Keep tiles visible while loading TileOverlay Map API v2 Android

Question

I would like my TileOverlay to behave like the real Google Maps. When you zoom in, the tile is still visible but pixelized until the new tile is downloaded.

The current behavior is: when you zoom in, tiles disappear and you see the ugly grid, and the user has to wait until the new tiles are loaded. This is kind of annoying.

Is there a solution to this problem?

Answer 1

I worked around this issue by "preloading" all zoomlevels before showing the map (just a copy/paste of the current state, need to clean up):

@UiThread
private void preloadAllZoomLevels(final float zoomLevel) {
    if (zoomLevel == map.getMaxZoomLevel()) {
        map.animateCamera(CameraUpdateFactory.newLatLngZoom(new LatLng(lat, lng), 7));
        mapFragmentContainer.animate().alpha(1f);
        return;
    }
    map.moveCamera(CameraUpdateFactory.newLatLngZoom(new LatLng(lat, lng), zoomLevel));

    final float nextZoomLevel = zoomLevel + 1;
    map.setOnMapLoadedCallback(new GoogleMap.OnMapLoadedCallback() {
        @Override
        public void onMapLoaded() {
            preloadAllZoomLevels(nextZoomLevel);
        }
    });
}