Android: Quickly building a menu for an application

After creating an Android Project in Eclipse called “AndroidMenus” I then set about creating a new XML file in a folder (you need to create this folder) called “menu” under the “res” (parent) folder. I named the xml file “mymenu.xml” and added this:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <menu xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android">     <item android:id="@+id/menuItem1"           android:icon="@drawable/menu_item1"           android:title="@string/menu_item1" />     <item android:id="@+id/menuItem2"           android:icon="@drawable/menu_item2"           android:title="@string/menu_item2" /> </menu>

As you can see we need to make sure we have some icons for the menu as well as some menu item strings in the strings.xml file which is located in the “res/values” folder. Here is my modified strings.xml file:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <resources>     <string name="hello">Hello World, AndroidMenus!</string>     <string name="app_name">Android Menus</string>     <string name="menu_item1">Item 1</string>     <string name="menu_item2">Item 2</string> </resources>

The “main.xml” file can be left just as the project wizard created it however you need to modify the “AndroidMenus.java” file to override the onCreateOptionsMenu method.

package com.giantflyingsaucer; import android.app.Activity; import android.os.Bundle; import android.view.Menu; import android.view.MenuInflater; public class AndroidMenus extends Activity {     /** Called when the activity is first created. */     @Override     public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState)     {         super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);         setContentView(R.layout.main);     }     @Override     public boolean onCreateOptionsMenu(Menu menu)     {         MenuInflater menuInflater = getMenuInflater();         menuInflater.inflate(R.menu.mymenu, menu);         return true;     } }

You also need to create some icons and place them into the appropriate folders as seen below:

Once you’ve got this done you can run the project. In the emulator press the “Menu” button to trigger the menu.
Results:

Yes its pretty ugly but like I said I’m not a graphics person. If you click on the menu items nothing happens, lets change this now by adding some Java code to the “AndroidMenus.java” file. For this we need to override the onOptionsItemSelected method.

package com.giantflyingsaucer; import android.app.Activity; import android.os.Bundle; import android.view.Menu; import android.view.MenuInflater; import android.view.MenuItem; import android.widget.Toast; public class AndroidMenus extends Activity {     /** Called when the activity is first created. */     @Override     public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState)     {         super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);         setContentView(R.layout.main);     }     @Override     public boolean onCreateOptionsMenu(Menu menu)     {         MenuInflater menuInflater = getMenuInflater();         menuInflater.inflate(R.menu.mymenu, menu);         return true;     }     @Override     public boolean onOptionsItemSelected(MenuItem item)     {         // Handle item selection         switch (item.getItemId())         {         case R.id.menuItem1:             Toast.makeText(AndroidMenus.this, "Menu Item 1 was pressed", 3000).show();             return true;         case R.id.menuItem2:             Toast.makeText(AndroidMenus.this, "Menu Item 2 was pressed", 3000).show();             return true;         default:             return super.onOptionsItemSelected(item);         }     } }

You can see with the code depending what choice is made is reflected with a quick toast notification.
Results:










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