How to display data from Firestore in a RecyclerView with Android?

Question

What is the best way to display data from an existing Firestore database in a RecyclerView using Android?

This isn't covered as a full explanation in an answer, so I've added this Q&A-style so it can be linked to in comments.

Answer 1

Assuming you have a Firestore database structure that looks like this:

Firestore-root
    |
    --- products (collection)
           |
           --- documentIdOne (document)
           |        |
           |        --- productName: "Milk"
           |
           --- documentIdTwo (document)
           |        |
           |        --- productName: "Soy Milk"
           |
           --- documentIdThree (document)
                    |
                    --- productName: "Bacon"

A model class that looks also like this:

public class ProductModel {
    private String productName;

    public ProductModel() {}

    public ProductModel(String productName) {this.productName = productName;}

    public String getProductName() {return productName;}
}

And a .XML file that contains a RecyclerView which also looks like this:

<android.support.v7.widget.RecyclerView
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:id="@+id/recycler_view"/>

To display all the product names, please follow the next steps.

First, you need to find the RecyclerView in your activity and set the LinearLayoutManager like this:

RecyclerView recyclerView = findViewById(R.id.recycler_view);
recyclerView.setLayoutManager(new LinearLayoutManager(this));

Then you need to create the root reference of your Firestore database and a Query object like this:

FirebaseFirestore rootRef = FirebaseFirestore.getInstance();
Query query = rootRef.collection("products")
        .orderBy("productName", Query.Direction.ASCENDING);

Then you'll have to create a FirestoreRecyclerOptions object like this:

FirestoreRecyclerOptions<ProductModel> options = new FirestoreRecyclerOptions.Builder<ProductModel>()
        .setQuery(query, ProductModel.class)
        .build();

In your activity class, create a holder class that looks like this:

private class ProductViewHolder extends RecyclerView.ViewHolder {
    private View view;

    ProductViewHolder(View itemView) {
        super(itemView);
        view = itemView;
    }

    void setProductName(String productName) {
        TextView textView = view.findViewById(R.id.text_view);
        textView.setText(productName);
    }
}

Then create an adapter which is declared as global:

private FirestoreRecyclerAdapter<ProductModel, ProductViewHolder> adapter;

And instantiate it in your activity like this:

adapter = new FirestoreRecyclerAdapter<ProductModel, ProductViewHolder>(options) {
    @Override
    protected void onBindViewHolder(@NonNull holder productViewHolder, int position, @NonNull ProductModel productModel) {
        holder.setProductName(productModel.getProductName());
    }

    @NonNull
    @Override
    public ProductViewHolder onCreateViewHolder(@NonNull ViewGroup parent, int viewType) {
        View view = LayoutInflater.from(parent.getContext()).inflate(R.layout.item_product, parent, false);
        return new ProductViewHolder(view);
    }
};
recyclerView.setAdapter(adapter);

In the end, don't forget to override the following two methods and start listening for changes:

@Override
protected void onStart() {
    super.onStart();
    adapter.startListening();
}

@Override
protected void onStop() {
    super.onStop();

    if (adapter != null) {
        adapter.stopListening();
    }
}

The result is this:

Edit:

If you want to display a toast message when the user clicks on an item, please add the following lines of code inside the setProductName() method from the ProductViewHolder class:

textView.setOnClickListener(new View.OnClickListener() {
    @Override
    public void onClick(View view) {
        Toast.makeText(getApplicationContext(), productName, Toast.LENGTH_SHORT).show();
    }
});