Android: Taking complete control of phone(kiosk mode), is it possible? How?

Solution 1:

Yes it is possible but you can not control the behaviour of Home key and end call key.

for full screen add android:theme="@android:style/Theme.NoTitleBar.Fullscreen" to activity tag in manifest file.

To disable incoming call you need to listen phone calls:

import android.app.Service;
import android.os.IBinder;
import android.telephony.PhoneStateListener;
import android.telephony.TelephonyManager;

public class MyPhoneStateListener extends Service{

    @Override
    public IBinder onBind(Intent arg0) {
        return null;
    }

    @Override
    public void onCreate() {
        super.onCreate();
            StateListener phoneStateListener = new StateListener();
            TelephonyManager telephonymanager = (TelephonyManager)getSystemService(TELEPHONY_SERVICE);
            telephonymanager.listen(phoneStateListener, PhoneStateListener.LISTEN_CALL_STATE);

    }

    class StateListener extends PhoneStateListener{
        @Override
        public void onCallStateChanged(int state, String incomingNumber) {
            super.onCallStateChanged(state, incomingNumber);
            switch(state){
                case TelephonyManager.CALL_STATE_RINGING:
                    //Disconnect the call here...
                    break;
                case TelephonyManager.CALL_STATE_OFFHOOK:
                    break;
                case TelephonyManager.CALL_STATE_IDLE:
                    break;
            }
        }
    };

    @Override
    public void onDestroy() {

    }
}

Note: While stopping service don't foget to remove the listener and add these permissions to your manifest file:

<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.READ_PHONE_STATE" />

and disconnect the call programmatically:

try{
    TelephonyManager manager = (TelephonyManager)context.getSystemService(Context.TELEPHONY_SERVICE);
    Class c = Class.forName(manager.getClass().getName());
    Method m = c.getDeclaredMethod("getITelephony");
    m.setAccessible(true);
    ITelephony telephony = (ITelephony)m.invoke(manager);
    telephony.endCall();
} catch(Exception e){
    Log.d("",e.getMessage());
}

Note: Add this file to disconnect the call: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/31740476/ITelephony.aidl

To disable keys you need to override:

@Override
public boolean dispatchKeyEvent(KeyEvent event) {
    if(KeyEvent.KEYCODE_MENU == event.getKeyCode() || KeyEvent.KEYCODE_DPAD_LEFT==event.getKeyCode()
            || KeyEvent.KEYCODE_DPAD_DOWN==event.getKeyCode() || KeyEvent.KEYCODE_DPAD_RIGHT==event.getKeyCode()
            || KeyEvent.KEYCODE_DPAD_UP==event.getKeyCode() || KeyEvent.KEYCODE_DPAD_CENTER==event.getKeyCode()
            || KeyEvent.KEYCODE_BACK==event.getKeyCode())
    {
        return false;
    }
    return true;
}

On Home key press the Home screen will come, so to overcome this you need to implement a service and there you need to implement a infinite thread to relaunch your app like this:

public class AppTrackingService extends Service {

    private RunnableThread thread;
    private Context ctx;

    @Override
    public IBinder onBind(Intent intent) {
        return null;
    }

    public void onCreate(){
        super.onCreate();
        ctx = AppTrackingService.this;
        thread = new RunnableThread();
    }

    public void onStart(Intent intent, int startid) {
        try{
            if(thread==null) thread = new RunnableThread();
            thread.startThread();
        }catch(Exception e){  }
    }

    class RunnableThread extends Thread {

        Handler back_handler = new Handler();
        boolean isContinue = false;

        public RunnableThread(){
            isContinue = false;
        }

        public void setIsContinue(boolean val){
            this.isContinue = val;
        }

        public void startThread(){
            isContinue = true;
            start();
        }

        public void run(){
            ActivityManager actMngr = (ActivityManager) getSystemService(Context.ACTIVITY_SERVICE);
            while(isContinue){
                try{
                //Maintain a boolean "isyourapprunning" to know if your app was running or not....
                    if(isyourapprunning){
                    String runningPkg = actMngr.getRunningTasks(1).get(0).topActivity.getPackageName();
                        if (!runningPkg.equals(ctx.getPackageName())){
                                launchApp(ctx.getPackageName());
                            }
                        Thread.sleep(2500);  //2.5 secs
                    }else{
                        isContinue = false;
                        stopSelf();
                    }

                }catch(Exception e){ }
            }//end of while loop
        }

        protected void launchApp(String packageName) {
            Intent mIntent = getPackageManager().getLaunchIntentForPackage(packageName);
            mIntent.addFlags(Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_CLEAR_TOP);
            mIntent.addFlags(Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_RESET_TASK_IF_NEEDED);
            if (null != mIntent) {
                try {
                    startActivity(mIntent);
                } catch(Exception e) { }
            }
        }
    }
}

EDIT

You would need to add the following permission to be able to end calls:

<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.CALL_PHONE" />

And you can use the following AIDL file:

package com.android.internal.telephony;

/**
 * Interface used to interact with the phone.  Mostly this is used by the
 * TelephonyManager class.  A few places are still using this directly.
 * Please clean them up if possible and use TelephonyManager instead.
 *
 * {@hide}
 */
interface ITelephony {
    /**
     * End call if there is a call in progress, otherwise does nothing.
     *
     * @return whether it hung up
     */
    boolean endCall();

    /**
     * Silence the ringer if an incoming call is currently ringing.
     * (If vibrating, stop the vibrator also.)
     *
     * It's safe to call this if the ringer has already been silenced, or
     * even if there's no incoming call.  (If so, this method will do nothing.)
     *
     * TODO: this should be a oneway call too (see above).
     *       (Actually *all* the methods here that return void can
     *       probably be oneway.)
     */
    void silenceRinger();
}

Solution 2:

Vineet's solution works. However i think it requires two more permissions that i found out from here

So the permissions needed are

android.permission.READ_PHONE_STATE, android.permission.MODIFY_PHONE_STATE, android.permission.CALL_PHONE

Although it worked for me like this

<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.READ_PHONE_STATE"/>

<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.CALL_PHONE"/>