IllegalArgumentException from Activity#startActivity(Intent)

Question

The Android#startActivity(Intent) is specified to throw android.content.ActivityNotFoundException if there was no Activity found to run the given Intent.

I therefore have code like

try {
    // Try to start activity provided by external app:
    startActivity(intent);
} catch (ActivityNotFoundException e) {
    // [...] Inform user about external app needed
    // for this functionality to work.
}

which catches ActivityNotFoundException to handle the case where the external app is not installed.

However, from the Crashes & ANRs section of the Google Play Developer Console I'm starting to get crashes as IllegalArgumentException: Unknown component com.example.package/com.example.package.Activity . Should code invoking startActivity() be ready to handle that exception as well? Is this a framework bug (or documentation error)?

Answer 1

This exception generally arises when you haven't declared it in your manifest file. So, try doing it Somewhere inside your application tag do this

 <activity
            android:name="Your_Activity_Name"
            android:theme="Whatever your theme is"
          </activity>

If its any other issue please let me know.

Answer 2

You can use this code to check it. This is the better approach then handling exception

List<ResolveInfo> list = getPackageManager().queryIntentActivities(intent, 
            PackageManager.MATCH_DEFAULT_ONLY);

if (list.size() > 0)
{
 // start your activity
}