Jetpack WindowManager 1.4 is steady

Posted by Xiaodao Wu – Developer Relations Engineer

Jetpack WindowManager retains getting higher. WindowManager offers you instruments to construct adaptive apps that work seamlessly throughout every kind of huge display gadgets. Model 1.4, which is steady now, introduces new options that make multi-window experiences much more highly effective and versatile. Whereas Jetpack Compose remains to be the easiest way to create app layouts for various display sizes, 1.4 makes some large enhancements to exercise embedding, together with exercise stack spinning, pane enlargement, and dialog full-screen dim. Multi-activity apps can simply make the most of all these nice options.

WindowManager 1.4 introduces a spread of enhancements. Listed below are a few of the highlights.

WindowSizeClass

We’ve up to date the WindowSizeClass API to assist customized values. We modified the API form to make it simple and extensible to assist customized values and add new values sooner or later. The excessive stage modifications are as follows:

• Opened the constructor to soak up minWidthDp and minHeightDp parameters so you may create your individual window measurement lessons
• Added comfort strategies for checking breakpoint validity
• Deprecated WindowWidthSizeClass and WindowHeightSizeClass in favor of WindowSizeClass#isWidthAtLeastBreakpoint() and WindowSizeClass#isHeightAtLeastBreakpoint() respectively

Right here’s a migration instance:

// outdated 

val sizeClass = WindowSizeClass.compute(widthDp, heightDp)
when (sizeClass.widthSizeClass) {
  COMPACT -> doCompact()
  MEDIUM -> doMedium()
  EXPANDED -> doExpanded()
  else -> doDefault()
}

// new
val sizeClass = WindowSizeClass.BREAKPOINTS_V1
                               .computeWindowSizeClass(widthDp, heightDp)

when {
  sizeClass.isWidthAtLeastBreakpoint(WIDTH_DP_EXPANDED_LOWER_BOUND) -> {
    doExpanded()
  }
  sizeClass.isWidthAtLeastBreakpoint(WIDTH_DP_MEDIUM_LOWER_BOUND) -> {
    doMedium()
  }
  else -> {
    doCompact()
  }
}

Some issues to notice within the new API:

• The order of the when branches ought to go from largest to smallest to assist customized values from builders or new values sooner or later
• The default department must be handled because the smallest window measurement class

Exercise embedding

Exercise stack pinning

Exercise stack pinning offers a strategy to maintain an exercise stack at all times on display, it doesn’t matter what else is going on in your app. This new function helps you to pin an exercise stack to a selected window, so the highest exercise stays seen even when the person navigates to different components of the app in a distinct window. That is excellent for issues like reside chats or video gamers that you simply need to carry on display whereas customers discover different content material.

personal enjoyable pinActivityStackExample(taskId: Int) {
 val splitAttributes: SplitAttributes = SplitAttributes.Builder()
   .setSplitType(SplitAttributes.SplitType.ratio(0.66f))
   .setLayoutDirection(SplitAttributes.LayoutDirection.LEFT_TO_RIGHT)
   .construct()

 val pinSplitRule = SplitPinRule.Builder()
   .setDefaultSplitAttributes(splitAttributes)
   .construct()

 SplitController.getInstance(applicationContext).pinTopActivityStack(taskId, pinSplitRule)
}

Pane enlargement

The brand new pane enlargement function, also referred to as interactive divider, helps you to create a visible separation between two actions in split-screen mode. You may make the pane divider draggable so customers can resize the panes – and the actions within the panes – on the fly. This provides customers management over how they need to view the app’s content material.

val splitAttributesBuilder: SplitAttributes.Builder = SplitAttributes.Builder()
   .setSplitType(SplitAttributes.SplitType.ratio(0.33f))
   .setLayoutDirection(SplitAttributes.LayoutDirection.LEFT_TO_RIGHT)

if (WindowSdkExtensions.getInstance().extensionVersion >= 6) {
   splitAttributesBuilder.setDividerAttributes(
       DividerAttributes.DraggableDividerAttributes.Builder()
           .setColor(getColor(context, R.colour.divider_color))
           .setWidthDp(4)
           .setDragRange(
               DividerAttributes.DragRange.DRAG_RANGE_SYSTEM_DEFAULT)
           .construct()
   )
}
val splitAttributes: SplitAttributes = splitAttributesBuilder.construct()

Dialog full-screen dim

WindowManager 1.4 offers you extra management over how dialogs dim the background. With dialog full-screen dim, you may select to dim simply the container the place the dialog seems or your entire activity window for a unified UI expertise. The whole app window dims by default when a dialog opens (see EmbeddingConfiguration.DimAreaBehavior.ON_TASK).To dim solely the container of the exercise that opened the dialog, use EmbeddingConfiguration.DimAreaBehavior.ON_ACTIVITY_STACK. This provides you extra flexibility in designing dialogs and makes for a smoother, extra coherent person expertise. Temu is among the many first builders to combine this function, the full-screen dialog dim has lowered display invalid touches by about 5%.

Enhanced posture assist

WindowManager 1.4 makes constructing apps that work flawlessly on foldables simple by offering extra details about the bodily capabilities of the machine. The brand new WindowInfoTracker#supportedPostures API lets you already know if a tool helps tabletop mode, so you may optimize your app’s format and options accordingly.

val currentSdkVersion = WindowSdkExtensions.getInstance().extensionVersion
val message =
if (currentSdkVersion >= 6) {
  val supportedPostures = WindowInfoTracker.getOrCreate(LocalContext.present).supportedPostures
  buildString {
    append(supportedPostures.isNotEmpty())
    if (supportedPostures.isNotEmpty()) {
      append(" ")
      append(
      supportedPostures.joinToString(
      separator = ",", prefix = "(", postfix = ")"))
    }
  }
} else {
  "N/A (WindowSDK model 6 is required, present model is $currentSdkVersion)"
}

Different API modifications

WindowManager 1.4 consists of a number of API modifications and additions to assist the brand new options. Notable modifications embrace:

• Steady and now not experimental APIs:
• ActivityEmbeddingController#invalidateVisibleActivityStacks
• ActivityEmbeddingController#getActivityStack
• SplitController#updateSplitAttributes

• API added to set exercise embedding animation background:
• SplitAttributes.Builder#setAnimationParams

• API to get up to date WindowMetrics data:
• ActivityEmbeddingController#embeddedActivityWindowInfo

• API to complete all actions in an exercise stack:
• ActivityEmbeddingController#finishActivityStack

Learn how to get began

To begin utilizing Jetpack WindowManager 1.4 in your Android initiatives, replace your app dependencies in construct.gradle.kts to the newest steady model:

dependencies {
    implementation("androidx.window:window:1.4.0") 
    // or, when you're utilizing the WindowManager testing library:
    testImplementation("androidx.window:window-testing:1.4.0")
}

Comfortable coding!