Question

I have an application in which the user can edit/add records offline and they should be sent to the server as soon as the Internet connection is established. It seems to be the exact behavior of the GMail application:

You can write an email offline, click “Send”, close the application/process, and when the Internet connection is back, a sync is performed which sends the email to the server.

The problem is that I already have a SyncAccount with a SyncAdapter running a daily sync. If I were to add a second sync using ContentResolver.addPeriodicSync, I would have to create another authority and thus would have to use different database tables?

Can I schedule two sync operations independent from each other, accessing the same database?

Answer 1

Problem solved. Apparently, you can request a one-time sync immediately, rather than scheduling one. You can also supply a list of extras to this one-time sync.

My solution is thus to put a parameter in that bundle and just do my magic accordingly in the adapter’s onPerformSync method.

    final String ACCOUNT_NAME = "dummyAcc";
    final String ACCOUNT_TYPE = "dummyAccType";
    final String PROVIDER = "dummyProvider";

    Account appAccount = new Account(ACCOUNT_NAME, ACCOUNT_TYPE);
    AccountManager accountManager = AccountManager.get(this);
    Bundle extras = new Bundle();
    extras.putBoolean("magicParam", true);
    extras.putBoolean(ContentResolver.SYNC_EXTRAS_MANUAL, true);
    ContentResolver.requestSync(appAccount, PROVIDER, extras);

...

@Override
public void onPerformSync(Account account, Bundle extras, String authority,
        ContentProviderClient provider, SyncResult syncResult) {
    if (extras.getBoolean("magicParam")) {
       // do magic;
    }
}