I am attempting to get the address out of the callback function. I have been reading the documentation for CallBacks and some posts but still don't get why this is not working, as at the moment of returning the 'address' variable the callback has already finished.
private fun getAddressForCoordinates(geoCoordinates: GeoCoordinates):String {
address = "unchanged"
val maxItems = 1
val reverseGeocodingOptions = SearchOptions(LanguageCode.EN_GB, maxItems)
searchEngine.search(geoCoordinates, reverseGeocodingOptions, addressSearchCallback)
return address
}
private val addressSearchCallback =
SearchCallback { searchError, list ->
if (searchError != null) {
//showDialog("Reverse geocoding", "Error: $searchError")
Toast.makeText(context, "Error: $searchError", Toast.LENGTH_LONG).show()
return#SearchCallback
}
Toast.makeText(
context,
"Reverse geocoded address:" + list!![0].address.addressText,
Toast.LENGTH_LONG
).show()
address = list[0].address.addressText
}
From your code and comment I assume you are not familiar with the concept of asynchronous execution. That concept was well described here. I'll quote the main point:
When you execute something synchronously, you wait for it to finish
before moving on to another task. When you execute something
asynchronously, you can move on to another task before it finishes.
The fact that search() requires providing a callback and it doesn't simply return search results, is a good indication that it is most probably asynchronous. Invoking it is like saying: "Search for the data in the background and let me know when you have it. This is my email address - please send me my results there". Where email address is your callback. Invoking search() method does not block execution of your code, it does not wait for results - it only schedules searching and returns almost immediately.
Asynchronous processing is usually more tricky than a regular, synchronous code, but in many cases it is more efficient. In your case you can either try to "convert" original async API of the library to sync API that your code expects - but this is not recommended approach. Or you can redesign your code, so it will work asynchronously. For example, instead of doing this:
fun yourMethodThatNeedsAddress() {
val address = getAddressForCoordinates()
doSomethingWithAddress(address)
}
You need to do this:
fun yourMethodThatNeedsAddress() {
scheduleGetAddressForCoordinates() // renamed getAddressForCoordinates()
}
fun addressSearchCallback() {
...
doSomethingWithAddress(address)
}
So, whatever you planned to do with the acquired address, you can't do this straight after you started searching. You need to wait for a callback and then continue with processing of your address from there.
The SearchEngine from the 4.x HERE SDK needs an online connection as it is fetching results from a remote backend. This may take a few milliseconds, depending on your network connection. So, whenever you perform a search request, you need to wait until the callback is called:
searchEngine.search(geoCoordinates, reverseGeocodingOptions, addressSearchCallback)
When you call this, you pass addressSearchCallback as parameter. The implementation for addressSearchCallback can look like in your example. It will be called whenever the operation has finished. If the device is offline, then an error will be shown.
Note that the search() method is not returning any results immediately. These are passed to the callback, which happens asynchronously on a background thread. Thus, your application can continue to work without blocking any UI.
Once results are retrieved, the callback will be executed by the HERE SDK on the main thread.
So, if your code needs to do something with the address result, you have to do it inside the onSearchCompleted() method defined by the SearchCallback. If you write it in plain Java without lambda notation, it is more visible: You create a new SearchCallback object and pass it as parameter to the SearchEngine. The SearchEngine stores the object and executes the object's onSearchCompleted() whenever it thinks it's the right time:
private SearchCallback addressSearchCallback = new SearchCallback() {
#Override
public void onSearchCompleted(#Nullable SearchError searchError, #Nullable List<Place> list) {
if (searchError != null) {
showDialog("Reverse geocoding", "Error: " + searchError.toString());
return;
}
// If error is null, list is guaranteed to be not empty.
showDialog("Reverse geocoded address:", list.get(0).getAddress().addressText);
// Here is the place to do something more useful with the Address object ...!
}
};
I took this from this GitHub code snippet. Note that there is also an OfflineSearchEngine, that works without an internet connection, but for some reason it follows the same pattern and executes the task asynchronously.
private void getAddressForCoordinates(GeoCoordinates geoCoordinates) {
int maxItems = 1;
SearchOptions reverseGeocodingOptions = new SearchOptions(LanguageCode.EN_GB, maxItems);
searchEngine.search(geoCoordinates, reverseGeocodingOptions, new SearchCallback() {
#Override
public void onSearchCompleted(#Nullable SearchError searchError, #Nullable List<Place> list) {
if (searchError != null) {
showDialog("Reverse geocoding", "Error: " + searchError.toString());
return;
}
// If error is null, list is guaranteed to be not empty.
showDialog("Reverse geocoded address:", list.get(0).getAddress().addressText);
}
});
}
SearchEngine, a SearchOptions instance needs to be provided to set the desired LanguageCode. It determines the language of the resulting address. Then we can make a call to the engine's search()-method to search online for the address of the passed coordinates. In case of errors, such as when the device is offline, SearchError holds the error cause.
The reverse geocoding response contains either an error or a result: SearchError and the result list can never be null at the same time - or non-null at the same time.
The Address object contained inside each Place instance is a data class that contains multiple String fields describing the address of the raw location, such as country, city, street name, and many more. Consult the API Reference for more details. If you are only interested in receiving a readable address representation, you can access addressText, as shown in the above example. This is a String containing the most relevant address details, including the place's title.
Please refer to following link for detailed documentation on search() function and parameters associated with it.
https://developer.here.com/documentation/android-sdk-explore/4.4.0.2/dev_guide/topics/search.html
Related
I have managed to read data from my firebase database but cant seem to re-use the String which has been read.
My successful read is as per below. When i check the logcat for the Log.d("Brand") it actually shows the String as expected.
brandchosenRef=FirebaseDatabase.getInstance().reference
val brandsRef = brandchosenRef.child("CarList2").orderByChild("Car").equalTo(searchable_spinner_brand.selectedItem.toString())
val valueEventListener = object : ValueEventListener {
override fun onDataChange(dataSnapshot: DataSnapshot) {
for(ds in dataSnapshot.children){
Log.d("spinner brand",searchable_spinner_brand.selectedItem.toString())
val Brand = ds.child("Brand").getValue(String::class.java)
val brandselected= Brand.toString()
Log.d("Brand","$brandselected")
selectedbrand== brandselected
Log.d("selected brand",selectedbrand)
}
}
override fun onCancelled(databaseError: DatabaseError) {
Log.d("Branderror","error on brand")
}
}
brandsRef.addListenerForSingleValueEvent(valueEventListener)
What i am trying to do is write "selectedbrand" into a separate node using the following:
val carselected = searchable_spinner_brand.selectedItem.toString()
val dealref = FirebaseDatabase.getInstance().getReference("Deal_Summary2")
val dealsummayId = dealref.push().key
val summaryArray = DealSummaryArray(dealsummayId.toString(),"manual input for testing","brand","Deal_ID",carselected,extrastext.text.toString(),otherinfo.text.toString(),Gauteng,WC,KZN,"Open")
dealref.child(dealsummayId.toString()).setValue(summaryArray).addOnCompleteListener{
}
Note, in the above i was inputting "manual input for testing" to check that my write to Firebase was working and it works as expected. if i replace that with selectedbrand, then i get the below error.
kotlin.UninitializedPropertyAccessException: lateinit property selectedbrand has not been initialized
the summary array indicated above is defined in a separate class as follows. and as seen "manual input for testing is declared as String.
class DealSummaryArray(val id:String,val brand:String,val Buyer_ID:String,val Deal_ID:String,val Car:String,val extras:String,val other_info:String,val Gauteng:String,val Western_Cape:String,val KZN:String,val Status:String) {
constructor():this("","","","","","","","","","",""){
}
}
My question simply put, it why can i not re-use the value i read from the database? even if i was not trying to re-write it to a new node i cannot seem to utilize the value outside of the firebase query.
I seem to get this problem everywhere in my activities and have to find strange work around's like write to a textview and then reference the textview. please assist.
Data is loaded from Firebase asynchronously, as it may take some time before you get a response from the server. To prevent blocking the application (which would be a bad experience for your users), your main code continues to run while the data is being loaded. And then when the data is available, Firebase calls your onDataChange method.
What this means in practice is that any code that needs the data from the database, needs to be inside the onDataChange method or be called from there. So any code that requires selectedbrand needs to be inside onDataChange or called from there (typically through a callback interface).
Also see:
How to check a certain data already exists in firestore or not, which contains example code including of the callback interface, in Java.
getContactsFromFirebase() method return an empty list, which contains a similar example for the Firebase Realtime Database.
Setting Singleton property value in Firebase Listener, which shows a way to make the code behave more synchronous, and explains shows that this may not work on various Android versions.
I have an disk storage that returns an Object? from disk (Could be already saved or not) and an BehaviourSubject (This data comes from other class call, check code below):
Code is:
private val subject: Subject<Optional<Element>> = BehaviorSubject.create()
fun getElements(): Observable<List<Element>> =
Observable.concat(Observable.just(storage.getElement()), subject)
.filter({ it.isPresent })
.take(1)
.flatMapSingle {
Observable.just(it.get())
.flatMapIterable { it.categories }
.toList()
}
fun updateSubject(response: Response) {
storage.save(response.element) //Save element in storage
subject.onNext(response.element.toOptional())
}
My problem is, in other class I do
getElements().subscribe(onElements(), onError());
First time, when storage has null it does nothing, even I've got a breakpoint in subject.onNext(response.element.toOptional()), hoping that onNext will trigger a stream for getElements, but nothing happens.
Second time, when I've already saved in storage the received element (So, storage.getElement() returns something) it works fine.
My functional description is:
Get element from both cache and subject, take first that arrives, and return it (First time it will be who the comes subject one), next time, i'm hoping that first one will be the storage one.
I am assuming that storage is some sort of persistence object so it so storage.getElement() might return a valid object at the time you create the subject?
If that is the case, then I think you should check to see if you have a stored object before you create the subject, if so use BehaviorSubject.createDefalut(storedObject) if it does exist or BehaviorSubject.create() if not.
Then inside your getElements() function I think you can just use subject.filter() ....
Your null optional elements are being filtered out by your .filter { it.isPresent } call so nothing gets emitted downstream.
The problem: I'm crashing when I want to render my incoming data which was retrieved asynchronously.
The app starts and displays some dialog boxes using XAML. Once the user fills in their data and clicks the login button, the XAML class has in instance of a worker class that does the HTTP stuff for me (asynchronously using IXMLHTTPRequest2). When the app has successfully logged in to the web server, my .then() block fires and I make a callback to my main xaml class to do some rendering of the assets.
I am always getting crashes in the delegate though (the main XAML class), which leads me to believe that I cannot use this approach (pure virtual class and callbacks) to update my UI. I think I am inadvertently trying to do something illegal from an incorrect thread which is a byproduct of the async calls.
Is there a better or different way that I should be notifying the main XAML class that it is time for it to update it's UI? I am coming from an iOS world where I could use NotificationCenter.
Now, I saw that Microsoft has it's own Delegate type of thing here: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/apps/hh755798.aspx
Do you think that if I used this approach instead of my own callbacks that it would no longer crash?
Let me know if you need more clarification or what not.
Here is the jist of the code:
public interface class ISmileServiceEvents
{
public: // required methods
virtual void UpdateUI(bool isValid) abstract;
};
// In main XAML.cpp which inherits from an ISmileServiceEvents
void buttonClick(...){
_myUser->LoginAndGetAssets(txtEmail->Text, txtPass->Password);
}
void UpdateUI(String^ data) // implements ISmileServiceEvents
{
// This is where I would render my assets if I could.
// Cannot legally do much here. Always crashes.
// Follow the rest of the code to get here.
}
// In MyUser.cpp
void LoginAndGetAssets(String^ email, String^ password){
Uri^ uri = ref new URI(MY_SERVER + "login.json");
String^ inJSON = "some json input data here"; // serialized email and password with other data
// make the HTTP request to login, then notify XAML that it has data to render.
_myService->HTTPPostAsync(uri, json).then([](String^ outputJson){
String^ assets = MyParser::Parse(outputJSON);
// The Login has returned and we have our json output data
if(_delegate)
{
_delegate->UpdateUI(assets);
}
});
}
// In MyService.cpp
task<String^> MyService::HTTPPostAsync(Uri^ uri, String^ json)
{
return _httpRequest.PostAsync(uri,
json->Data(),
_cancellationTokenSource.get_token()).then([this](task<std::wstring> response)
{
try
{
if(_httpRequest.GetStatusCode() != 200) SM_LOG_WARNING("Status code=", _httpRequest.GetStatusCode());
String^ j = ref new String(response.get().c_str());
return j;
}
catch (Exception^ ex) .......;
return ref new String(L"");
}, task_continuation_context::use_current());
}
Edit: BTW, the error I get when I go to update the UI is:
"An invalid parameter was passed to a function that considers invalid parameters fatal."
In this case I am just trying to execute in my callback is
txtBox->Text = data;
It appears you are updating the UI thread from the wrong context. You can use task_continuation_context::use_arbitrary() to allow you to update the UI. See the "Controlling the Execution Thread" example in this document (the discussion of marshaling is at the bottom).
So, it turns out that when you have a continuation, if you don't specify a context after the lambda function, that it defaults to use_arbitrary(). This is in contradiction to what I learned in an MS video.
However by adding use_currrent() to all of the .then blocks that have anything to do with the GUI, my error goes away and everything is able to render properly.
My GUI calls a service which generates some tasks and then calls to an HTTP class that does asynchronous stuff too. Way back in the HTTP classes I use use_arbitrary() so that it can run on secondary threads. This works fine. Just be sure to use use_current() on anything that has to do with the GUI.
Now that you have my answer, if you look at the original code you will see that it already contains use_current(). This is true, but I left out a wrapping function for simplicity of the example. That is where I needed to add use_current().
(Note: this is an over-simplified scenario to demonstrate my coding issue.)
I have the following class interface:
public class CustomerService
{
Task<IEnumerable<Customer>> FindCustomersInArea(String areaName);
Task<Customer> GetCustomerByName(String name);
:
}
This is the client-side of a RESTful API which loads a list of Customer objects from the server then exposes methods that allows client code to consume and work against that list.
Both of these methods work against the internal list of Customers retrieved from the server as follows:
private Task<IEnumerable<Customer>> LoadCustomersAsync()
{
var tcs = new TaskCompletionSource<IEnumerable<Customer>>();
try
{
// GetAsync returns Task<HttpResponseMessage>
Client.GetAsync(uri).ContinueWith(task =>
{
if (task.IsCanceled)
{
tcs.SetCanceled();
}
else if (task.IsFaulted)
{
tcs.SetException(task.Exception);
}
else
{
// Convert HttpResponseMessage to desired return type
var response = task.Result;
var list = response.Content.ReadAs<IEnumerable<Customer>>();
tcs.SetResult(list);
}
});
}
catch (Exception ex)
{
tcs.SetException(ex);
}
}
The Client class is a custom version of the HttpClient class from the WCF Web API (now ASP.NET Web API) because I am working in Silverlight and they don't have an SL version of their client assemblies.
After all that background, here's my problem:
All of the methods in the CustomerService class use the list returned by the asynchronous LoadCustomersAsync method; therefore, any calls to these methods should wait (asynchronously) until the LoadCustomers method has returned and the appopriate logic executed on the returned list.
I also only want one call made from the client (in LoadCustomers) at a time. So, I need all of the calls to the public methods to wait on the same internal task.
To review, here's what I need to figure out how to accomplish:
Any call to FindCustomersInArea and GetCustomerByName should return a Task that waits for the LoadCustomersAsync method to complete. If LoadCustomersAsync has already returned (and the cached list still valid), then the method may continue immediately.
After LoadCustomersAsync returns, each method has additional logic required to convert the list into the desired return value for the method.
There must only ever be one active call to LoadCustomersAsync (of the GetAsync method within).
If the cached list expires, then subsequent calls will trigger a reload (via LoadCustomersAsync).
Let me know if you need further clarification, but I'm hoping this is a common enough use case that someone can help me work out the logic to get the client working as desired.
Disclaimer: I'm going to assume you're using a singleton instance of your HttpClient subclass. If that's not the case we need only modify slightly what I'm about to tell you.
Yes, this is totally doable. The mechanism we're going to rely on for subsequent calls to LoadCustomersAsync is that if you attach a continuation to a Task, even if that Task completed eons ago, you're continuation will be signaled "immediately" with the task's final state.
Instead of creating/returning a new TaskCompletionSource<T> (TCS) every time from the LoadCustomerAsync method, you would instead have a field on the class that represents the TCS. This will allow your instance to remember the TCS that last represented the call that represented a cache-miss. This TCS's state will be signaled exactly the same as your existing code. You'll add the knowledge of whether or not the data has expired as another field which, combined with whether the TCS is currently null or not, will be the trigger for whether or not you actually go out and load the data again.
Ok, enough talk, it'll probably make a lot more sense if you see it.
The Code
public class CustomerService
{
// Your cache timeout (using 15mins as example, can load from config or wherever)
private static readonly TimeSpan CustomersCacheTimeout = new TimeSpan(0, 15, 0);
// A lock object used to provide thread safety
private object loadCustomersLock = new object();
private TaskCompletionSource<IEnumerable<Customer>> loadCustomersTaskCompletionSource;
private DateTime loadCustomersLastCacheTime = DateTime.MinValue;
private Task<IEnumerable<Customer>> LoadCustomersAsync()
{
lock(this.loadCustomersLock)
{
bool needToLoadCustomers = this.loadCustomersTaskCompletionSource == null
||
(this.loadCustomersTaskCompletionSource.Task.IsFaulted || this.loadCustomersTaskCompletionSource.Task.IsCanceled)
||
DateTime.Now - this.loadCustomersLastCacheTime.Value > CustomersService.CustomersCacheTimeout;
if(needToLoadCustomers)
{
this.loadCustomersTaskCompletionSource = new TaskCompletionSource<IEnumerable<Customer>>();
try
{
// GetAsync returns Task<HttpResponseMessage>
Client.GetAsync(uri).ContinueWith(antecedent =>
{
if(antecedent.IsCanceled)
{
this.loadCustomersTaskCompletionSource.SetCanceled();
}
else if(antecedent.IsFaulted)
{
this.loadCustomersTaskCompletionSource.SetException(antecedent.Exception);
}
else
{
// Convert HttpResponseMessage to desired return type
var response = antecedent.Result;
var list = response.Content.ReadAs<IEnumerable<Customer>>();
this.loadCustomersTaskCompletionSource.SetResult(list);
// Record the last cache time
this.loadCustomersLastCacheTime = DateTime.Now;
}
});
}
catch(Exception ex)
{
this.loadCustomersTaskCompletionSource.SetException(ex);
}
}
}
}
return this.loadCustomersTaskCompletionSource.Task;
}
Scenarios where the customers aren't loaded:
If it's the first call, the TCS will be null so the TCS will be created and customers fetched.
If the previous call faulted or was canceled, a new TCS will be created and the customers fetched.
If the cache timeout has expired, a new TCS will be created and the customers fetched.
Scenarios where the customers are loading/loaded:
If the customers are in the process of loading, the existing TCS's Task will be returned and any continuations added to the task using ContinueWith will be executed once the TCS has been signaled.
If the customers are already loaded, the existing TCS's Task will be returned and any continuations added to the task using ContinueWith will be executed as soon as the scheduler sees fit.
NOTE: I used a coarse grained locking approach here and you could theoretically improve performance with a reader/writer implementation, but it would probably be a micro-optimization in your case.
I think you should change the way you call Client.GetAsync(uri). Do it roughly like this:
Lazy<Task> getAsyncLazy = new Lazy<Task>(() => Client.GetAsync(uri));
And in your LoadCustomersAsync method you write:
getAsyncLazy.Value.ContinueWith(task => ...
This will ensure that GetAsync only gets called once and that everyone interested in its result will receive the same task.
In classic ASP.NET I’d persist data extracted from a web service in base class property as follows:
private string m_stringData;
public string _stringData
{ get {
if (m_stringData==null)
{
//fetch data from my web service
m_stringData = ws.FetchData()
}
return m_stringData;
}
}
This way I could simply make reference to _stringData and know that I’d always get the data I was after (maybe sometimes I’d use Session state as a store instead of a private member variable).
In Silverlight with a WCF I might choose to use Isolated Storage as my persistance mechanism, but the service call can't be done like this, because a WCF service has to be called asynchronously.
How can I both invoke the service call and retrieve the response in one method?
Thanks,
Mark
In your method, invoke the service call asynchronously and register a callback that sets a flag. After you have invoked the method, enter a busy/wait loop checking the flag periodically until the flag is set indicating that the data has been returned. The callback should set the backing field for your method and you should be able to return it as soon as you detect the flag has been set indicating success. You'll also need to be concerned about failure. If it's possible to get multiple calls to your method from different threads, you'll also need to use some locking to make your code thread-safe.
EDIT
Actually, the busy/wait loop is probably not the way to go if the web service supports BeginGetData/EndGetData semantics. I had a look at some of my code where I do something similar and I use WaitOne to simply wait on the async result and then retrieve it. If your web service doesn't support this then throw a Thread.Sleep -- say for 50-100ms -- in your wait loop to give time for other processes to execute.
Example from my code:
IAsyncResult asyncResult = null;
try
{
asyncResult = _webService.BeginGetData( searchCriteria, null, null );
if (asyncResult.AsyncWaitHandle.WaitOne( _timeOut, false ))
{
result = _webService.EndGetData( asyncResult );
}
}
catch (WebException e)
{
...log the error, clean up...
}
Thanks for your help tvanfosson. I followed your code and have also found a pseudo similar solution that meets my needs exactly using a lambda expression:
private string m_stringData;
public string _stringData{
get
{
//if we don't have a list of departments, fetch from WCF
if (m_stringData == null)
{
StringServiceClient client = new StringServiceClient();
client.GetStringCompleted +=
(sender, e) =>
{
m_stringData = e.Result;
};
client.GetStringAsync();
}
return m_stringData;
}
}
EDIT
Oops... actually this doesn't work either :-(
I ended up making the calls Asynchronously and altering my programming logic to use MVVM pattern and more binding.