How to programmatically round corners and set random background colors

Question

Instead of setBackgroundColor, retrieve the background drawable and set its color:

v.setBackgroundResource(R.drawable.tags_rounded_corners);

GradientDrawable drawable = (GradientDrawable) v.getBackground();
if (i % 2 == 0) {
  drawable.setColor(Color.RED);
} else {
  drawable.setColor(Color.BLUE);
}

Also, you can define the padding within your tags_rounded_corners.xml:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<shape xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android">
  <corners android:radius="4dp" />
  <padding
    android:top="2dp"
    android:left="2dp"
    android:bottom="2dp"
    android:right="2dp" />
</shape> 

Total programmatic approach to set rounded corners and add random background color to a View. I have not tested the code, but you get the idea.

 GradientDrawable shape =  new GradientDrawable();
 shape.setCornerRadius( 8 );

 // add some color
 // You can add your random color generator here
 // and set color
 if (i % 2 == 0) {
  shape.setColor(Color.RED);
 } else {
  shape.setColor(Color.BLUE);
 }

 // now find your view and add background to it
 View view = (LinearLayout) findViewById( R.id.my_view );
 view.setBackground(shape);

Here we are using gradient drawable so that we can make use of GradientDrawable#setCornerRadius because ShapeDrawable DOES NOT provide any such method.

I think the fastest way to do this is:

GradientDrawable gradientDrawable = new GradientDrawable(
            GradientDrawable.Orientation.TOP_BOTTOM, //set a gradient direction 
            new int[] {0xFF757775,0xFF151515}); //set the color of gradient
gradientDrawable.setCornerRadius(10f); //set corner radius

//Apply background to your view
View view = (RelativeLayout) findViewById( R.id.my_view );
if(Build.VERSION.SDK_INT>=16)
     view.setBackground(gradientDrawable);
else view.setBackgroundDrawable(gradientDrawable);    

You can better achieve it by using the DrawableCompat like this:

Drawable backgroundDrawable = view.getBackground();             
DrawableCompat.setTint(backgroundDrawable, newColor);