Run Javascript Webapp in Background of native App

Question

i'm working on an android app, which displays a webapp/website in its main activitiy like this:

@Override
protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
    super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
    setContentView(R.layout.activity_main);

      WebView myWebView = (WebView) findViewById(R.id.webview);
      WebSettings webSettings = myWebView.getSettings();
      webSettings.setJavaScriptEnabled(true);
      myWebView.setWebViewClient(new WebViewClient());
      myWebView.loadUrl("http://localhost");    
}

My webApp/Website, i'd like to open, uses some javascript code, which has to be executed a long time.

But now here's the problem: I want to run this javascript also when the screen turns off after some seconds or anything else happens. Ideally, I want to open my Android App, which opens my webapp and execute the js-code, whether my phone is locked, display turned off etc..

First I thought about a Service, but I don't know if this makes sense while displaying a website.

I hope someone could help me or give me a hint.

Regards

Answer 1

Depending on your specific use-case, it might be possible to use Javascript interpreter such as Mozilla Rhino . It's not a browser, just a headless runtime, so it can be run from within a Service (in fact, I'm using it in one of my projects in this exact way).

The problem here would be to pass a job from your WebView to Rhino - those are two separate runtimes. Both Rhino and WebView allow you to bind Java to Javascript, so it could be accomplished, but it won't be straigthforward.