android - How to fill ListPreference dynamically when onPreferenceClick is triggered?

Question

I have a preference activity that has a language as ListPreference which displays the available language list. I can fill the list when onCreate is called, but I want to fill the list when the user clicks on it.

this is the java code :

public class SettingsActivity extends PreferenceActivity implements OnPreferenceClickListener {
    @Override
    public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);

        try {
            addPreferencesFromResource(R.xml.settings);
        } catch (Exception e) {

        }

    }

    @Override
    public boolean onPreferenceClick(Preference preference) {

        if((preference instanceof ListPreference) && (preference.getKey().equals("language"))){
            ListPreference lp = (ListPreference)preference;
            CharSequence[] entries = { "English", "French" };
            CharSequence[] entryValues = {"1" , "2"};
            lp.setEntries(entries);
            lp.setDefaultValue("1");
            lp.setEntryValues(entryValues);
            return true;
        }
        return false;

    }
}

and this is the settings.xml (preference) :

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<PreferenceScreen
  xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android">
    <PreferenceCategory android:title="General Settings">
        <CheckBoxPreference android:key="enabled"  android:title="Application Status" android:summary="Enable or disable the application" />
         <ListPreference 
         android:key="language" 
         android:title="Language"
         android:dialogTitle="Application language" 
         android:summary="Select the Application language"
         />
    </PreferenceCategory>
</PreferenceScreen>

I searched but found no result! An exception occurs every time I click on that list.

Answer 1

You are getting the exception because your ListPreference object is not initialized - you either need to set entries and entryValues attributes in your XML or do it programatically in onCreate().

If if you need to change the items in the list dynamically after the initial ListPreference object has been initialized then you will need to attach the OnPreferenceClickListener directly to the ListPreference object. Use the key you have specified in the XML to get a handle to the preference.

Since the code to populate the entries and entryValues arrays will have to be run both in onCreate() and in onPreferenceClick, it makes sense to extract it to a separate method - setListPreferenceData() in order to avoid duplication.

public class SettingsActivity extends PreferenceActivity {
    @Override
    public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);

        try {
            addPreferencesFromResource(R.xml.settings);
        } catch (Exception e) {

        }

        final ListPreference listPreference = (ListPreference) findPreference("language");

        // THIS IS REQUIRED IF YOU DON'T HAVE 'entries' and 'entryValues' in your XML
        setListPreferenceData(listPreference);

        listPreference.setOnPreferenceClickListener(new OnPreferenceClickListener() {
            @Override
            public boolean onPreferenceClick(Preference preference) {

                setListPreferenceData(listPreference);
                return false;
            }
        });
    }

    protected static void setListPreferenceData(ListPreference lp) {
            CharSequence[] entries = { "English", "French" };
            CharSequence[] entryValues = {"1" , "2"};
            lp.setEntries(entries);
            lp.setDefaultValue("1");
            lp.setEntryValues(entryValues);
    }
}

Here is another example from google's DeskClock app: