Choosing Sherlock Actionbar over Support Libraries

Question

Why should we choose using the Sherlock Action Bar in Android rather than the Support Libraries ? Is there a solid reason for using one above the other ?

Answer 1

Sherlock Action Bar purpose is to add the ActionBar visual concept implementation for API level below 11 (since ActionBar was added in API level 11). Taken from ActionBar javadoc: "A window feature at the top of the activity that may display the activity title, navigation modes, and other interactive items."

Support library (as the name describes) is a jar that provides APIs added in newer versions of Android to older ones. The best example I can think of is the Fragment implementation: Added in API level 11 made it so easy to integrate different parts of UI accross the application. But that was only for API level 11 above. So when the support library was released it provided this feature for API levels below 11.

So these 2 are separate concepts (one is for UI only, while the other is for supporting newer APIs in older Android versions). To add more, Sherlock AB uses support library.