why does excludeFromRecents remove all activities?

Question

My app has two entry points (MainActivity and FromNotificationActivity).

I want MainActivity to appear in recent tasks, but not FromNotificationActivity)

With nothing declared in the manifest, if I do...

• MainActivity
• Back
• FromNotificationActivity
• Back

... I find FromNotificationActivity listed in recent tasks

If I add android:excludeFromRecents="true" to FromNotificationActivity in the manifest and repeat the same sequence, I find nothing in the recent lists.

What incantations must I invoke such that after the above sequence of steps, I get MainActivity in the recent list.

Answer 1

By default, all the activities of an application have the same affinity. Activities with same affinity conceptually belong to the same task. Hence in this case both MainActivity and FromNotificationActivity belong to the same task. android:excludeFromRecents ensures the task is not listed in the recent apps. That is the reason, when android:excludeFromRecents is set to true for FromNotificationActivity, MainActivity disappers from history.

Solution: Use android:taskAffinity to specify different tasks for both the activities. Use android:excludeFromRecents for FromNotificationActivity if that task should not be shown in history at all.

<activity        android:name="com.example.MainActivity"     android:label="@string/app_name"     android:taskAffinity=".MainActivity" >         <intent-filter>             <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />             <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />         </intent-filter> </activity>   <activity android:name="com.example.FromNotificationActivity"     android:label="@string/notification_name"     android:taskAffinity=".NotificationActivity"     android:excludeFromRecents="true">         <intent-filter>             <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />             <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />         </intent-filter> </activity>