Marketing Week speaks to O2 Money commercial director Simon Cottenham and O2’s head of product for mobile payments Nathan Cushnie about how the new mobile payments app, O2 Wallet, will work for users and partner brands.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBdX--hHKq4&feature=player_embedded

Android WebView

Android WebView enables us to display web pages and interact with web content, there are several reasons that you might want to use WebView in your applications, but i think one the most interesting features of WebView is JavaScript integration capability. in this article I'm gonna show you a simple example of how easy it is to call javascript functions from your java code and vice versa.
first of all let's see how our example will be looking like :

it's actually just a WebView which is displaying a local Html page, this html page contains a java script slideshow component, I've actually used the very same code that i found over here. the original javascript component has two button which can be used to slide into the next or previous page, but what I wanted was to be able to slide through pages using Swiping Gestures, Like...Swipe Left...go to next page, Swipe Right ...previous page.

There are two javaScript functions , moveBackward() which replaces the current Item with previous one using a left to right sliding effect and moveForward() which does the exact opposite thing. all we need to do is to detect user Gestures, if it is a right to left gesture (swipe left) we will call moveForward()function and if it is a swipe right gesture we will call moveBackward() function, in this example I've used SimpleGestureFilter class and here is our onSwipe method implementation:

@Override
public void onSwipe(int direction) {


switch (direction) {

case SimpleGestureFilter.SWIPE_RIGHT : webView.loadUrl("javascript:moveBackward()");
break;
case SimpleGestureFilter.SWIPE_LEFT : webView.loadUrl("javascript:moveForward()");
break;
case SimpleGestureFilter.SWIPE_DOWN :
case SimpleGestureFilter.SWIPE_UP :

}
}

It's much easier than you though it would be, isn't it? we just need to pass the name of our javascript function (with 'javascript:' prefix) to loadUrl() method of the WebView instance.
as you can see in the pictures above, we have 3 buttons in our html form 'Add', 'Remove' and 'Report', we also have a Vector of Strings in our Activity; when 'Add' button is pressed the name of the current item will be sent to our activity and got stored in the Vector, when 'Remove' button is pressed the name of current item will be removed from Vector and in both cases a message will be shown afterwords that the operation has just been done :


if user presses the "Report" button a javascript popup box will be shown which says how many items are currently stored in our Vector:


here is the html and javascript code that is being used to render those 3 buttons:

.
.
.

var items = ["British Columbia", "Ontario", "Yukon","New Brunswick"];

function report(){

var contentStr = window.interface.getReportContent();

var contentDiv = document.getElementById("showBoxContent");
contentDiv.innerHTML = contentStr;
showBox();
}

.
.
.



.
.
.

and here is our Activity source code :

public class WebViewSample extends Activity implements SimpleGestureListener{

private Handler handler = new Handler();
private WebView webView;
private SimpleGestureFilter filter;
private Vector provinces = new Vector();

@Override
public void onCreate(Bundle icicle) {
super.onCreate(icicle);
setContentView(R.layout.webview_layout);
webView = (WebView) findViewById(R.id.webview);

WebSettings webSettings = webView.getSettings();
webSettings.setSaveFormData(false);
webSettings.setJavaScriptEnabled(true);

this.filter = new SimpleGestureFilter(this,this);
this.filter.setMode(SimpleGestureFilter.MODE_TRANSPARENT);

webView.addJavascriptInterface(new MyJavaScriptInterface(), "interface");

webView.loadUrl("file:///android_asset/test.html");
}

@Override
public boolean dispatchTouchEvent(MotionEvent me){
this.filter.onTouchEvent(me);
return super.dispatchTouchEvent(me);
}

@Override
public void onSwipe(int direction) {

switch (direction) {

case SimpleGestureFilter.SWIPE_RIGHT : webView.loadUrl("javascript:moveBackward()");
break;
case SimpleGestureFilter.SWIPE_LEFT : webView.loadUrl("javascript:moveForward()");
break;
case SimpleGestureFilter.SWIPE_DOWN :
case SimpleGestureFilter.SWIPE_UP :

}
}


@Override
public void onDoubleTap() {
}


private void addOrRemove(String name,boolean add){

String msg = null;
boolean alreadyAdded = this.provinces.contains(name);

if(add){
if(!alreadyAdded){
this.provinces.add(name);
msg = name+" Has just been added to the List.";
}
else
msg = name+" Has already been added to the list.";
}
else{
if(alreadyAdded){
this.provinces.remove(name);
msg = name+" Has just been removed from the List.";
}
else
msg = name+" has never been added to the list!";
}

Toast.makeText(this, msg, Toast.LENGTH_LONG).show();
}


final class MyJavaScriptInterface {

MyJavaScriptInterface() {
}

public void add(final String name) {
handler.post(new Runnable() {
public void run() {
addOrRemove(name, true);
}
});
}

public void remove(final String name) {
handler.post(new Runnable() {
public void run() {
addOrRemove(name, false);
}
});
}

public String getReportContent() {
if(provinces.size() == 0)
return " The list is empty. ";

String content = "You have added these provinces into the list :

";
for(int i=0;i
";

return content;
}

}

}

as you can see all we have is a simple WebView instance which displays the content of 'test.html' file that is located in assets directory of our project.

we've called addJavascriptInterface() method of our WebView instance in order to be able to call java methods in javascript code this method has two parameters, the first one is an Object methods of which we want to call in our javascript code and the second parameter is an String which will be used as the name of that java object in javascript context. once addJavascriptInterface() method is called the specified java object will be attached to the Html document's window object and can be referred by its name.
Remember that when methods of the passed java object is called in javascript context, it's not gonna invoked in the Main(UI) thread, and if you need to get it called in the UI thread you will need to use a Handler and post a new runnable to run your code, just like what I've done for add() and remove() methods in this example (though it is not necessary in this example).
another important thing to remember is the fact that you cannot pass or return any complex object to or from javascript context, that is all you are allowed to use are primitive and String data types.
Ref: Android & Amir

Children’s Laureate Praises eBooks

Sleepydog’s range of eBooks for the iPhone and Android has been given the thumbs up by Children’s Laureate, Anthony Browne.

Our approach to eBooks has been developed in partnership with award-winning children’s author, Steve Skidmore, and is based around the core aim of encouraging kids to read.

Speaking to Skidmore, Browne said: ”This is a great idea! Anything that makes reading cool and gets kids reading for pleasure must be a good thing.”

With a total of 12 eBooks for children now published on iTunes and also coming on Android Market, we’re looking forward to releasing many more titles in the coming months.

Want to find out more? Download our eBooks brochure to understand the Sleepydog approach to eBooks or visit here

Android API - SMS handling

Many new application will use SMS as data delivery platform. Reality shows, on-demand movies etc request users to send predefined formatted SMS. Similarly some applications are coming up which sends data to user using SMS. Let’s see how such an application can be built using Android platform.

Android API support developing applications that can send and receive SMS messages. The android emulator does not support sending of the SMS currently. But the emulator can receive SMS. Lets explore the android SMS support and develop a small program that listens to the SMSes received on the device (on emulator) and will show that message as notification.

The event handling on Android is done with the help of intents and intent receivers. The intents announce (or broadcast) the event and intent receivers respond to the event. Intent receivers act as the event handlers.

Let’s define an intent receiver that can handle the SMS received event:

package com.wissen.sms.receiver;
/**
* The class is called when SMS is received.
*/
public class SMSReceiver extends BroadcastReceiver {

@Override
public void onReceive(Context context, Intent intent) {
// TODO
}
}

We need to configure this intent receiver to receive SMS receive event. For SMS receive event android has defined an intent as ‘ android.provider.Telephony.SMS_RECEIVED ‘. The receiver can be configured in AndroidManifest.xml as follows:







To receive SMS, application also needs to specify permission for receiving SMS. The permission can be set in AndroidManifest.xml as follows:

Now our intent receiver is all set to be called when the android device will receive SMS. Now we only need to retrieve the received SMS and show the SMS text in a notification.

Here is the code of intent receiver that will read the SMS from intent received and show the first message (pdu).

public void onReceive(Context context, Intent intent) {
Bundle bundle = intent.getExtras();

Object messages[] = (Object[]) bundle.get(”pdus”);
SmsMessage smsMessage[] = new SmsMessage[messages.length];
for (int n = 0; n < messages.length; n++) {
smsMessage[n] = SmsMessage.createFromPdu((byte[]) messages[n]);
}

// show first message
Toast toast = Toast.makeText(context,
“Received SMS: ” + smsMessage[0].getMessageBody(), Toast.LENGTH_LONG);
toast.show();
}

The SMS received by the Android device is in the form of pdus (protocol description unit). Class SmsMessage, defined in android.telephony.gsm package, can store information about the SMS. The class can also be used to create SmsMessage object from received pdus. Toast widget is used to show the SMS body as an notification.

Running the Program:
Only remaining thing now is running the application and sending the SMS message to the emulator. An SMS message can be sent to the emulator in the DDMS eclipse perspective (Dalvik Debug Monitor Service). ‘Emulator Control’ window can be used to send SMS message (an incoming number has to be provided which can be anything).



Here is the application screen shot in action,
Android SMS receiver application

Download the sample code: here

Do It Anyway - by Mother Teresa

People are often unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered;
Forgive them anyway.

If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives;
Be kind anyway.

If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies;
Succeed anyway.

If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you;
Be honest and frank anyway.

What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight;
Build anyway.

If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous;
Be happy anyway.

The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow;
Do good anyway.

Give the world the best you have and it may just never be enough;
Give the world the best you have anyway.

You see, in the final analysis, it's all between you and God;
It was never between you and them anyway.