Beginning Android

 />
 <ListView
  android:id='@android:id/list'
  android:layout_width='fill_parent'
  android:layout_height='fill_parent'
  android:drawSelectorOnTop='false'
 />
</LinearLayout>

In addition to that XML file, you need an XML file with the words to show in the list:

<words>
 <word value='lorem' />
 <word value='ipsum' />
 <word value='dolor' />
 <word value='sit' />
 <word value='amet' />
 <word value='consectetuer' />
 <word value='adipiscing' />
 <word value='elit' />
 <word value='morbi' />
 <word value='vel' />
 <word value='ligula' />
 <word value='vitae' />
 <word value='arcu' />
 <word value='aliquet' />
 <word value='mollis' />
 <word value='etiam' />
 <word value='vel' />
 <word value='erat' />
 <word value='placerat' />
 <word value='ante' />
 <word value='porttitor' />
 <word value='sodales' />
 <word value='pellentesque' />
 <word value='augue' />
 <word value='purus' />
</words>

While this XML structure is not exactly a model of space efficiency, it will suffice for a demo.

The Java code now must read in that XML file, parse out the words, and put them someplace for the list to pick up:

public class StaticFileDemo extends ListActivity {
 TextView selection;
 ArrayList<String> items = new ArrayList<String>();
 @Override
 public void onCreate(Bundle icicle) {
  super.onCreate(icicle);
  setContentView(R.layout.main);
  selection = (TextView)findViewById(R.id.selection);
  try {
   InputStream in = getResources().openRawResource (R.raw.words);
   DocumentBuilder builder = DocumentBuilderFactory
    .newInstance().newDocumentBuilder();
   Document doc = builder.parse(in, null);
   NodeList words = doc.getElementsByTagName('word');
   for (int i=0; iwords.getLength(); i++) {
    items.add(((Element)words.item (i)).getAttribute('value'));
   }
   in.close();
  } catch (Throwable t) {
   Toast
   .makeText(this, 'Exception: '+t.toString(), 2000).show();
  }
  setListAdapter(new ArrayAdapter<String> (this,
   android.R.layout.simple_list_item_1, items));
 }
 public void onListItemClick(ListView parent, View v, int position,
  long id) {
  selection.setText(items.get (position).toString());
 }
}

The differences between the Chapter 8 example and this one mostly lie within onCreate(). We get an InputStream for the XML file (getResources().openRawResource (R.raw.words)), then use the built-in XML parsing logic to parse the file into a DOM Document, pick out the word elements, then pour the value attributes into an ArrayList for use by the ArrayAdapter.

The resulting activity looks the same as before (Figure 18-1), since the list of words is the same, just relocated.

Figure 18-1. The StaticFileDemo sample application

Of course, there are even easier ways to have XML files available to you as pre-packaged files, such as by using an XML resource. That is covered in the next chapter. However, while this example uses XML, the file could just as easily have been a simple one-word-per-line list, or in some other format not handled natively by the Android resource system.

Readin’ ’n’ Writin’