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Why Inflater is Used in Android?

If you’ve ever wondered why Android uses an inflater, you’ve come to the right place. Android inflates the views in its layout automatically during the activity’s onCreate() method. The rest of the inflation is up to the Android developer. For instance, the Inflater class inflates the views in a ListView, but if you want to customise the views of this view type, you’ll have to manually inflate each one.

The Inflater class is a system service used by Android to instantiate XML layout files in memory. This method looks up a view object in an XML file and passes it to the parent. It then sets the control of the TextView to the view’s parent. This XML is then passed through AAPT, an Android processing step, where it’s transformed into an optimized version. Because of this, it is impossible for users to extract an Inflater from an APK.

Why Do We Use Layout Inflater?

As an Android developer, you may wonder why we need to use LayoutInflater, the library that inflates XML layouts. Android does most of this for you when you call setContentView() in the onCreate() method of an activity. But, if you want your list view to display a custom layout, you will need to manually inflate every view in the ListView.

This class will generate an XML layout file and view objects from the corresponding XML file. In addition to this, it uses the “inflater” keyword in the corresponding java class of the layout(xml) file. This allows Android to create both a static and a dynamic layout. Inflater is primarily used for dynamic layouts. Having a static UI is not enough.

Using LayoutInflater in your Android application is a great way to create custom widgets, add tinting support, and more. While you’re at it, you can even set up a custom Factory interface to extend LayoutInflater. Inflate methods take a parameter named view, which must be non-null. After the constructor, the factory method calls the next factory default method to create the view.

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What is Inflater Class in Android?

What is Inflater Class in Android? Inflate is a transitive verb that means to swell with air or expand abnormally. It can refer to two different types of views. It can also be a component of an XML layout file. An inflate method loads the layout XML from the application code. Then, it uses the XML layout to create a View hierarchy and binds it to a parent ViewGroup.

The Inflater class provides general purpose compression and decompression. This library uses the ZLIB compression library, which was originally part of the PNG graphics standard. A simple example of a string can be seen below. Another example of an Inflater class is in a web browser. Using a custom Intent allows you to navigate from activity to activity by delegating the responsibility of one application to another.

Inflate method creates a View Object based on the layout file. It calculates the layout parameters and then returns the view based on the new XML. If there is no root view in the layout file, the inflate method will not add the view to the root view automatically. Fortunately, this can be manually added if necessary. It is important to understand that the inflate method is not an easy one to use and can cause problems in your app if you are not careful.

How Do I Use Layout Inflater?

The Android LayoutInflater class instantiates view objects based on a given XML file. The layout xml file must have a factory name, and this factory must not be null. The factory name must be set once, and is called on each element’s name at runtime. It’s best to use this constructor when creating adapter views, where a single view object corresponds to one record. You can also use this class inside an Activity or Fragment.

The inflate() method looks up the rootView in the view group. It then inflates the view and sets its layout parameters to the TextView. It then calls the finished inflator recursively, returning the view. The finished inflator then attaches itself to the parent. This method steps out of recursion and runs through a private factory. If the view is not inflated from the XML file, it throws an exception.

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Why Do We Use the Layout Inflater in Listview?

Why Do We Use the Layout Inflaters in Listview? ListViews contain references to view objects, but these views are not associated with data. If a user scrolls down the list, the listview will inflate more views as the list continues. This can waste memory and cause garbage collection. The inflate method should be used only when customizing the ListView’s views.

The Layout Inflater is used to create a new row layout from the one that has been displayed in the current list. Its function is to recycle view objects. Basically, when a listview calls getView, it should return a row layout. The Layout Inflater makes it possible to update the row layout on subsequent getView calls. It is not trivial to find the inner view of a listview.

To improve the performance of ListView, we can implement the View Holder pattern. It caches the results of findViewById, which is a recursive search of the view hierarchy. Generally, the performance loss is not significant, but it becomes a problem when list item layouts get more complex. With the View Holder pattern, we can get around this problem.

What is Root in Inflate Android?

If you’ve ever used an inflater, you’re probably wondering: what is the root of the new view hierarchy? Well, the root is the view that controls the entire view hierarchy. The root of a view is the object that surrounds all of the view objects, including the subclasses. The parent view can either entertain or ignore touch events. The inflate() method will return the root view if it was supplied.

What is a ViewGroup?

A ViewGroup is a reusable container for a collection of views. It is the base class of layouts and views containers. Android uses the LinearLayout subclass of ViewGroup. The Adapter is a bridge between a UI component and a data source. The adapter sends data from the data source to the adapter view, which in turn shows the data on different views.

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LayoutInflater is one of the Android System Services. It parses XML files to create View objects. View objects are the building blocks of the Android OS, and they represent the data you see on your screen. Inflating a view means taking a layout XML file and parsing it to create a hierarchy of views. This hierarchy is referred to as a ViewGroup.

What is View Binding in Android?

If you’re an Android developer, you’re probably familiar with the findViewById() method, which returns an inflated version of the View. This approach assumes that the View is already present. View Binding replaces this approach, and automatically generates a binding class that contains references to all views in the application. For more information about View Binding, check out Google’s official documentation.

View Binding is a convenient way to find and configure views in your Android application. It helps you write less code and eliminates boilerplate code. It works with Java, Kotlin, and Objective-C, and it’s type-safe. It’s also an excellent choice if you’re writing a large number of activities. By learning the basics of view binding, you’ll have an easier time building beautiful applications.

The view binding process generates a binding class for the layout file. It contains a direct reference to the views and their ids as assigned in the XML layout. This reduces boilerplate code and makes it easier to work with views and perform operations on them. The only disadvantage of view binding is that it does not support two-way binding. You’ll also need to add the layout-tag to your layout files to use it.

Learn More Here:

1.) Android Help Center

2.) Android – Wikipedia

3.) Android Versions

4.) Android Guides