Android Endless List

How can I create a list where when you reach the end of the list I am notified so I can load more items?

Solution 1:

One solution is to implement an OnScrollListener and make changes (like adding items, etc.) to the ListAdapter at a convenient state in its onScroll method.

The following ListActivity shows a list of integers, starting with 40, adding items when the user scrolls to the end of the list.

public class Test extends ListActivity implements OnScrollListener {

    Aleph0 adapter = new Aleph0();

    protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
        setListAdapter(adapter); 
        getListView().setOnScrollListener(this);
    }

    public void onScroll(AbsListView view,
        int firstVisible, int visibleCount, int totalCount) {

        boolean loadMore = /* maybe add a padding */
            firstVisible + visibleCount >= totalCount;

        if(loadMore) {
            adapter.count += visibleCount; // or any other amount
            adapter.notifyDataSetChanged();
        }
    }

    public void onScrollStateChanged(AbsListView v, int s) { }    

    class Aleph0 extends BaseAdapter {
        int count = 40; /* starting amount */

        public int getCount() { return count; }
        public Object getItem(int pos) { return pos; }
        public long getItemId(int pos) { return pos; }

        public View getView(int pos, View v, ViewGroup p) {
                TextView view = new TextView(Test.this);
                view.setText("entry " + pos);
                return view;
        }
    }
}

You should obviously use separate threads for long running actions (like loading web-data) and might want to indicate progress in the last list item (like the market or gmail apps do).

Solution 2:

Just wanted to contribute a solution that I used for my app.

It is also based on the OnScrollListener interface, but I found it to have a much better scrolling performance on low-end devices, since none of the visible/total count calculations are carried out during the scroll operations.

1. Let your ListFragment or ListActivity implement OnScrollListener

2. Add the following methods to that class:

   @Override
   public void onScroll(AbsListView view, int firstVisibleItem,
           int visibleItemCount, int totalItemCount) {
       //leave this empty
   }
   
   @Override
   public void onScrollStateChanged(AbsListView listView, int scrollState) {
       if (scrollState == SCROLL_STATE_IDLE) {
           if (listView.getLastVisiblePosition() >= listView.getCount() - 1 - threshold) {
               currentPage++;
               //load more list items:
               loadElements(currentPage);
           }
       }
   }
   

   where currentPage is the page of your datasource that should be added to your list, and threshold is the number of list items (counted from the end) that should, if visible, trigger the loading process. If you set threshold to 0, for instance, the user has to scroll to the very end of the list in order to load more items.

3. (optional) As you can see, the "load-more check" is only called when the user stops scrolling. To improve usability, you may inflate and add a loading indicator to the end of the list via listView.addFooterView(yourFooterView). One example for such a footer view:

   <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
   
   <RelativeLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
       android:id="@+id/footer_layout"
       android:layout_width="fill_parent"
       android:layout_height="wrap_content"
       android:padding="10dp" >
   
       <ProgressBar
           android:id="@+id/progressBar1"
           android:layout_width="wrap_content"
           android:layout_height="wrap_content"
           android:layout_centerVertical="true"
           android:layout_gravity="center_vertical" />
   
       <TextView
           android:layout_width="wrap_content"
           android:layout_height="wrap_content"
           android:layout_centerVertical="true"
           android:layout_toRightOf="@+id/progressBar1"
           android:padding="5dp"
           android:text="@string/loading_text" />
   
   </RelativeLayout>
   

4. (optional) Finally, remove that loading indicator by calling listView.removeFooterView(yourFooterView) if there are no more items or pages.