How to detect when button pressed and released on android

Question

I would like to start a timer that begins when a button is first pressed and ends when it is released (basically I want to measure how long a button is held down). I'll be using the System.nanoTime() method at both of those times, then subtract the initial number from the final one to get a measurement for the time elapsed while the button was held down.

(If you have any suggestions for using something other than nanoTime() or some other way of measuring how long a button is held down, I'm open to those as well.)

Thanks! Andy

Answer 1

Use OnTouchListener instead of OnClickListener:

// this goes somewhere in your class:   long lastDown;   long lastDuration;    ...    // this goes wherever you setup your button listener:   button.setOnTouchListener(new OnTouchListener() {      @Override      public boolean onTouch(View v, MotionEvent event) {         if(event.getAction() == MotionEvent.ACTION_DOWN) {            lastDown = System.currentTimeMillis();         } else if (event.getAction() == MotionEvent.ACTION_UP) {            lastDuration = System.currentTimeMillis() - lastDown;         }          return true;      }   });