How to partially update views in an app widget without rebuilding all the RemoteViews

Question

I'm implementing an app widget and I'd like to be able to change the property of a single view in the widget layout, without rebuilding all the RemoteViews from scratch, which involves loading XML etc and which is not necessary in some circumstances.. Is there a way to say "update property X on view identified by a specific ID in the current widget layout"? I've seen that there is a partiallyUpdateAppWidget method in the AppWidgetManager class but I can't understand nor if it is meant for this purpose neither how it must be used.. Can you help me or point me to a useful link or example?

Answer 1

Yes, you can use partiallyUpdateAppWidget method in the AppWidgetManager class. As an example, if you want to update a text view inside a widget:

AppWidgetManager appWidgetManager = AppWidgetManager.getInstance(context);
rv = new RemoteViews(context.getPackageName(), R.layout.widgetlayout); 
rv.setTextViewText(R.id.ofTextViewInWidgetLayoutXML, "Hello World");
appWidgetManager.partiallyUpdateAppWidget(appWidgetIds, rv);

Ref: Just update a widget RemoteViews instead of completly creating a new one?