长时间运行android后台服务

Question

I have an app that launches another app. When my app goes into the background I want it to execute a method every 1 minute while in the background. The user might be in the other app for hours and I need this code to execute as long as possible.

What is the best way to do this in Android?

The Android docs say:

" If you need to keep threads running for long periods of time, it is highly recommended you use the various APIs provided by the java.util.concurrent pacakge such as Executor, ThreadPoolExecutor and FutureTask"

Those utilities are a little over my head. I also need help with a background timer.

Basically I just want this:

(while my app is in background) do:
MyMethod()
Wait(1 minute)

Answer 1

You need to register to the alarmmanager service and invoke the your receiver every 1 minute. This is a good example to start with Use alarmmanager to schedule events.

Answer 2

Try using the ScheduledExecutorService see http://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/util/concurrent/ScheduledExecutorService.html ;

It has a method called scheduleWithFixedDelay(Runnable command, long initialDelay, long delay, TimeUnit unit)

you could do

Executors.newScheduledThreadPool(1).scheduleWithFixedDelay(new Runnable() {
public void run() {
wait(1);
}),0,1,TimeUnit.SECONDS);