Android Actionbar items as three dots

Question

I have a menu for my main activity (res/menu/main_menu.xml) and I want only one item on the Actionbar and the rest shall be hidden under three dots menu.

The problem is, I never see the three dots item on my actionbar. Why I can't see three dots item? How to force items to be hidden under it?

Note: I use minSdkVersion="14" and I test in AVD.

Guinevere

Answer 1

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<menu xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android" 
    xmlns:app="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res-auto">

    <item android:id="@+id/menu_item_share"
        android:title="@string/share"
        android:icon="@android:drawable/ic_menu_share"
        app:showAsAction="ifRoom"
        android:actionProviderClass="android.widget.ShareActionProvider" />

    <item
        android:id="@+id/empty"
        android:title="@string/options"
        android:orderInCategory="101"
        app:showAsAction="always"
        android:icon="@drawable/baseline_more_vert_black">

        <menu>

            <item android:id="@+id/action_settings"
                android:icon="@android:drawable/ic_menu_preferences"
                app:showAsAction="ifRoom"
                android:title="@string/settings" />

            <item android:id="@+id/action_help"
                android:icon="@android:drawable/ic_menu_help"
                app:showAsAction="ifRoom"
                android:title="@string/help" />

        </menu>

    </item>

</menu>

You will need to add the baseline_more_vert_black icons to your res/drawable... folders once you've downloaded them from here.

Nakesha

See this answer for how/where to get the actual overflow icons: https://mcmap.net/q/538096/-how-do-i-get-a-copy-of-the-android-overflow-menu-icon-closed – Nakesha

Answer 2

try this;

menu.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<menu xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    xmlns:app="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res-auto">
    <item
        android:id="@+id/menu_new_content_facebook"
        android:orderInCategory="100"
        android:title="@string/str_share_facebook"
        app:showAsAction="never" />

    <item
        android:id="@+id/menu_new_content_twitter"
        android:orderInCategory="200"
        android:title="@string/str_share_twitter"
        app:showAsAction="never" />
</menu>

MainActivity.java

 @Override
public boolean onCreateOptionsMenu(Menu menu) {
    getMenuInflater().inflate(R.menu.menu, menu);
    return true;
}

@Override
public boolean onOptionsItemSelected(MenuItem item) {
    int id = item.getItemId();
    if(id == R.id.menu_new_content_twitter){
        // do something
    }
    return super.onOptionsItemSelected(item);
}

Dobby

Answer 3

this solution provided by ban-geoengineering is one very intresting... 3 dot icon sometimes doesn't display if you use android:showAsAction namespace android: instead custom namespace like:

<menu xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
 xmlns:app="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res-auto">
<item
    android:id="@+id/taskNotificationsBtn"
    app:showAsAction="always"
    android:icon="@drawable/tasks"/>

But solution provided by ban-geoengineering help me to solve problem with reversing ActionBar items direction to match this to Arabic layout. I have used ActionBarRTLizer library and standard approach with android os 3dots causes some bug when menu item icons cover each other sometimes (very frustratign situation), but this custom solution

<item
    android:id="@+id/empty"
    android:title="@string/options"
    android:orderInCategory="101"
    android:showAsAction="always"
    android:icon="@drawable/ic_action_overflow">

    <menu>

        <item android:id="@+id/action_settings"
            android:icon="@android:drawable/ic_menu_preferences"
            android:showAsAction="ifRoom"
            android:title="@string/settings" />

        <item android:id="@+id/action_help"
            android:icon="@android:drawable/ic_menu_help"
            android:showAsAction="ifRoom"
            android:title="@string/help" />

    </menu>

</item>

solved the problem and RTL works perfectly well! :)

This may also be helpful if you want to handle hardware menu buttons:

@Override
public boolean onKeyUp(int keyCode, KeyEvent event) {
   if (keyCode == KeyEvent.KEYCODE_MENU) {
     // do stuff
     return true;
   } else {
     return super.onKeyUp(keyCode, event);
   }
}

and add here: mMenuReference.performIdentifierAction(R.id.menu_0, 1);

in order to replace Sub Menu displayed as overflow menu depending for example on current Activity you could use this solution:

 public boolean onCreateOptionsMenu(Menu menu) {
      // Inflate your main_menu into the menu
      getMenuInflater().inflate(R.menu.main_menu, menu);

      // Find the menuItem to add your SubMenu
      MenuItem myMenuItem = menu.findItem(R.id.my_menu_item);

      // Inflating the sub_menu menu this way, will add its menu items 
      // to the empty SubMenu you created in the xml
      getMenuInflater().inflate(R.menu.sub_menu, myMenuItem.getSubMenu());

   }

Hilliary

Answer 4

Why I can't see three dots item?

Your emulator is emulating a device that has a MENU button. If there is a MENU button on the device, the MENU button brings up the overflow.

Postal

Can I remove menu button from my AVD to see how it looks like in a device without menu button? – Guinevere

@MustafaChelik: Yes, though it may be awkward. If you are using Eclipse, or can run the android avd command to bring up the original AVD Manager, in the Device Definitions tab, you would change the "Buttons" drop-down to "Software". In the Android Studio AVD Manager, the equivalent is the "Has Hardware Buttons (Back/Home/Menu)" checkbox in the device definition. Or, in the config.ini file for the AVD definition (e.g., ~/.android/avd/.../config.ini), the hw.mainKeys would need to be no to emulate a device without a MENU key. – Postal

Answer 5

The solution can be found here https://mcmap.net/q/538097/-android-action-bar-three-dots-not-displayed, which worked perfect for me. No need to work with xml staff, it is done only programatically.

private void getOverflowMenu() {

         try {
            ViewConfiguration config = ViewConfiguration.get(this);
            Field menuKeyField = ViewConfiguration.class.getDeclaredField("sHasPermanentMenuKey");
            if(menuKeyField != null) {
                menuKeyField.setAccessible(true);
                menuKeyField.setBoolean(config, false);
            }
        } catch (Exception e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
        }
    }

Peh