Boolean vs boolean(s) as trilean switches

Question

I'm developing an Android application and I just ran into something. I have some anonymous classes (event listeners). They are parameterized from the database. What I did is this:

buttonA.setOnTouchListener(new View.OnTouchListener() {
                        private Boolean isActive = null;
                        private boolean isTrigger;
                        private int onLevel;
                        private int offLevel;
                        private int chIdx;

                        @Override
                        public boolean onTouch(View v, MotionEvent event) {
                            if (isActive == null) {
                                Cursor btnSettings = dbHelper.getButtonsTable().fetchButton(1, profileId, currentMode);
                                ...
...
                            }
                            return true;
                        }

Is it considered a good practice to use the Boolean object as a trilean switch (it has a null value if the listener haven't been parameterized yet) or I should use two boolean variables...or maybe an integer?

Do you have and ideas?

Answer 1

Best yet, use an type (probably an enum) with accurate descriptions of the three states. Booleans don't give a lot of information to the person who is calling the function (especially when used as a tristate).

public enum ActiveStatus {
  On,
  Off,
  Unknown
}

Answer 2

I would say either use Boolean with true, false and null or use an enum. I tend to use a Boolean being null as a kind of "don't know yet". If you are using null as something more meaningful than "don't know" you are probably semantically better off going with an enum.