Question

I want to capture the finger movement direction on Android touch phone. If a user slides his finger in up/down/left/right direction, I want to capture this direction. How can I find this? Thanks.

Answer 1

Implement onTouchEvent(), and calculate dx and dy by where the user presses down and lifts up. You can use these values to figure out the direction of the move.

float x1, x2, y1, y2, dx, dy;
String direction;
switch(event.getAction()) {
    case(MotionEvent.ACTION_DOWN):
        x1 = event.getX();
        y1 = event.getY();
        break;

    case(MotionEvent.ACTION_UP): {
        x2 = event.getX();
        y2 = event.getY();
        dx = x2-x1;
        dy = y2-y1;

        // Use dx and dy to determine the direction of the move
        if(Math.abs(dx) > Math.abs(dy)) {
            if(dx>0)
              direction = "right";
            else
              direction = "left";
        } else {
            if(dy>0)
              direction = "down";
            else
              direction = "up";
        }
    }
}