview);
}
}
Notice that this doesn't use a layout file. Just create a TextView
, give it some text and set that as the content. Duplicate this for each of the three activities, and add the corresponding<activity/>
tags to the Android Manifest file.
- You need an icon for each of your tabs. For each icon, you should create two versions: one for when the tab is selected and one for when it is unselected. The general design recommendation is for the selected icon to be a dark color (grey), and the unselected icon to be a light color (white). (See the Icon Design Guidelines.) For example:
For this tutorial, you can copy these images and use them for all three tabs. (When you create tabs in your own application, you should create customized tab icons.)
Now create a state-list drawable that specifies which image to use for each tab state:
- Save the icon images in your project
res/drawable/
directory.
- Create a new XML file in
res/drawable/
named ic_tab_artists.xml
and insert the following:<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<selector xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android">
<!-- When selected, use grey -->
<itemandroid:drawable="@drawable/ic_tab_artists_grey"
android:state_selected="true"/>
<!-- When not selected, use white-->
<itemandroid:drawable="@drawable/ic_tab_artists_white"/>
</selector>
This is a state-list drawable, which you will apply as the tab image. When the tab state changes, the tab icon will automatically switch between the images defined here.
- Open the
res/layout/main.xml
file and insert the following:<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<TabHostxmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
android:id="@android:id/tabhost"
android:layout_width="fill_parent"
android:layout_height="fill_parent">
<LinearLayout
android:orientation="vertical"
android:layout_width="fill_parent"
android:layout_height="fill_parent"
android:padding="5dp">
<TabWidget
android:id="@android:id/tabs"
android:layout_width="fill_parent"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"/>
<FrameLayout
android:id="@android:id/tabcontent"
android:layout_width="fill_parent"
android:layout_height="fill_parent"
android:padding="5dp"/>
</LinearLayout>
</TabHost>
This is the layout that will display the tabs and provide navigation between each Activity
created above.
The TabHost
requires that a TabWidget
and a FrameLayout
both live somewhere within it. To position the TabWidget
and FrameLayout
vertically, a LinearLayout
is used. TheFrameLayout
is where the content for each tab goes, which is empty now because the TabHost
will automatically embed each Activity
within it.
Notice that the TabWidget
and the FrameLayout
elements have the IDs tabs
and tabcontent
, respectively. These names must be used so that the TabHost
can retrieve references to each of them. It expects exactly these names.
- Now open
HelloTabWidget.java
and make it extend TabActivity
:
publicclassHelloTabWidgetextendsTabActivity{
- Use the following code for the
onCreate()
method:publicvoid onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState){
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
setContentView(R.layout.main);
Resources res = getResources();// Resource object to get Drawables
TabHost tabHost = getTabHost(); // The activity TabHost
TabHost.TabSpec spec; // Resusable TabSpec for each tab
Intent intent; // Reusable Intent for each tab
// Create an Intent to launch an Activity for the tab (to be reused)
intent =newIntent().setClass(this,ArtistsActivity.class);
// Initialize a TabSpec for each tab and add it to the TabHost
spec = tabHost.newTabSpec("artists").setIndicator("Artists",
res.getDrawable(R.drawable.ic_tab_artists))
.setContent(intent);
tabHost.addTab(spec);
// Do the same for the other tabs
intent =newIntent().setClass(this,AlbumsActivity.class);
spec = tabHost.newTabSpec("albums").setIndicator("Albums",
res.getDrawable(R.drawable.ic_tab_albums))
.setContent(intent);
tabHost.addTab(spec);
intent =newIntent().setClass(this,SongsActivity.class);
spec = tabHost.newTabSpec("songs").setIndicator("Songs",
res.getDrawable(R.drawable.ic_tab_songs))
.setContent(intent);
tabHost.addTab(spec);
tabHost.setCurrentTab(2);
}
This sets up each tab with their text and icon, and assigns each one an Activity
.
A reference to the TabHost
is first captured with getTabHost()
. Then, for each tab, a TabHost.TabSpec
is created to define the tab properties. The newTabSpec(String)
method creates a new TabHost.TabSpec
identified by the given string tag. For each TabHost.TabSpec
, setIndicator(CharSequence, Drawable)
is called to set the text and icon for the tab, andsetContent(Intent)
is called to specify the Intent
to open the appropriate Activity
. Each TabHost.TabSpec
is then added to the TabHost
by calling addTab(TabHost.TabSpec)
.
At the very end, setCurrentTab(int)
opens the tab to be displayed by default, specified by the index position of the tab.
Notice that not once was the TabWidget
object referenced. This is because a TabWidget
must always be a child of a TabHost
, which is what you use for almost all interaction with the tabs. So when a tab is added to the TabHost
, it's automatically added to the child TabWidget
.
- Now open the Android Manifest file and add the
NoTitleBar
theme to the HelloTabWidget's <activity>
tag. This will remove the default application title from the top of the layout, leaving more space for the tabs, which effectively operate as their own titles. The <activity>
tag should look like this:<activityandroid:name=".HelloTabWidget"android:label="@string/app_name"
android:theme="@android:style/Theme.NoTitleBar">
- Run the application.
Your application should look like this (though your icons may be different):