How can I tell if Android app is running in the fo

Question

I am doing a status bar notification in my android app that is triggered by c2dm. I don't want to display the notification if the app is running. How do you determine if the app is running and is in the foreground?

Answer 1

Here is a method that I use (and supporting method):

private boolean checkIfAppIsRunningInForeground() {
    ActivityManager activityManager = (ActivityManager)getSystemService(Context.ACTIVITY_SERVICE);
    for(ActivityManager.RunningAppProcessInfo appProcessInfo : activityManager.getRunningAppProcesses()) {
        if(appProcessInfo.processName.contains(this.getPackageName())) {
            return checkIfAppIsRunningInForegroundByAppImportance(appProcessInfo.importance);
        }
    }
    return false;
}

private boolean checkIfAppIsRunningInForegroundByAppImportance(int appImportance) {
    switch (appImportance) {
        //user is aware of app
        case ActivityManager.RunningAppProcessInfo.IMPORTANCE_FOREGROUND:
        case ActivityManager.RunningAppProcessInfo.IMPORTANCE_VISIBLE:
            return true;
        //user is not aware of app
        case ActivityManager.RunningAppProcessInfo.IMPORTANCE_BACKGROUND:
        case ActivityManager.RunningAppProcessInfo.IMPORTANCE_EMPTY:
        case ActivityManager.RunningAppProcessInfo.IMPORTANCE_PERCEPTIBLE:
        case ActivityManager.RunningAppProcessInfo.IMPORTANCE_SERVICE:
        default:
            return false;
    }
}

Answer 2

Since API 16 you can do it like this:

static boolean shouldShowNotification(Context context) {
    RunningAppProcessInfo myProcess = new RunningAppProcessInfo();
    ActivityManager.getMyMemoryState(myProcess);
    if (myProcess.importance != RunningAppProcessInfo.IMPORTANCE_FOREGROUND)
        return true;

    KeyguardManager km = (KeyguardManager) context.getSystemService(Context.KEYGUARD_SERVICE);
    // app is in foreground, but if screen is locked show notification anyway
    return km.inKeyguardRestrictedInputMode();
}

Answer 3

There is no global callback for this, but for each activity it is onStop(). You don't need to mess with an atomic int. Just have a global int with the number of started activities, in every activity increment it in onStart() and decrement it in onStop().

Follow this

Answer 4

Starting support library version 26 you can use ProcessLifecycleOwner to determine app current state, just add it to your dependencies like described here, for example:

dependencies {
    def lifecycle_version = "1.1.1"

    // ViewModel and LiveData
    implementation "android.arch.lifecycle:extensions:$lifecycle_version"
    // alternatively - Lifecycles only (no ViewModel or LiveData).
    //     Support library depends on this lightweight import
    implementation "android.arch.lifecycle:runtime:$lifecycle_version"
    annotationProcessor "android.arch.lifecycle:compiler:$lifecycle_version" // use kapt for Kotlin
}

, Now you can query ProcessLifecycleOwner whenever you want to check app state, for example to check if app is running in foreground you just have to do this:

 boolean isAppInForeground = ProcessLifecycleOwner.get().getLifecycle().getCurrentState().isAtLeast(Lifecycle.State.STARTED);
 if(!isAppInForeground)
    //Show Notification in status bar

Answer 5

Following up on Gadenkan's reply I needed something like this so I could tell if my app wasn't running in the foreground, but I needed something that was app wide and didn't require me setting/unsetting flags throughout my application.

Gadenkan's code pretty much hit the nail on the head but it wasn't in my own style and felt it could be tidier, so in my app its condensed down to this.

if (!context.getPackageName().equalsIgnoreCase(((ActivityManager)context.getSystemService(Context.ACTIVITY_SERVICE)).getRunningTasks(1).get(0).topActivity.getPackageName()))
{
// App is not in the foreground
}

(Side note: You can just remove the ! if you want the check to work the other way around)

Although with this approach you need the GET_TASKS permission.

Answer 6

As Vinay says, probably the best solution (to support newer android versions, 14+) is to use ActivityLifecycleCallbacks in the Application class implementation.

package com.telcel.contenedor.appdelegate;

import android.app.Activity;
import android.app.Application.ActivityLifecycleCallbacks;
import android.os.Bundle;

/** Determines global app lifecycle states. 
 * 
 * The following is the reference of activities states:
 * 
 * The <b>visible</b> lifetime of an activity happens between a call to onStart()
 * until a corresponding call to onStop(). During this time the user can see the
 * activity on-screen, though it may not be in the foreground and interacting with 
 * the user. The onStart() and onStop() methods can be called multiple times, as 
 * the activity becomes visible and hidden to the user.
 * 
 * The <b>foreground</b> lifetime of an activity happens between a call to onResume()
 * until a corresponding call to onPause(). During this time the activity is in front
 * of all other activities and interacting with the user. An activity can frequently
 * go between the resumed and paused states -- for example when the device goes to
 * sleep, when an activity result is delivered, when a new intent is delivered -- 
 * so the code in these methods should be fairly lightweight. 
 * 
 * */
public class ApplicationLifecycleManager implements ActivityLifecycleCallbacks {

    /** Manages the state of opened vs closed activities, should be 0 or 1. 
     * It will be 2 if this value is checked between activity B onStart() and
     * activity A onStop().
     * It could be greater if the top activities are not fullscreen or have
     * transparent backgrounds.
     */
    private static int visibleActivityCount = 0;

    /** Manages the state of opened vs closed activities, should be 0 or 1
     * because only one can be in foreground at a time. It will be 2 if this 
     * value is checked between activity B onResume() and activity A onPause().
     */
    private static int foregroundActivityCount = 0;

    /** Returns true if app has foreground */
    public static boolean isAppInForeground(){
        return foregroundActivityCount > 0;
    }

    /** Returns true if any activity of app is visible (or device is sleep when
     * an activity was visible) */
    public static boolean isAppVisible(){
        return visibleActivityCount > 0;
    }

    public void onActivityCreated(Activity activity, Bundle bundle) {
    }

    public void onActivityDestroyed(Activity activity) {
    }

    public void onActivityResumed(Activity activity) {
        foregroundActivityCount ++;
    }

    public void onActivityPaused(Activity activity) {
        foregroundActivityCount --;
    }


    public void onActivitySaveInstanceState(Activity activity, Bundle outState) {
    }

    public void onActivityStarted(Activity activity) {
        visibleActivityCount ++;
    }

    public void onActivityStopped(Activity activity) {
        visibleActivityCount --;
    }
}

And in Application onCreate() method:

registerActivityLifecycleCallbacks(new ApplicationLifecycleManager());

Then ApplicationLifecycleManager.isAppVisible() or ApplicationLifecycleManager.isAppInForeground() would be used to know the desired state.