Question

I am working on an Android Honeycomb with an ActionBar. I have set up the ActionBar the following way:

// Configures the action bar
private void configureActionBar() {
    mActionBar = getActionBar();
    mActionBar.setNavigationMode(ActionBar.NAVIGATION_MODE_LIST);

    SpinnerAdapter spinnerAdapter = ArrayAdapter.createFromResource(this, R.array.rooms, android.R.layout.simple_spinner_dropdown_item);

    ActionBar.OnNavigationListener navigationCallback = new ActionBar.OnNavigationListener() {
        public boolean onNavigationItemSelected(int itemPosition, long itemId) {
            String[] rooms = getResources().getStringArray(R.array.rooms);

            mAppState.setCurrentRoom(rooms[itemPosition]);

            return false;
        }
    };

    mActionBar.setListNavigationCallbacks(spinnerAdapter, navigationCallback);
}

The image below displays a screenshot of a portion of the ActionBar. I would like to style the dropdown list, but am not sure how to do it. This link has some XML samples, but I do not know how to apply them and how to style the specific elements that are pointed out below.

Here’s a list of changes that I would like to make:

1. Change the font size of the selected item to match that of the words “Room Manager”
2. Remove the gray line underlying the displayed selected item
3. Remove the blue line at the top of the dropdown list
4. Add radio buttons to the list items and check the currently selected item in the dropdown list
5. Change the color of the lines separating the list items

Does anyone have any ideas on how to do this?

Thank you!

Answer 1

I found out how to style the items in the list, as well as the displayed item. The solution involved creating two layout xml files in the /res/layout directory – one for the spinner dropdown items, and one for the selector (the displayed item). I was then able to add the view resources to the ArrayAdapter.

R.layout.spinner_dropdown_text_view:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<TextView xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:id="@+id/spinnerDropdownTextView"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="50dp"
    android:paddingLeft="10dp"
    android:gravity="center_vertical"
    android:textSize="18dp" />

R.layout.spinner_selector_text_view:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<TextView xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:id="@+id/spinnerSelectorTextView"
    android:layout_width="210dp"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:paddingTop="12dp"
    android:textSize="18dp"
    android:textColor="@android:color/black" />

The ArrayAdapter code:

ArrayAdapter<CharSequence> aa = ArrayAdapter.createFromResource(this, R.array.rooms, R.layout.spinner_selector_text_view);
aa.setDropDownViewResource(R.layout.spinner_dropdown_text_view);

The result:

Unfortunately, I was not able to figure out how to add the radio buttons, or how to remove any of the horizontal lines.