What happens when I start an alarm twice?

Question

I'm Jumping trough hoops (well, it's not that complicated ofcourse) to avoid starting an alarm twice. The basic code goes like this:

AlarmManager mgr=(AlarmManager)getSystemService(Context.ALARM_SERVICE);
Intent i=new Intent(this, MyService.class);
PendingIntent pi=PendingIntent.getService(this, 0, i, 0);
mgr.setInexactRepeating(AlarmManager.ELAPSED_REALTIME_WAKEUP, SystemClock.elapsedRealtime(), AlarmManager.INTERVAL_FIFTEEN_MINUTES, pi);

Would it matter if I would actually run this code everytime my app starts? I'm not seeing any ill effects when calling this about 10 times as an overkill-experiment, but I can't find any reference as to if this is coincidence or expected behavior.

If it is not especially expected, it feels 'wrong'. It might get me in to trouble later if the behavior of the AlarmManager changes.

Answer 1

Since the cancel method for AlarmManager is fine with a 'similar' Intent to cancel the alarm, we can say that the platform recognizes the intent given the class name. Hence calling this repeatedly shouldn't be a problem since the platform will know that for such a pending intent an alarm already exists.

Here is a post that talks something similar.