How to get the result of OnPostExecute() to main activity because AsyncTask is a separate class?

I have this two classes. My main Activity and the one that extends the AsyncTask, Now in my main Activity I need to get the result from the OnPostExecute() in the AsyncTask. How can I pass or get the result to my main Activity?

Here is the sample codes.

My main Activity.

public class MainActivity extends Activity{

    AasyncTask asyncTask = new AasyncTask();

    @Override
    public void onCreate(Bundle aBundle) {
        super.onCreate(aBundle);            

        //Calling the AsyncTask class to start to execute.  
        asyncTask.execute(a.targetServer); 

        //Creating a TextView.
        TextView displayUI = asyncTask.dataDisplay;
        displayUI = new TextView(this);
        this.setContentView(tTextView); 
    }

}

This is the AsyncTask class

public class AasyncTask extends AsyncTask<String, Void, String> {

TextView dataDisplay; //store the data  
String soapAction = "http://sample.com"; //SOAPAction header line. 
String targetServer = "https://sampletargeturl.com"; //Target Server.

//SOAP Request.
String soapRequest = "<sample XML request>";    



@Override
protected String doInBackground(String... string) {

String responseStorage = null; //storage of the response

try {


    //Uses URL and HttpURLConnection for server connection. 
    URL targetURL = new URL(targetServer);
    HttpURLConnection httpCon = (HttpURLConnection) targetURL.openConnection();
    httpCon.setDoOutput(true);
    httpCon.setDoInput(true);
    httpCon.setUseCaches(false); 
    httpCon.setChunkedStreamingMode(0);

    //properties of SOAPAction header
    httpCon.addRequestProperty("SOAPAction", soapAction);
    httpCon.addRequestProperty("Content-Type", "text/xml; charset=utf-8"); 
    httpCon.addRequestProperty("Content-Length", "" + soapRequest.length());
    httpCon.setRequestMethod(HttpPost.METHOD_NAME);


    //sending request to the server.
    OutputStream outputStream = httpCon.getOutputStream(); 
    Writer writer = new OutputStreamWriter(outputStream);
    writer.write(soapRequest);
    writer.flush();
    writer.close();


    //getting the response from the server
    InputStream inputStream = httpCon.getInputStream(); 
    BufferedReader bufferedReader = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(inputStream));
    ByteArrayBuffer byteArrayBuffer = new ByteArrayBuffer(50);

    int intResponse = httpCon.getResponseCode();

    while ((intResponse = bufferedReader.read()) != -1) {
        byteArrayBuffer.append(intResponse);
    }

    responseStorage = new String(byteArrayBuffer.toByteArray()); 

    } catch (Exception aException) {
    responseStorage = aException.getMessage(); 
    }
    return responseStorage;
}

protected void onPostExecute(String result) {

    aTextView.setText(result);

}       

}

Solution 1:

Easy:

Create interface class, where String output is optional, or can be whatever variables you want to return.
```
 public interface AsyncResponse {
     void processFinish(String output);
 }
```

Go to your AsyncTask class, and declare interface AsyncResponse as a field :

 public class MyAsyncTask extends AsyncTask<Void, Void, String> {
   public AsyncResponse delegate = null;

     @Override
     protected void onPostExecute(String result) {
       delegate.processFinish(result);
     }
  }

In your main Activity you need to implements interface AsyncResponse.

 public class MainActivity implements AsyncResponse{
   MyAsyncTask asyncTask =new MyAsyncTask();

   @Override
   public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {

      //this to set delegate/listener back to this class
      asyncTask.delegate = this;

      //execute the async task 
      asyncTask.execute();
   }

   //this override the implemented method from asyncTask
   @Override
   void processFinish(String output){
      //Here you will receive the result fired from async class 
      //of onPostExecute(result) method.
    }
  }

UPDATE

I didn't know this is such a favourite to many of you. So here's the simple and convenience way to use interface.

still using same interface. FYI, you may combine this into AsyncTask class.

in AsyncTask class :

public class MyAsyncTask extends AsyncTask<Void, Void, String> {

  // you may separate this or combined to caller class.
  public interface AsyncResponse {
        void processFinish(String output);
  }

  public AsyncResponse delegate = null;

    public MyAsyncTask(AsyncResponse delegate){
        this.delegate = delegate;
    }

    @Override
    protected void onPostExecute(String result) {
      delegate.processFinish(result);
    }
}

do this in your Activity class

public class MainActivity extends Activity {
  
   MyAsyncTask asyncTask = new MyAsyncTask(new AsyncResponse(){
    
     @Override
     void processFinish(String output){
     //Here you will receive the result fired from async class 
     //of onPostExecute(result) method.
     }
  }).execute();

 }

Or, implementing the interface on the Activity again

public class MainActivity extends Activity 
    implements AsyncResponse{
      
    @Override
    public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {

        //execute the async task 
        new MyAsyncTask(this).execute();
    }
      
    //this override the implemented method from AsyncResponse
    @Override
    void processFinish(String output){
        //Here you will receive the result fired from async class 
        //of onPostExecute(result) method.
    }
}

As you can see 2 solutions above, the first and third one, it needs to create method processFinish, the other one, the method is inside the caller parameter. The third is more neat because there is no nested anonymous class.

Tip: Change String output, String response, and String result to different matching types in order to get different objects.

Solution 2:

There are a few options:

Nest the AsyncTask class within your Activity class. Assuming you don't use the same task in multiple activities, this is the easiest way. All your code stays the same, you just move the existing task class to be a nested class inside your activity's class.
```
public class MyActivity extends Activity {
    // existing Activity code
    ...

    private class MyAsyncTask extends AsyncTask<String, Void, String> {
        // existing AsyncTask code
        ...
    }
}
```

Create a custom constructor for your AsyncTask that takes a reference to your Activity. You would instantiate the task with something like new MyAsyncTask(this).execute(param1, param2).

public class MyAsyncTask extends AsyncTask<String, Void, String> {
    private Activity activity;

    public MyAsyncTask(Activity activity) {
        this.activity = activity;
    }

    // existing AsyncTask code
    ...
}

Solution 3:

I felt the below approach is very easy.

I have declared an interface for callback

public interface AsyncResponse {
    void processFinish(Object output);
}

Then created asynchronous Task for responding all type of parallel requests

 public class MyAsyncTask extends AsyncTask<Object, Object, Object> {

    public AsyncResponse delegate = null;//Call back interface

    public MyAsyncTask(AsyncResponse asyncResponse) {
        delegate = asyncResponse;//Assigning call back interfacethrough constructor
    }

    @Override
    protected Object doInBackground(Object... params) {

      //My Background tasks are written here

      return {resutl Object}

    }

    @Override
    protected void onPostExecute(Object result) {
        delegate.processFinish(result);
    }

}

Then Called the asynchronous task when clicking a button in activity Class.

public class MainActivity extends Activity{

    @Override
    public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {

    Button mbtnPress = (Button) findViewById(R.id.btnPress);

    mbtnPress.setOnClickListener(new View.OnClickListener() {

            @Override
            public void onClick(View v) {

                MyAsyncTask asyncTask =new MyAsyncTask(new AsyncResponse() {

                    @Override
                    public void processFinish(Object output) {
                        Log.d("Response From Asynchronous task:", (String) output);

                        mbtnPress.setText((String) output);
                   }
                });

                asyncTask.execute(new Object[] { "Your request to aynchronous task class is giving here.." });


            }
        });

    }



}

Thanks

Solution 4:

You can try this code in your Main class. That worked for me, but i have implemented methods in other way

try {
    String receivedData = new AsyncTask().execute("http://yourdomain.com/yourscript.php").get();
} 
catch (ExecutionException | InterruptedException ei) {
    ei.printStackTrace();
}

Solution 5:

This answer might be late but I would like to mention few things when your Activity dependent on AsyncTask. That would help you in prevent crashes and memory management. As already mentioned in above answers go with interface, we also say them callbacks. They will work as an informer, but never ever send strong reference of Activity or interface always use weak reference in those cases.

Please refer to below screenshot to findout how that can cause issues.

enter image description here

As you can see if we started AsyncTask with a strong reference then there is no guarantee that our Activity/Fragment will be alive till we get data, so it would be better to use WeakReference in those cases and that will also help in memory management as we will never hold the strong reference of our Activity then it will be eligible for garbage collection after its distortion.

Check below code snippet to find out how to use awesome WeakReference -

MyTaskInformer.java Interface which will work as an informer.

public interface MyTaskInformer {

    void onTaskDone(String output);

}

MySmallAsyncTask.java AsyncTask to do long running task, which will use WeakReference.

public class MySmallAsyncTask extends AsyncTask<String, Void, String> {

    // ***** Hold weak reference *****
    private WeakReference<MyTaskInformer> mCallBack;

    public MySmallAsyncTask(MyTaskInformer callback) {
        this.mCallBack = new WeakReference<>(callback);
    }

    @Override
    protected String doInBackground(String... params) {

        // Here do whatever your task is like reading/writing file
        // or read data from your server or any other heavy task

        // Let us suppose here you get response, just return it
        final String output = "Any out, mine is just demo output";

        // Return it from here to post execute
        return output;
    }

    @Override
    protected void onPostExecute(String s) {
        super.onPostExecute(s);

        // Here you can't guarantee that Activity/Fragment is alive who started this AsyncTask

        // Make sure your caller is active

        final MyTaskInformer callBack = mCallBack.get();

        if(callBack != null) {
            callBack.onTaskDone(s);
        }
    }
}

MainActivity.java This class is used to start my AsyncTask implement interface on this class and override this mandatory method.

public class MainActivity extends Activity implements MyTaskInformer {

    private TextView mMyTextView;

    @Override
    protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
        setContentView(R.layout.activity_main);

        mMyTextView = (TextView) findViewById(R.id.tv_text_view);

        // Start your AsyncTask and pass reference of MyTaskInformer in constructor
        new MySmallAsyncTask(this).execute();
    }

    @Override
    public void onTaskDone(String output) {

        // Here you will receive output only if your Activity is alive.
        // no need to add checks like if(!isFinishing())

        mMyTextView.setText(output);
    }
}