On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 9:03 AM, westmeadboy <westmead...@yahoo.co.uk>wrote:
> If an app needs to download some critical data (without the data it > cannot function) of several MB, what is the best practice? > How much is "several" MB? While you should definitely try to keep the app size down, a few megs isn't going to be a deal breaker. The Google Maps app is 6MB for example. Of course, you have to question whether your app is so awesome people are going to sacrifice that much space for it. When my phone gets low on space, the biggest ones I don't use that often are the first to go. Like Yahel said, you should have *some* default data so your app can do *something* right off the bat. It's unlikely you'll need all of the several MB of data immediately, so you could also do downloading of stuff on-demand as it's required. If it exists locally, use it, if not, try to download it and put some default content in it's place until it's ready. > Is a service absolutely essential for this? > If you decide that you must load everything up front before you can do anything, then yeah, probably use a Service - ideally with an ongoing notification letting the user know the progress and an option to cancel if they wish. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- TreKing - Chicago transit tracking app for Android-powered devices http://sites.google.com/site/rezmobileapps/treking -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Android Developers" group. To post to this group, send email to android-developers@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to android-developers+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/android-developers?hl=en
