Question

I have two methods which read the same data from database, the first returns Cursor and the second returns List of objects.Now I show my items in activity using SimpleCursorAdapter and the first method, byt I can also use the second method and appropriate adapter.
Which of these two ways is beter to use and in the second way which adapter I should use?

P.S sorry for poor english

Answer 1

Definitely go with SimpleCursorAdapter. If possible, always use Cursor if your data comes from database, you save memory by not creating List of objects. Creating objects in Java is expensive with regards to time and memory consumption and you have to bear in mind you are on mobile platform with limited resources. If you are using List of objects for your ListView than use custom adapter extending from ArrayAdapter.

It’s not always straightforward to use Cursor although your data comes from database. Let’s say you store places in the database defined by its name and location and you want to display them in a ListView sorted by distance from current location. It makes it difficult to execute a query which returns sorted results unless you don’t store relative distance in additional column. But you can get Cursor convert it to List of objects and sort this collection before sending it to your ListView.