Calling startActivity() from outside of an Activity?

Question

if your android version is below Android - 6 then you need to add this line otherwise it will work above Android - 6.

...
Intent i = new Intent(this, Wakeup.class);
i.addFlags(Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK);
...

For Multiple Instance of the same activity , use the following snippet,

Note : This snippet, I am using outside of my Activity. Make sure your AndroidManifest file doesn't contain android:launchMode="singleTop|singleInstance". if needed, you can change it to android:launchMode="standard".

Intent i = new Intent().setClass(mActivity.getApplication(), TestUserProfileScreenActivity.class);  
i.setFlags(Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK | Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_MULTIPLE_TASK);

// Launch the new activity and add the additional flags to the intent
mActivity.getApplication().startActivity(i);

This works fine for me. Hope, this saves times for someone. If anybody finds a better way, please share with us.

Android Doc says -

FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK requirement is now enforced

With Android 9, you cannot start an activity from a non-activity context unless you pass the intent flag FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK. If you attempt to start an activity without passing this flag, the activity does not start, and the system prints a message to the log.

Note: The flag requirement has always been the intended behavior, and was enforced on versions lower than Android 7.0 (API level 24). A bug in Android 7.0 prevented the flag requirement from being enforced.

That means for (Build.VERSION.SDK_INT <= Build.VERSION_CODES.M) || (Build.VERSION.SDK_INT >= Build.VERSION_CODES.P) it is mandatory to add Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK while calling startActivity() from outside of an Activity context.

So it is better to add flag for all the versions -

...
Intent i = new Intent(this, Wakeup.class);
i.addFlags(Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK);
...

You didn't paste the part where you call startActivity, that's the interesting part.

You might be calling startActivity in a Service context, or in an Application context.

Print "this" to log cat before making the startActivity call, and see what it refers to, it's sometimes a case of using an inner "this" accidentally.

Sometimes this error can occur without an explicit call to startActivity(...). For example, some of you may have seen a stack trace like this in Crashlytics:

Fatal Exception: android.util.AndroidRuntimeException: Calling startActivity() from outside of an Activity  context requires the FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK flag. Is this really what you want?
       at android.app.ContextImpl.startActivity(ContextImpl.java:1597)
       at android.app.ContextImpl.startActivity(ContextImpl.java:1584)
       at android.content.ContextWrapper.startActivity(ContextWrapper.java:337)
       at android.text.style.URLSpan.onClick(URLSpan.java:62)
       at android.text.method.LinkMovementMethod.onTouchEvent(LinkMovementMethod.java:217)
       at android.widget.TextView.onTouchEvent(TextView.java:9522)
       at android.view.View.dispatchTouchEvent(View.java:8968)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTransformedTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2709)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2425)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTransformedTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2709)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2425)
       at android.widget.AbsListView.dispatchTouchEvent(AbsListView.java:5303)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTransformedTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2709)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2425)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTransformedTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2709)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2425)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTransformedTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2709)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2425)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTransformedTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2709)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2425)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTransformedTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2709)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2425)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTransformedTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2709)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2425)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTransformedTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2709)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2425)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTransformedTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2709)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2425)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTransformedTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2709)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2425)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTransformedTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2709)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2425)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTransformedTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2709)
       at android.view.ViewGroup.dispatchTouchEvent(ViewGroup.java:2425)
       at com.android.internal.policy.impl.PhoneWindow$DecorView.superDispatchTouchEvent(PhoneWindow.java:2559)
       at com.android.internal.policy.impl.PhoneWindow.superDispatchTouchEvent(PhoneWindow.java:1767)
       at android.app.Activity.dispatchTouchEvent(Activity.java:2866)
       at android.support.v7.view.WindowCallbackWrapper.dispatchTouchEvent(WindowCallbackWrapper.java:67)
       at android.support.v7.view.WindowCallbackWrapper.dispatchTouchEvent(WindowCallbackWrapper.java:67)
       at com.android.internal.policy.impl.PhoneWindow$DecorView.dispatchTouchEvent(PhoneWindow.java:2520)
       at android.view.View.dispatchPointerEvent(View.java:9173)
       at android.view.ViewRootImpl$ViewPostImeInputStage.processPointerEvent(ViewRootImpl.java:4706)
       at android.view.ViewRootImpl$ViewPostImeInputStage.onProcess(ViewRootImpl.java:4544)
       at android.view.ViewRootImpl$InputStage.deliver(ViewRootImpl.java:4068)
       at android.view.ViewRootImpl$InputStage.onDeliverToNext(ViewRootImpl.java:4121)
       at android.view.ViewRootImpl$InputStage.forward(ViewRootImpl.java:4087)
       at android.view.ViewRootImpl$AsyncInputStage.forward(ViewRootImpl.java:4201)
       at android.view.ViewRootImpl$InputStage.apply(ViewRootImpl.java:4095)
       at android.view.ViewRootImpl$AsyncInputStage.apply(ViewRootImpl.java:4258)
       at android.view.ViewRootImpl$InputStage.deliver(ViewRootImpl.java:4068)
       at android.view.ViewRootImpl$InputStage.onDeliverToNext(ViewRootImpl.java:4121)
       at android.view.ViewRootImpl$InputStage.forward(ViewRootImpl.java:4087)
       at android.view.ViewRootImpl$InputStage.apply(ViewRootImpl.java:4095)
       at android.view.ViewRootImpl$InputStage.deliver(ViewRootImpl.java:4068)
       at android.view.ViewRootImpl.deliverInputEvent(ViewRootImpl.java:6564)
       at android.view.ViewRootImpl.doProcessInputEvents(ViewRootImpl.java:6454)
       at android.view.ViewRootImpl.enqueueInputEvent(ViewRootImpl.java:6425)
       at android.view.ViewRootImpl$WindowInputEventReceiver.onInputEvent(ViewRootImpl.java:6654)
       at android.view.InputEventReceiver.dispatchInputEvent(InputEventReceiver.java:185)
       at android.os.MessageQueue.nativePollOnce(MessageQueue.java)
       at android.os.MessageQueue.next(MessageQueue.java:143)
       at android.os.Looper.loop(Looper.java:130)
       at android.app.ActivityThread.main(ActivityThread.java:5942)
       at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java)
       at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:372)
       at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit$MethodAndArgsCaller.run(ZygoteInit.java:1400)
       at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit.main(ZygoteInit.java:1195)

And you may wonder what you did wrong, since the trace only includes framework code. Well, here's an example of how this can happen. Let's say we're in a fragment.

Activity activity = getActivity();
Context activityContext = activity;
Context appContext = activityContext.getApplicationContext();
LayoutInflater inflater = LayoutInflater.from(appContext); // whoops!
View view = inflater.inflate(R.layout.some_layout, parent, false);
TextView tvWithLinks = (TextView) view.findViewById(R.id.tv_with_links);

tvWithLinks.setMovementMethod(LinkMovementMethod.getInstance()); // whoops!!

Now, when a user clicks on that text view, your app will crash with the stack trace above. This is because the layout inflater has a reference to the application context, and so therefore your text view has an application context. Clicking on that text view implicitly calls appContext.startActivity(...).

Final note: I tested this on Android 4, 5, 6, and 7 devices. It only affects 4, 5, and 6. Android 7 devices apparently have no trouble calling appContext.startActivity(...).

I hope this helps someone else!

Try changing to this line:

PendingIntent pendingIntent = PendingIntent.getBroadcast(getContext(), 0, i, 0);

I just want to notice that startActivity from outside an activity is valid in some android versions (between N and O-MR1) and the interesting point is that it is a bug in android source code!

This is the comment above startActivity implementation. See here.

Calling start activity from outside an activity without FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK is generally not allowed, except if the caller specifies the task id the activity should be launched in. A bug was existed between N and O-MR1 which allowed this to work.