Detecting physical Menu key press in Android

Question

I am trying to detect when the physical Menu button on my Android phone has been pressed. I though the code below would work but it does not. Where am I going wrong please?

The error returned is 'Illegal modifier for parameter onKeyDown; only final is permitted'

public boolean onKeyDown(int keyCode, KeyEvent event) {
    if (keyCode == KeyEvent.KEYCODE_MENU) {
        // Do Stuff
    } else {
        return super.onKeyDown(keyCode, event);
    }
}

Answer 1

I'd look for an up key event, rather than a down event, with onKeyUp.

public boolean onKeyUp(int keyCode, KeyEvent event) {
    if (keyCode == KeyEvent.KEYCODE_MENU) {
        // ........
        return true;
    }
    return super.onKeyUp(keyCode, event);
}

We return true because we're handling the event; return false if you want the system to handle the event too.

You can do all of this in your Activity instance too because Activity is a known indirect subclass of KeyEvent.

Answer 2

Based on all of the above this appears to be the correct implementation that will consume menu key "up" events only and pass on other key events to the superclass.

public boolean onKeyUp(int keyCode, KeyEvent event) {
    if (keyCode == KeyEvent.KEYCODE_MENU) {
        // ...
        return true;
    } else {
        return super.onKeyUp(keyCode, event);
    }
}