i want to scale my android application, basically i developed it for 800×480 display with a AbsoluteLayout. This is necessary for my Application, i can’t change it.
Now the Problem:
When i start my app in the Emulator the buttons disappear and the images are extremly large. I thought android would scale applications with a fixed size down by default, but it does not work. I already tried to manipulate the manifest but this did not work.
I use a ImageView component for graphics.
Targeting Android 2.1
Cheers
Felix
It is definitely not ideal to use AbsoluteLayout. But, if you want to just push through with it, you should switch the units of all your co-ordinates and sizes away from px (pixels) to dp (density independent pixels). You will have to scale all of your existing co-ordinates by a factor of 2/3 to start, since 1 dp = 1.5px at the density that your layout targets (hdpi).
You will need to explicitly specify the sizes of all your images and layouts. If, for example, you had a button that was 30px wide and 120px tall, then it will become 20dp wide and 80dp tall.
Of course, the images won’t look great on smaller (mdpi) screens, since they will be scaled to 2/3 size. Also, some devices are fixed to landscape mode, where you will definitely encounter layout problems. So it’s not pretty, but it may get you over the finish line, depending on your requirements.