androidandroid-7.0-nougatandroid-appshortcut

How to launch existing instance of an activity from static shortcut


I have an Activity(MainActivity) in my application and have one static shortcut(pointed to TempActivity).

As the static shortcuts will always have FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK and FLAG_ACTIVITY_CLEAR_TASK set, I've created TempActivity which is an invisible Activity i.e It'll start MainActivity and then calls finish(). And also as suggested in developer docs SecondActivity has android:taskAffinity="" in the app's AndroidManifest.xml file.

MainActivity has android:launchMode="singleTop"

Even after doing this still MainActivity is getting launched in new task instead of existing task(created when launched from home screen).

AndroidManifest.xml

<activity
            android:name=".MainActivity"
            android:launchMode="singleTop">
            <intent-filter>
                <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />

                <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />
            </intent-filter>

            <meta-data
                android:name="android.app.shortcuts"
                android:resource="@xml/shortcuts" />
        </activity>
        <activity android:name=".TempActivity" android:taskAffinity=""></activity>

Shortcut

<shortcut
        android:enabled="true"
        android:icon="@drawable/icon"
        android:shortcutDisabledMessage="@string/app_name"
        android:shortcutId="static"
        android:shortcutLongLabel="@string/app_name"
        android:shortcutShortLabel="@string/app_name">
    <intent
        android:action="custom"
        android:targetClass="com.example.mobile.appshortcut.TempActivity"
        android:targetPackage="com.example.mobile.appshortcut" />
    </shortcut>

TempActivity.java

public class TempActivity extends AppCompatActivity {

protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
    super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
    //setContentView(R.layout.activity_main2);
    //Intent intent = getIntent(); // From Shortcut
    Intent intent = new Intent(); // For Testing
    intent.setClass(this,MainActivity.class);
    startActivity(intent);
    finish();
}

@Override
protected void onNewIntent(Intent intent) {
    super.onNewIntent(intent);
}

}

Link to developer docs https://developer.android.com/reference/android/content/pm/ShortcutManager.html


Solution

  • android:taskAffinity="" should be on MainActivity, not TempActivity.

    So your AndroidManifest should be something like that:

        <activity
            android:launchMode="singleTask"
            android:taskAffinity=""
            android:name=".MainActivity">
            <intent-filter>
                <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN"/>
    
                <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER"/>
            </intent-filter>
    
            <meta-data
                android:name="android.app.shortcuts"
                android:resource="@xml/shortcut"/>
        </activity>
        <activity
            android:name=".TempActivity"/>
    

    And TempActivity

    public class TempActivity extends AppCompatActivity {
    
        protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
            super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
            startActivity(new Intent(this, MainActivity.class));
            finish();
        }
    
    }
    

    And just to make sure, publishing my shortcut.xml

    <shortcuts xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android">
        <shortcut
            android:enabled="true"
            android:shortcutDisabledMessage="@string/app_name"
            android:shortcutId="compose"
            android:shortcutLongLabel="@string/app_name"
            android:shortcutShortLabel="@string/app_name">
            <intent
                android:action="android.intent.action.VIEW"
                android:targetClass="kidinov.org.test.TempActivity"
                android:targetPackage="kidinov.org.test"/>
            <categories android:name="android.shortcut.conversation"/>
        </shortcut>
    </shortcuts>
    

    I've created sample project - it works fine. Feel free to check it out.