Show empty view for ArrayAdapter in Android

Question

I've got a ListView in my application that's rendered in a ListFragment's onActivityCreated()using setListAdapter(). Passed in to this setListAdapter()are my implementation of ArrayAdapter. At some times this adapter can be empty, and that's fine, but at those moments I would like to show a message in the list telling that there are no items, instead of just an empty view. However I don't really know how to achieve this, as for I have researched most people to show lists in a ListActivityand by doing that you can setEmptyView() but this doesn't seem doable when using a ListFragment. Another way of doing this was to change view in the ListFragment if the ArrayAdapter has no item's in it, then change view to another showing the message, but this seems to me a bit hacky.

Whats really the proper way of doing what I want to achieve?

Tried to setEmptyView() to my ListView but that didn't work either, see code on how views are inflated in my ListFragment:

public class MyFragment extends ListFragment {

    @SuppressLint("InflateParams")
    @Override
    public View onCreateView(LayoutInflater inflater, ViewGroup container, Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        ListView listView = (ListView) inflater.inflate(R.layout.my_list, null);
        listView.setEmptyView(inflater.inflate(R.layout.list_items_missing, null));
        return listView;
    }

    @Override
    public void onActivityCreated(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        super.onActivityCreated(savedInstanceState);

        MyItemArrayAdapter adapter = new MyItemArrayAdapter(getActivity());

        // Populate adapter with items...

        setListAdapter(adapter);
    }
}

Shouldn't this result in the empty view beeing shown if no items exists in my adapter?

try putting background image for ListView inside xml. If no item, show background image, if there is item, make background color. It is how google message app does — Jemshit
– Jemshit, Commented Apr 9, 2015 at 10:42
ListActivity has no setEmptyView method. The method is part of ListView — Blackbelt
– Blackbelt, Commented Apr 9, 2015 at 10:44
See updated question on how I'm trying to setEmptyView() to my ListView — Robert
– Robert, Commented Apr 9, 2015 at 14:05

Community · Accepted Answer · 2017-05-23 12:30:17Z

2

1) Try putting backgroundImage for ListView inside xml. If no item, show backgroundImage, if there is item, put background color.

2) You can also do what as @kgandroid suggested and here, setEmptyView() which you set custom view.

Example:

enter image description here

Another:

enter image description here

edited May 23, 2017 at 12:30

CommunityBot

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answered Apr 9, 2015 at 10:49

Jemshit

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5 Comments

Robert Over a year ago

I'd like to use a background image for listview, but can't get the resolutions right for that image. It will always look different for different devices and there screen resolutions. I guess I need to create a nine patch image but this start to look overkill for tha things I want to achieve. Then I tried to setEmptyView instead but that didnt work either. See updated question for the code.

Jemshit Over a year ago

@Robert this guy used it in ListFragment: stackoverflow.com/a/15990955/3736955. Try TextView emptyView=(TextView)inflater.inflate(R.layout.list_items_missing, null), (ViewGroup) getListView().getParent()).addView(emptyView); listView.setEmptyView(emptyView);

Robert Over a year ago

that did acually work, must have been the ((ViewGroup) getListView().getParent()).addView(emptyView); that was missing

Robert Over a year ago

just for curiosity, how do you made the background images for the list views so they look good on most devices? I still think using background images are the cleanest solution.

Jemshit Over a year ago

I haven't tried myself, i saw them in apps. Probably using different resolutions of image (xxhdpi, xhdpi,hdpi,mdpi,ldpi...)

Alejandro Cumpa · Accepted Answer · 2015-04-09 14:20:38Z

0

You can customize your adapter to show the layout R.layout.list_items_missing when (item == null) instead of inflating the normal custom list item layout that you implement.

Something like this:

public View getView(int position, View convertView, ViewGroup parent) 
{
   ViewHolder holder; //asuming you have this in your custom adapter
if (convertView == null) {

        holder = new ViewHolder();
  if(MyItemArrayList.get(position)!=null)
{
        convertView = this.inflater.inflate(R.layout.layout_list_item,
                parent, false);
else
{
convertView = this.inflater.inflate(R.layout.list_items_missing,
                    parent, false);

}
//the rest of the adapter logic
}

answered Apr 9, 2015 at 14:20

Alejandro Cumpa

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