Question

I am implementing a syncadapter for an android app and would like to make the settings for the account available under the “Accounts & sync” menu. I have seen this done in the DropBox app(as shown below), but I have not been able to find documentation on how to do this. I have the accounted added, just want to add a link to the account settings in this menu.

Answer 1

In your Android Manifest, you should have a section like this to define your account authenticator:

<service android:name="AccountAuthenticatorService"
 android:exported="true" android:process=":auth">
 <intent-filter>
  <action android:name="android.accounts.AccountAuthenticator" />
 </intent-filter>
 <meta-data android:name="android.accounts.AccountAuthenticator"
  android:resource="@xml/authenticator" />
</service>

The meta-data tag above should point to an XML file that defines your account, like this:

<account-authenticator xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:accountType="fm.last.android.account"
    android:icon="@drawable/icon"
    android:smallIcon="@drawable/icon"
    android:label="@string/app_name"
    android:accountPreferences="@xml/account_preferences"/>

The android:accountPreferences attribute above points to an XML file that defines your preferences screen, like so:

<PreferenceScreen
  xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android">
    <PreferenceCategory
            android:title="General Settings" />

    <PreferenceScreen
        android:key="account_settings"
        android:title="Account Settings"
        android:summary="Sync frequency, notifications, etc.">
        <intent
            android:action="fm.last.android.activity.Preferences.ACCOUNT_SETUP"
            android:targetPackage="fm.last.android"
            android:targetClass="fm.last.android.activity.Preferences" />
    </PreferenceScreen>
</PreferenceScreen>

The above PreferenceScreen will launch an intent to display a settings screen, but you can also define the settings directly in the XML file.