Subscribing Or Binding To An Existing Intent Service

I have an app that has an initial activty that list some files within a list view. When an item is clicked within the list it takes you to a detail activity of that specific file.

Solution 1:

For a download you sure can use an IntentService. It runs on a different thread. Also, keep in mind that calling startService() several times for that IntentService it will create a queue and will handle one intent at a time.

To show the progress on an Activity I don't belive broadcasts are the right thing. Although it is highly likely they are process in order, the framework or Android itself won't guarantee an order upon delivery. This means that you can get the broadcast for 50% and then the broadcast for 40%. For this I recommend that you take a look on this example: http://developer.android.com/reference/android/app/Service.html#LocalServiceSample

It can look a little bit more complicated but you'll have a 2 way communication that you can rely on.

Solution 2:

I managed to find a solution. It turns out that I have to use a broadcast intent to publish the progress in my service; And use BroadcastReceiver in my activities to retrieve the results.

The link below shows an example of sending and retrieving results from services via broadcasts.

http://mobile.tutsplus.com/tutorials/android/android-fundamentals-intentservice-basics/