Question

In my activity I have for example

SQLiteDatabase db = openOrCreateDatabase(Preferences.DB_NAME, Context.MODE_PRIVATE, null);
db.execSQL("CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS data (id INTEGER PRIMARY KEY, value VARCHAR)");
Cursor dbResult = db.rawQuery("SELECT value FROM data", null);
// do sometning with cursors
dbResult.close();
db.close();

What’s the benefit of using SQLiteOpenHelper like

DatabaseHelper helper = new DatabaseHelper(this);
SQLiteDatabase db = helper.getWriteableDatabase();
SQLiteDatabase db_2 = helper.getReadableDatabase();
Cursor dbResult = db_2.rawQuery("SELECT value FROM data", null);
// do sometning with cursors
dbResult.close();
helper.close();

Class itself

public class DatabaseHelper extends SQLiteOpenHelper {
    public DatabaseHelper(Context context) {
        super(context, Preferences.DB_NAME, null, Preferences.DB_VERSION);
    }

    @Override
    public void onCreate(SQLiteDatabase db) {
        String query = "CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS data (id INTEGER PRIMARY KEY, value VARCHAR)";
        db.execSQL(query);
        db.close();
    }

    @Override
    public void onUpgrade(SQLiteDatabase db, int oldVersion, int newVersion) {
    }
}

Answer 1

SQLiteDatabase

SQLiteDatabase has methods to create, delete, execute SQL commands,
and perform other common database management tasks.

SQLiteOpenHelper

A helper class to manage database creation and version management.

I will say this much, the onUpgrade that comes with SQLiteOpenHelper comes in REALLY handy when upgrading your application. It’s mainly for creation and upgrading / version management. SQLiteDatabase is mainly for CRUD operations (you can create with it but that is what SQLiteOpenHelper is for).