howdy, Dominic!

Hi Mark, just gathering my questions now - first time on this

no problem

howdy, Jumana!

hey mark!

Dominic: do you have a question ready?

good good and u?

yup i do

My question is regarding Content Providers. Just wondering what the options I have in authorizing users to use my content provider

Dominic: there is no concept in Android of "authorizing users to use [your] content provider"

if it's installed, by definition, users can use it

that's the piont

er, point

mmmhh, ok

you can use permissions to allow users to indicate which third-party apps should access the content provider

but if a third-party app has the permission and calls the content provider, you have no way of saying "um, wait, I need the user to log in"

if you need that, don't expose the content provider, and do the authorization in your own activities

Jumana: your turn -- what's your question?

I tried something like android:protectionLevel - but thought there might be another option.

thanks

i was just wondering in which scenarios would layoutinflaters be used?

behind the scenes, setContentView() and the built-in adapter classes (e.g., ArrayAdapter) use LayoutInflater

you will use it directly in lots of other places, such as elaborate custom adapters, fragments, action bar custom views, etc.

oh ok

basically, any time you want to convert layout XML into a View, you need LayoutInflater

im still learning. yet to explore all that

thanks anway

Dominic: do you have another question?

yes

also i was just thinking of a way to create a presentation on android like a .pps

oops sorry

dominic, go ahead

Is there a way for the content provider to find out what the package name is of the app thats calling it?

not really

the expectation is that if you care about the caller, you should be implementing a custom permission

ah - yes, ok

thanks - over to you jumana :)

you can either protect the content provider via the permission at the XML level or via checkCallingPermission()

Jumana: your turn -- what is your next question?

ok, thanks

pointers on how to implement slideshows ? like a .pps

how big is your development team>?

not big at all

then you probably aren't going to be implementing slideshows like a .pps

why do u ask?

parsing and displaying a .pps would take a few dozen developer-months, off the cuff, at minimum

no i know i can't develop a MS powerpoint but i was just wondering ...

if there is a way i can implement image flipper with some sound for example

well, you can certainly change the image displayed by an ImageView

and you can certainly play sound

a lot of images flipping in a given time period with some sound files playing in the bk grnd

it seems like you have the solution, so I am confused as to what your question is

but can that sound playing be linked with the images being flipped?

not really

tahts my question

you can create your own metadata (e.g,. SMIL)

but parsing that metadata and applying it is up to you

there's an off chance that WebView can actually render SMIL -- haven't tried that

oh ok

it's not like sound files intrinsically know about image files or vice versa

if you want to glue those together, you have to write the glue

Dominic: do you have another question?

was just thinking of maiking an app for my 2 year old where the images of animals etc. keep flipping along with the associated noises - you know what i mean?

oh ok got it, mark -thanks

yes, I've another question when you're ready

Again, question regarding permissions to providers.

Dominic: go ahead

I can view all the providers on my phone, and when I try to access some of them (eg twitter/facebook providers) I get errors......even though I've added the readPermission to my app

why is that?

you'd have to take that up with the authors of those providers, I imagine

howdy, fitz!

ok, so generally, do the authors of those providers not make their api publically available?

is that hopw they get around authorizing?

Dominic: if they don't document the use of their content provider, I would assume that they aren't expecting you to use it

ok, fair enough i guess

conversely, if they do document the use of their content provider, said documentation should cover permission stuff

yup, got it. one more q

fitz: do you have a question?

Is it possible for content provider to be accessed from a browser?

Dominic: you can try typing in a content:// URL, but it will only work if the content provider is supporting openFile() on that URL

i mean is it possible for javascript or html to access the content provider?

no

ok, thanks - thats all my questions

fitz: do you have a question?

Jumana: do you have a question?

good morning

no, mark. Im fine

if anyone comes up with a question, chime in

ok

does commonsware have some kind of an online training?

no, sorry

or certification?

ok

no, sorry

so I build an ant job in IntelliJ and it says BUILD SUCCESSFUL - in your book it says to run in emulator - how to I get the build in emulator to test app

any training in the middle east in the near future?

fitz: run ant clean install to install the app in the emulator from Ant

Jumana: no, sorry -- of my scheduled training, the closest is Belgium

not cluing into what that means sorry

:-) ok

at the command line type:

ant clean install

ant is the Ant program

clean and install are command-line arguments to that program

clean is the equivalent of an Eclipse "Project > Clean" action from the menu

ok so install know to go get the emulator?

install compiles and installs the app on the running emulator or attached device

the emulator must be running first

ok that is tha part I missed thanks

I will give it a shot - so off to Google IO

Thought I was finished, but I've another question then regarding how content provider should store its data. Bearing in mind a lot of data may need to be stored (I dunno, lets say 10000+ entries) is it best to store that data in SQLLite database? How does performance of accessing that data in SQLLite compare to storing it on memory card?

fitz: yeah, I'll be headed in an airportly direction in an hour or two

? will it focus on Honeycomb

Dominic: it is impossible to answer your questions in the abstract

I don't know what an "entry" is

I don't know why you are using a content provider

I don't know what you are expecting consumers of the content provider to do

fitz: will what focus on Honeycomb?

ok, sorry for vagueness

the android sessions at Google IO

fitz: a few will be Honeycomb-centered

many should be more generic

I'm using a content provider because I want to store data on the phone that another app can use. However, I don't want to make it publicly available. I thought content provider would be best suited? Should I look at other options?

ok - cool - do you know if there will be a specific site to watch live feeds or tapes sessions

tapes that is :)

taped

Dominic: no that sounds like a reasonable use for a ContentProvider, secured by a permission

fitz: long-term, they'll be on YouTube

ok

fitz: short-term, I would assume that http://www.google.com/events/io/2011/about.html will eventually have info about where to connect to the streams

the boldface items on http://www.google.com/events/io/2011/sessi… will be the live-streamed ones

ok great thanks

Dominic: if an "entry" is something that looks like a database row, I would use SQLite or *some* database

if an "entry" is a file being returned via openFile(), then individual files somewhere (internal or external storage) would probably be better

Ok, got it. That sounds good to me. Again, sorry for vagueness, not sure of full requirements yet and just doing some research first. ;)

running out of time here -- any last questions?

OK, well, that's a wrap for today's chat

next one is Friday, 4pm Eastern

have a pleasant day, all!