Android Sensor. This tutorial describes how to use the Android Sensor manager. The tutorial is based on Eclipse 3.6, Java 1.6 and Android 2.3.3 (Gingerbread).

1. Android Sensors

1.1. SensorManager

Android Sensors supports several sensors via the SensorManager, for example the accelerometer. Unfortunately, you cannot test the accelerometer on the Android emulator.

You can access a SensorManager via getSystemService(SENSOR_SERVICE). The Sensor class defines several constants for accessing the different sensors.

  • Sensor.TYPE_GYROSCOPE

  • Sensor.TYPE_MAGNETIC_FIELD

  • Sensor.TYPE_ORIENTATION

  • Sensor.TYPE_ACCELEROMETER

You can access the sensor via the sensorManager.getDefaultSensor() method, which takes the sensor type and the delay defined as constants on SensorManager as parameters.

1.2. Sensor listener

Once you acquired a sensor, you can register a SensorEventListener object on it. This listener will get informed, if the sensor data changes.

To avoid the unnecessary usage of battery power, you can register your listener in the onResume() method and de-register it in the onPause() method.

2. Tutorial: Accelerometer

We will build an application which will change its background color if it is shuffled. Create a new Android project called de.vogella.android.sensor with an activity called SensorTestActivity.

Change your layout file to the following code.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:orientation="vertical" >

    <TextView
        android:id="@+id/textView"
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
        android:layout_height="match_parent"
        android:text="Shake to get a toast and to switch color" />

</LinearLayout>

Change your activity class to the following code.

package de.vogella.android.sensor;

import android.app.Activity;
import android.graphics.Color;
import android.hardware.Sensor;
import android.hardware.SensorEvent;
import android.hardware.SensorEventListener;
import android.hardware.SensorManager;
import android.os.Bundle;
import android.view.View;
import android.view.Window;
import android.view.WindowManager;
import android.widget.Toast;

public class SensorTestActivity extends Activity implements SensorEventListener {
    private SensorManager sensorManager;
    private boolean color = false;
    private View view;
    private long lastUpdate;

    /** Called when the activity is first created. */
    @Override
    public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        requestWindowFeature(Window.FEATURE_NO_TITLE);
        getWindow().setFlags(WindowManager.LayoutParams.FLAG_FULLSCREEN,
                WindowManager.LayoutParams.FLAG_FULLSCREEN);

        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
        setContentView(R.layout.main);
        view = findViewById(R.id.textView);
        view.setBackgroundColor(Color.GREEN);

        sensorManager = (SensorManager) getSystemService(SENSOR_SERVICE);
        lastUpdate = System.currentTimeMillis();
    }

    @Override
    public void onSensorChanged(SensorEvent event) {
        if (event.sensor.getType() == Sensor.TYPE_ACCELEROMETER) {
            getAccelerometer(event);
        }

    }

    private void getAccelerometer(SensorEvent event) {
        float[] values = event.values;
        // Movement
        float x = values[0];
        float y = values[1];
        float z = values[2];

        float accelationSquareRoot = (x * x + y * y + z * z)
                / (SensorManager.GRAVITY_EARTH * SensorManager.GRAVITY_EARTH);
        long actualTime = event.timestamp;
        if (accelationSquareRoot >= 2) //
        {
            if (actualTime - lastUpdate < 200) {
                return;
            }
            lastUpdate = actualTime;
            Toast.makeText(this, "Device was shuffed", Toast.LENGTH_SHORT)
                    .show();
            if (color) {
                view.setBackgroundColor(Color.GREEN);
            } else {
                view.setBackgroundColor(Color.RED);
            }
            color = !color;
        }
    }

    @Override
    public void onAccuracyChanged(Sensor sensor, int accuracy) {

    }

    @Override
    protected void onResume() {
        super.onResume();
        // register this class as a listener for the orientation and
        // accelerometer sensors
        sensorManager.registerListener(this,
                sensorManager.getDefaultSensor(Sensor.TYPE_ACCELEROMETER),
                SensorManager.SENSOR_DELAY_NORMAL);
    }

    @Override
    protected void onPause() {
        // unregister listener
        super.onPause();
        sensorManager.unregisterListener(this);
    }
}

3. Tutorial: Building a compass

Create a new Android project called de.vogella.android.sensor.compass with an activity called MainActivity.

Create the following custom View class.

package de.vogella.android.sensor.compass;

import android.content.Context;
import android.graphics.Canvas;
import android.graphics.Color;
import android.graphics.Paint;
import android.view.View;

public class MyCompassView extends View {

    private Paint paint;
    private float position = 0;

    public MyCompassView(Context context) {
        super(context);
        init();
    }

    private void init() {
        paint = new Paint();
        paint.setAntiAlias(true);
        paint.setStrokeWidth(2);
        paint.setTextSize(25);
        paint.setStyle(Paint.Style.STROKE);
        paint.setColor(Color.WHITE);
    }

    @Override
    protected void onDraw(Canvas canvas) {
        int xPoint = getMeasuredWidth() / 2;
        int yPoint = getMeasuredHeight() / 2;

        float radius = (float) (Math.max(xPoint, yPoint) * 0.6);
        canvas.drawCircle(xPoint, yPoint, radius, paint);
        canvas.drawRect(0, 0, getMeasuredWidth(), getMeasuredHeight(), paint);

        // 3.143 is a good approximation for the circle
        canvas.drawLine(
                xPoint,
                yPoint,
                (float) (xPoint + radius
                        * Math.sin((double) (-position) / 180 * 3.143)),
                (float) (yPoint - radius
                        * Math.cos((double) (-position) / 180 * 3.143)), paint);

        canvas.drawText(String.valueOf(position), xPoint, yPoint, paint);
    }

    public void updateData(float position) {
        this.position = position;
        invalidate();
    }

}

Change the coding of your activity.

package de.vogella.android.sensor.compass;

import android.app.Activity;
import android.content.Context;
import android.hardware.Sensor;
import android.hardware.SensorEvent;
import android.hardware.SensorEventListener;
import android.hardware.SensorManager;
import android.os.Bundle;
import android.util.Log;
import android.widget.Toast;

public class MainActivity extends Activity {

    private static SensorManager sensorService;
    private MyCompassView compassView;
    private Sensor sensor;

    /** Called when the activity is first created. */
    @Override
    public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
        compassView = new MyCompassView(this);
        setContentView(compassView);

        sensorService = (SensorManager) getSystemService(Context.SENSOR_SERVICE);
        sensor = sensorService.getDefaultSensor(Sensor.TYPE_ORIENTATION);
        if (sensor != null) {
            sensorService.registerListener(mySensorEventListener, sensor,
                    SensorManager.SENSOR_DELAY_NORMAL);
            Log.i("Compass MainActivity", "Registerered for ORIENTATION Sensor");
        } else {
            Log.e("Compass MainActivity", "Registerered for ORIENTATION Sensor");
            Toast.makeText(this, "ORIENTATION Sensor not found",
                    Toast.LENGTH_LONG).show();
            finish();
        }
    }

    private SensorEventListener mySensorEventListener = new SensorEventListener() {

        @Override
        public void onAccuracyChanged(Sensor sensor, int accuracy) {
        }

        @Override
        public void onSensorChanged(SensorEvent event) {
            // angle between the magnetic north direction
            // 0=North, 90=East, 180=South, 270=West
            float azimuth = event.values[0];
            compassView.updateData(azimuth);
        }
    };

    @Override
    protected void onDestroy() {
        super.onDestroy();
        if (sensor != null) {
            sensorService.unregisterListener(mySensorEventListener);
        }
    }

}