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Including One Layout in Another

0:57 with Michael Lustig

The 'include' tag is a powerful trick used in Android layouts to decrease duplicated code. Let's see how to use them in our music application. Toward the end of the video, I 'll issue you a challenge to create your first style on your own.

Documentation

Project Files

  • 0:00

    Before we move on, I wanted to point out a cool feature of Android

  • 0:03

    layouts that I'm using in this app.

  • 0:04

    If you look at the activitysongplayback.xml file,

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    you'll notice that I have an interesting looking tag called include.

  • 0:11

    Although it isn't something that directly relates to styles and

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    themes, I wanted to share this cool trick as it's used a couple of times in the app.

  • 0:17

    And it's a great way to isolate layouts that are semantically similar.

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    To utilize the include tag, you simply have to declare your layout file in

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    one file, and you use the include tag in another layout that you want to use it in.

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    Then, specify the layout attribute with the name of the file your layout you'd

  • 0:32

    like to include was created in.

  • 0:38

    Now that you've got another cool Android trick under your belt,

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    I'm going to challenge you to extract another couple of styles for this app.

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    Try and see if you can create a style for

  • 0:46

    the song's playback time and the song's duration.

  • 0:49

    Then, if you want to go above and beyond,

  • 0:51

    try styling the album artwork with the rounded corners in the playback activity.

  • 0:55

    Come back when you're ready for my solution.

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