receiving intents while application is running

Question

I have successfully made my application receive intents while not running, it starts and passes the URI data through to the rest of the app correctly. It is a native C++ app but all the code below relates to the Java/Android API side of it.

I am trying to receive and process intents that are received while the application is running, whether backgrounded or not. So far I haven't been able to do this, the receiver just doesn't seem to trigger and I usually get this error when calling from the shell, which indicates that i have set something up incorrectly.

adb shell am start -W -a android.intent.action.VIEW -d "testappschema://Episode"
Starting: Intent { act=android.intent.action.VIEW dat=abg://Episode }
Error: Activity not started, unable to resolve Intent { act=android.intent.action.VIEW dat=testappschema://Episode flg=0x10000000 }

I have tried both the manifest and dynamic allocation of a BroadcastReciever as described here Vogella Tutorial

I have also been reading the official documentation but whilst informative it doesnt have much in the way of code samples.

I include my manifest snippet here, please note this is a template certain values (usually prefixed with a double underline) are autofilled at build time

<application android:label="@string/app_name" android:icon="@drawable/app_icon" android:hasCode="true" android:theme="@android:style/Theme.NoTitleBar.Fullscreen" android:debuggable="__DEBUGGABLE" android:name="__APPLICATIONNAME" android:largeHeap="true">
 <activity android:name="__ACTIVITYNAME" android:label="@string/app_name" android:configChanges="orientation|keyboardHidden|screenSize" android:screenOrientation="sensorLandscape" android:launchMode="singleTask">
  <intent-filter>
    <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />
    <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />
  </intent-filter>
  <intent-filter android:label="@string/app_name">
    <action android:name="android.intent.action.VIEW" />
    <category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT" />
    <category android:name="android.intent.category.BROWSABLE" />
    <data android:scheme="testappschema_launch" />
  </intent-filter>
</activity>
<receiver   
    android:name="com.testapp.IntentListener"
    android:enabled="true"
    android:exported="true">
    <intent-filter android:label="@string/app_name">
        <action android:name="android.intent.action.VIEW" />
        <category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT" />
        <category android:name="android.intent.category.BROWSABLE" />
        <data android:scheme="testappschema" />
    </intent-filter>
</receiver>

And this is my BroadcastReciever class

package com.testapp;

import android.content.BroadcastReceiver;
import android.content.Context;
import android.content.Intent;

import android.util.Log;

public class IntentListener extends BroadcastReceiver{

    private Intent m_tCurrentIntent = null;

    @Override
    public void onReceive(Context context, Intent tIntent) {
            Log.d("IntentListener", "IntentRecv: " + tIntent.getData().toString());
        m_tCurrentIntent = tIntent;
    }

    public Intent getCurrentIntent()
    {
        Log.d("IntentListener", "getCurrentIntent");
        Intent tTempIntent = m_tCurrentIntent;
        m_tCurrentIntent = null;
        return tTempIntent;
    }

}

Answer 1

I actually just needed to use the method onNewIntent within my activity, instead of having a broadcast receiver onNewIntent

Answer 2

If you will take a look on the ADB shell commands, you'll find, that am start is used for starting Activity only, you should know, that BroadcastReceiver != Activity. For broadcasting you should use am broadcast instead.