Container like div, span etc

Question

Is it possible to create a container like a div? The problem is that I have 4 controls (TextView, Buttons and EditView), and I want to center these. But instead of doing them one by one, I was wondering if there is a smart way of doing this. In web application, using css, we can do this on a div:

margin-left: auto;
margin-right: auto;
height: xxx;
width: yyy;

Then the div will be centered on the page

Is there a similar way in when creating android apps?

Answer 1

In XML, the equivalent of a Div, is a ViewGroup.

Example: LinearLayout, RelativeLayout etc.

ViewGroups can contain Views and Controls like: TextView, Button and EditView.

More ViewGroup Subclasses

I created an example of what I think you're asking:

I used a LinearLayout to hold our Views and Controls.

Then I used android:gravity="center_horizontal", on our LinearLayout, to center the children.

<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:orientation="vertical"
    android:gravity="center_horizontal"
    tools:context=".MainActivity" >
    <TextView
        android:layout_width="200dp"
        android:gravity="center_horizontal"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="@string/hello_world" />
    <Button
        android:layout_width="200dp"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="@string/hello_world" />
    <EditView
        android:layout_width="200dp"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="@string/hello_world" />
</LinearLayout>

Here's what it looks like:

Answer 2

android:layout_gravity="center|center_vertical|center_horizontal|right|left"