An Android Picture-in-Picture Tutorial

Following on from the previous chapters, this chapter will take the existing VideoPlayer project and enhance it to add Picture-in-Picture support, including detecting PiP mode changes and the addition of a PiP action designed to display information about the currently running video.

The first step in adding PiP support to an Android app project is to enable it within the project Manifest file. Open the manifests -> AndroidManifest.xml file and modify the activity element to enable PiP support:

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<activity android:name=".VideoPlayerActivity"
 android:supportsPictureInPicture="true"
 android:configChanges="screenSize|smallestScreenSize|screenLayout|orientation">
    <intent-filter>
        <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />
        <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />
    </intent-filter>
</activity>
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As currently designed, the layout for the VideoPlayer activity consists solely of a VideoView instance. A button will now be added to the layout for the purpose of switching into PiP mode. Load the activity_video_player.xml file into the layout editor and drag a Button object from the palette onto the layout so that it is positioned as shown in Figure 73-1:

Change the text on the button so that it reads “Enter PiP Mode” and extract the string to a resource named enter_pip_mode. Before moving on to the next step, change the ID of the button to pipButton and configure the button to call a method named enterPipMode.

The enterPipMode onClick callback method now needs to be added to the VideoPlayerActivity.java class file. Locate this file, open it in the code editor and add this method as follows:

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import android.view.View;
import android.app.PictureInPictureParams;
import android.util.Rational;
import android.widget.Button;
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public void enterPipMode(View view) {
 
    Button pipButton = (Button) findViewById(R.id.pipButton);
 
    Rational rational = new Rational(videoView.getWidth(),
            videoView.getHeight());
 
    PictureInPictureParams params =
            new PictureInPictureParams.Builder()
                    .setAspectRatio(rational)
                    .build();
 
    pipButton.setVisibility(View.INVISIBLE);
    videoView.setMediaController(null);
    enterPictureInPictureMode(params);
}

The method begins by obtaining a reference to the Button view, then creates a Rational object containing the width and height of the VideoView. A set of Picture-in-Picture parameters is then created using the PictureInPictureParams Builder, passing through the Rational object as the aspect ratio for the video playback. Since the button does not need to be visible while the video is in PiP mode it is made invisible. The video playback controls are also hidden from view so that the video view will be unobstructed while in PiP mode.

Compile and run the app on a device or emulator running Android version 8 or newer and wait for video playback to begin before clicking on the PiP mode button. The video playback should minimize and appear in the PiP window as shown in Figure 73-2:

Although the video is now playing in the PiP window, much of the view is obscured by the standard Android action bar. To remove this requires a change to the application theme style of the activity. Within Android Studio, locate and edit the app -> res -> styles.xml file and modify the AppTheme element to use the NoActionBar theme:

<resources>
    <!-- Base application theme. -->
    <style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light.NoActionBar">
        <!-- Customize your theme here. -->
        <item name="colorPrimary">@color/colorPrimary</item>
        <item name="colorPrimaryDark">@color/colorPrimaryDark</item>
        <item name="colorAccent">@color/colorAccent</item>
    </style>
</resources>

Compile and run the app, place the video playback into PiP mode and note that the action bar no longer appears in the window:

Click in the PiP window so that it increases in size, then click within the full screen mode markers that appear in the center of the window. Although the activity returns to full screen mode, note the button and media playback controls remain hidden.

Clearly some code needs to be added to the project to detect when PiP mode changes take place within the activity.

As discussed in the previous chapter, PiP mode changes are detected by overriding the onPictureInPictureModeChanged() method within the affected activity. In this case, the method needs to be written such that it can detect whether the activity is entering or exiting PiP mode and to take appropriate action to re-activate the PiP button and the playback controls. Remaining within the VideoPlayerActivity.java file, add this method now:

@Override
public void onPictureInPictureModeChanged(boolean isInPictureInPictureMode) {
    super.onPictureInPictureModeChanged(isInPictureInPictureMode);
 
    Button pipButton = (Button) findViewById(R.id.pipButton);
 
    if (isInPictureInPictureMode) {
 
    } else {
        pipButton.setVisibility(View.VISIBLE);
        videoView.setMediaController(mediaController);
    }
}

When the method is called, it is passed a Boolean value indicating whether the activity is now in PiP mode. The code in the above method simply checks this value to decide whether to show the PiP button and to re-activate the playback controls.

The final step in the project is to add an action to the PiP window. The purpose of this action is to display a Toast message containing the name of the currently playing video. This will require some communication between the PiP window and the activity. One of the simplest ways to achieve this is to implement a broadcast receiver within the activity, and the use of a pending intent to broadcast a message from the PiP window to the activity. These steps will need to be performed each time the activity enters PiP mode so code will need to be added to the onPictureInPictureModeChanged() method. Locate this method now and begin by adding some code to create an intent filter and initialize the broadcast receiver:

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import android.content.BroadcastReceiver;
import android.content.Context;
import android.content.Intent;
import android.content.IntentFilter;
import android.widget.Toast;
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public class VideoPlayerActivity extends AppCompatActivity {
 
    private BroadcastReceiver receiver;
    private VideoView videoView;
    private MediaController mediaController;
    String TAG = "VideoPlayer";
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@Override
    public void onPictureInPictureModeChanged(
                     boolean isInPictureInPictureMode) {
        super.onPictureInPictureModeChanged(isInPictureInPictureMode);
 
        Button pipButton = (Button) findViewById(R.id.pipButton);
 
        if (isInPictureInPictureMode) {
            IntentFilter filter = new IntentFilter();
            filter.addAction(
              "com.ebookfrenzy.videoplayer.VIDEO_INFO");
 
            receiver = new BroadcastReceiver() {
                @Override
                public void onReceive(Context context, 
                                          Intent intent) {
                    Toast.makeText(context, 
                     "Favorite Home Movie Clips", 
                            Toast.LENGTH_LONG).show();
                }
            };
 
            registerReceiver(receiver, filter);
 
        } else {
            pipButton.setVisibility(View.VISIBLE);
            videoView.setMediaController(mediaController);
 
            if (receiver != null) {
                unregisterReceiver(receiver);
            }
        }
    }
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}

With the broadcast receiver implemented, the next step is to create a RemoteAction object configured with an image to represent the action within the PiP window. For the purposes of this example, an image icon file named ic_info_24dp.xml will be used. This file can be found in the project_icons folder of the source code download archive available from the following URL:

https://www.ebookfrenzy.com/web/androidstudio32/index.php

Locate this icon file and copy and paste it into the app -> res -> drawables folder within the Project tool window:

The next step is to create an Intent that will be sent to the broadcast receiver. This intent then needs to be wrapped up within a PendingIntent object, allowing the intent to be triggered later when the user taps the action button in the PiP window.

Edit the VideoPlayerActivity.java file to add a method to create the Intent and PendingIntent objects as follows:

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import android.app.PendingIntent;
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public class VideoPlayerActivity extends AppCompatActivity {
 
       private static final int REQUEST_CODE = 101;
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       private void createPipAction() {
          Intent actionIntent = 
              new Intent("com.ebookfrenzy.videoplayer.VIDEO_INFO");
 
          final PendingIntent pendingIntent = 
              PendingIntent.getBroadcast(VideoPlayerActivity.this,
                REQUEST_CODE, actionIntent, 0);
    }
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}

Now that both the Intent object, and the PendingIntent instance in which it is contained have been created, a RemoteAction object needs to be created containing the icon to appear in the PiP window, and the PendingIntent object. Remaining within the createPipAction() method, add this code as follows:

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import android.app.RemoteAction;
import android.graphics.drawable.Icon;
 
import java.util.ArrayList;
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private void createPipAction() {
 
    final ArrayList<RemoteAction> actions = new ArrayList<>();
 
    Intent actionIntent = 
              new Intent("com.ebookfrenzy.videoplayer.VIDEO_INFO");
 
    final PendingIntent pendingIntent = PendingIntent.getBroadcast(
         VideoPlayerActivity.this,
            REQUEST_CODE, actionIntent, 0);
 
    final Icon icon = 
              Icon.createWithResource(VideoPlayerActivity.this, 
                     R.drawable.ic_info_24dp);
    RemoteAction remoteAction = new RemoteAction(icon, "Info", 
              "Video Info", pendingIntent);
 
    actions.add(remoteAction);
}

Now a PictureInPictureParams object containing the action needs to be created and the parameters applied so that the action appears within the PiP window:

private void createPipAction() {
 
    final ArrayList<RemoteAction> actions = new ArrayList<>();
 
    Intent actionIntent = 
              new Intent("com.ebookfrenzy.videoplayer.VIDEO_INFO");
 
    final PendingIntent pendingIntent = 
       PendingIntent.getBroadcast(VideoPlayerActivity.this,
            REQUEST_CODE, actionIntent, 0);
 
    final Icon icon = 
              Icon.createWithResource(VideoPlayerActivity.this, 
                     R.drawable.ic_info_24dp);
    RemoteAction remoteAction = new RemoteAction(icon, "Info", 
              "Video Info", pendingIntent);
 
    actions.add(remoteAction);
 
    PictureInPictureParams params =
                new PictureInPictureParams.Builder()
                        .setActions(actions)
                        .build();
 
    setPictureInPictureParams(params);
}

The final task before testing the action is to make a call to the createPipAction() method when the activity enters PiP mode:

@Override
public void onPictureInPictureModeChanged(boolean isInPictureInPictureMode) {
    super.onPictureInPictureModeChanged(isInPictureInPictureMode);
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        registerReceiver(receiver, filter);
        createPipAction(); 
    } else {
        pipButton.setVisibility(View.VISIBLE);
        videoView.setMediaController(mediaController);
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}

Build and run the app once again and place the activity into PiP mode. Tap on the PiP window so that the new action button appears as shown in Figure 73-5:

Click on the action button and wait for the Toast message to appear displaying the name of the video:

This chapter has demonstrated addition of Picture-in-Picture support to an Android Studio app project including enabling and entering PiP mode and the implementation of a PiP action. This included the use of a broadcast receiver and pending intents to implement communication between the PiP window and the activity.